The encyclopedia · Engineering & Operations · Technical decision · 2025
One solenoid in the battery pack could silently cut a Tesla's drive power
A defective contactor in the high-voltage path could cause a sudden loss of drive power, prompting a recall of 12,963 Model 3 and Model Y vehicles.
Tesla · 2025-10-22
What happened
In October 2025 Tesla recalled 12,963 electric vehicles — 5,038 Model 3s and 7,925 Model Ys — after finding a defect in the battery pack's main contactor. The part, a solenoid made by InTiCa, could fail and interrupt high-voltage power to the drive system.
The failure can cause a sudden loss of drive power while driving, raising the risk of a crash. Tesla said it was aware of 36 warranty claims and 26 field reports as of 7 October, but no collisions or injuries.
The fix replaces the contactor free of charge. The recall covers select 2025 Model 3 and 2026 Model Y vehicles.
Why it happened
- Tesla used a single contactor component whose solenoid could fail electrically, and the design offered no graceful degradation — a failed contactor means the car simply loses drive power.
- The defect surfaced only through field reports and warranty claims after the vehicles were on the road, because the failure signature was intermittent and hard to reproduce in advance.
- A sudden loss of drive power in traffic is a safety-relevant failure, which is why the action was handled as a recall rather than a routine service campaign.
The lesson
A single weak component in the high-voltage path can take drive power with no warning. Test the contactor for the duty it will see; treat a sudden loss of drive power as a safety defect.
Aftermath
Tesla replaced the faulty contactors in affected vehicles at no cost. The recall was small in scale and resolved without reported collisions or injuries.
Sources
- NHTSA Recall Report — 25V690 (Tesla battery connector)
- USA Today — Tesla recalls vehicles over battery failure
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