2022 Tesla Model S Steering Problems

The yoke steering is not intuitive and makes it really hard to instinctively press the horn or use the directionals, without taking your eyes off the road. This presents a serious safety hazard especially in the case of an emergency, where milliseconds count to avert an accident. At a minimum the horn button should be placed on the center of the steering or be replaced with a traditional wheel. In fact, if the car were to spin out of control, the rectangular shape of the yoke would likely prevent me from regaining control of the car. When I purchased the car in 2022 a regular steering wheel was not option. Tesla is now allowing retro fits but at a significant cost to the owner. There have been several instances in the two years where i pressed the center of the yoke with no effect, which could have led to an accident. I am surprised this kind of serious hazard is still permitted to exist and I kindly ask for your immediate attention.

The horn is in a difficult place to access compared to ALL other vehicles in the USA making it a safety concern and hazard will driving should an emergency arise and you can’t get to the horn quickly. This has happened to me driving the 2022 Tesla Model S and I could not get to the horn swerving violently to avoid a collision.

RECALL ISSUE FOR MY VEHICLE. HAVE BEEN HAVING ISSUES WITH THE AUTO STEER/AUTO PILOT THAT COMES IN THE CAR. THE AUTO STEER AUTOMATICALLY GOES OFF AND WHENEVER YOU MAKE A TURN, THERE'S A WEIRD SOUND.

The car doesn’t have a conventional horn. Instead the horn is activated via a small button on the steering wheel. I don’t mean to be a pain, but I feel as though the horn is meant for emergency situations mostly. I’ve been in multiple situations now where someone has almost hit me and I tried to swerve and find the horn but given the fact I have to keep my eyes on the person swerving into me, was unable to find it in time. One of these times, the person continued to not see me and I nearly was pinned between the car and the wall of the freeway. Due to not being able to activate the horn, I had to swerve and slam on my brakes instead almost being rear ended by the car behind me. Ideally I’d love if Tesla has to recall this steering wheel for one with a mechanical horn. They have just started making the wheels with a mechanical horn again and it would be great if they received a recall so that us without them, who are put at risk, can receive them by visiting the service center and having the wheels swapped. Thank you again for the time in reading this. I apologize for the long story. I only ask because it’s unsafe for both myself and those around me and now there’s a remedy

The Tesla was driving normally as I was driving through the canyons of Utah at 65 MPH. the car gave an error about lane assist malfunction and immediately followed by steering assist malfunction. The car was very hard to turn and I nearly crashed into a concrete barrier as I forced the car to turn. I was not using auto drive

This vehicle came with a YOKE style steering wheel, I did not order it this way, it is how the new car arrived. It is TERRIBLE and I cannot believe TESLAS is allowed to put it in their cars. (This is my second Model S, my first is a 2015 and I love it). It has none of the standard stalks on the side (Directional signal, headlight flash, etc.). I heard that removing the stalks saved the company a pile of money too. It is a very uncomfortable shape to hold and control. I find myself holding it with just my THUMBS, draped over the top corners of the wheel. All the important features: left turn signal, right turn signal, horn, headlight flash, and wiper are controlled by SMALL icons illustrated on the front of the yoke. They are NOT user friendly and you have to LOOK at the wheel every time you want to use them, which takes your eyes off the road!! I have been driving this car for over a year now and I still cannot honk the horn or flash the lights in time to warn other drivers of impending trouble. Many times I end up doing the wrong thing: like flash the lights instead of honk! The turn signals are terrible, it is very hard to determine if I have even engaged the signal I want as it is a small spot to press, and it is easy to press the wrong direction signal. When backing up and having to look over your shoulder (sometimes you can not use the back-up camera), the flat top of the yoke wheel is extremely hard to hold on to while you try to move the wheel from left to right to back up safely: a round wheel is MUCH easier to handle. Also, the layout of the wheel and the monitor screen (it's now horizontal) is such that it blocks the entire lower left corner of the screen. I would also complain about the 2 scroll wheels on the yoke, they are too sensitive and control too many functions depending on how you push them, but that is mostly TESLA "high-tech" stuff which they still can't get right. GET RID OF THE YOKE STEERING WHEEL, and the small icons: it is dangerous to use.

Car has a small capacitive touch button for horn instead of center-press. During emergency incidents, it is not possible to react quickly and hit the horn, which has led to several near-misses due to a delay in alerting other drivers with the horn while searching for the horn button, which moves as the wheel (yoke) turns.

The horn is a small button on the steering wheel which isn't easily located in an emergency. Tesla has said a software update was coming to move the horn to the center as with all other vehicles but it still hasn't done so. This could cause accidents while a driver is searching for the horn.

Yolk turn signal button issues. Does not register a click. Issue has also been reported on the following site with a video demonstrating the issue. https://teslamotorsclub.com/tmc/threads/yolk-turn-signal-button-issues-does-not-register-a-click.285402/

The vehicles horn is too difficult to locate during an emergency and requires you to look down at the wheel to find it. The "Yoke" steering wheel does not have the horn in the center as traditional across all other brand vehicles. It's a touch-capacitive area to the right and only about the size of a thumb tack. It's not raised or textured in anyway.

My vehicle was hit in the parking lot with my car being stationary/parked as I could not click the horn button as it is not in the center of the steering wheel. Per CEO comments: [XXX] Replying to @[XXX] All cars made since November also have push center for horn – just waiting on firmware update. If you mash right side of yoke with your palm, horn will trigger. 7:13 PM · Mar 1, 2022 on Twitter INFORMATION Redacted PURSUANT TO THE FREEDOM OF INFORMATION ACT (FOIA), 5 U.S.C. 552(B)(6)

When slightly pressing the accelerator while at speeds between approximately 35-70 MPH, there appears to be a vibration felt in the front of the car. It can be felt in the yoke and the pedal. It could affect the driver's ability to break or turn the wheel in emergency. It appears more than 60% of the owner of the same model and year has detected a similar shaking in the yoke and pedal, yet the manufacture delays to resolve it. https://teslamotorsclub.com/tmc/threads/poll-vibration-felt-when-slightly-accelerating-refresh-mode-s-plaid-or-lr.236933/

The horn "button" on the 2022 Model S steering "yoke" is impossible to engage consistently when the wheel is in any orientation other than straight. I have been in 5 near accidents that have required lane departures and roadway departures to avoid collisions with other vehicles because it has been impossible to find and engage the horn button without removing attention from the road and impending accident. This design essentially leaves the Model S with no operative horn in an emergency situation. There are no tactile keys to find the button in the dark, it is not illuminated, and there is no way to find it when the wheel is in a non-centered orientation. In many cases, I have inadvertently engaged wipers/washer fluid in the midst of an accident scenario, further obstructing my view and causing additional distractions from safely operating the vehicle. Please make them fix this!!!

A driver moving at highway speeds began to change lanes while I was next to him. I tried to honk the horn (which, on my yoke, is a small, haptic feedback touch screen of sorts) to warn him. The horn did not sound, either because it did not respond or because I missed the tiny, physically undistinguished area of yoke that serves as the horn activator.

This is regarding the turn signal controls on the 2022 Tesla Model S requiring users to take their focus off the road at best and being difficult/impossible to use in many situations at worst. In order to turn on a blinker, instead of physically actuating a stalk like on virtually all other cars, the user has to find and press at a certain place on the steering wheel. There is no physical button to feel for, so one has to look down at the steering wheel to find the button. If one tries to feel around for it, they risk the chance of initiating the wrong signal, since they're flat, capacitance buttons. I've had several incidents where I was unable to turn on my blinkers because the wheel had been rotated and the arrows were not only way out of their normal location, but they were also confusingly reversed in direction. Instead of focusing on looking for pedestrians, watching other traffic, and properly starting the turn and/or exiting the roundabout, I have to focus on finding the turn buttons and figure out which one I need to use (since they're both facing the opposite direction in that wheel orientation). Other incidents include turning on the wrong indicator when the wheel is rotation half way around, and not being able to find the indicators quickly enough to activate them in emergency situations (like when an ambulance appears and I need to quickly turn them on to pull to the side of the road). Finally, unlike physical stalks, they give no physical indication of when they turn off, so they are often left on when the computer isn't smart enough to turn them off automatically, or when I don't think they're turning off properly, I press the button again to toggle it off only to have it turn off an instant earlier, causing me to turn on the signal again and possibly confusing other drivers. I've never had any of these issues with regular turn signal stalks in other cars, and this new design does not offer any visible benefits.

Steering Yoke Safety Issue: Tesla Model S Plaid cars come with a steering yoke instead of steering wheel. The steering yoke’s horn, turn signal, high beam, voice assistant, windshield wiper, and cruise control LED indicators that identify these buttons become invisible due to sun glare when the sun is behind or to the left of the driver. The glossy surface of the yoke combined with the weak LED lights of the indicators make the yoke unusable for honking the horn, make it impossible to find the horn, turn signal, windshield wiper, and other buttons, effectively making these features unusable. At a minimum, these critical safety buttons being invisible and having no tactile way to finding them during sunny days causes a significant distraction away from looking at the road. In the attached photo, you will see the effect of sun glare on the yoke while driving. This design flaw in the steering yoke/wheel puts my safety and the safety of others at risk because of inability to use the horn, windshield wipers, voice assistant, high beams, and turn signals when the sun or any other bright light causes yoke glare. Furthermore, the lack of tactile indication of where the buttons are, because they are only indicated/separated by lighting (LEDs) causes the driver to have to divert attention away from the road and onto the steering yoke to find the controls, or push parts of the yoke randomly until the correct function button is found. This is a serious safety issue which can be resolved by using a different material for the steering yoke indicator buttons, by having tactile separators/notches where the yoke buttons are so the user can find where to press during sunny days.

The vehicle is equipped with a yoke style steering control. I find it difficult to use in the least and dangerous in many scenarios including emergency sharp turns, maneuvering in tight locations ie: a parking garage, parallel parking, trying to recover from a slip on ice and recovering from hitting a pot hole and having the yoke pulled from ones grip. In addition the yoke is fitted with turn signal buttons that are very difficult to discern when signaling is required in the middle of a turn. The yoke is also equipped with a horn button that I find impossible to find in an emergency. There were no test drives available when ordering this vehicle so I had no way of testing the yoke prior to taking delivery of the car. I would like to see Tesla offer a retrofitted traditional steering control in the form of a wheel similar to the control offered in older Model S vehicles.

I have used the self driving feature of my 2022 Tesla Model S on several highway trips, most recently a round trip between Seattle and Palm Springs. The following problems with the Tesla self driving feature were noted. (My car has only the basic self driving feature, not the full self driving upgrade) 1. Random “phantom braking” where the car, without apparent reason, suddenly braked. 2. On several occasions the car abruptly swerved off toward an off ramp. I think this occurred when the white line marking the side of the road was interrupted by the off ramp where there was no painted line. 3. On several occasions when the turn signal was activated in order to change lines the car started to move over into the adjacent lane but abruptly swerved back to the original lane. I was able to maintain control but it was a frightening event. Due to the unpredictable nature of these events I greatly reduced my use of the fsd feature.

My Tesla plaid arrived with a yoke steering wheel. The sales associate told me that it's easy to get used to, and that it works well. I have driven the car for a couple weeks now and it is clearly a safety hazard. First off, it is difficult to steer, especially if you need to get out of a dangerous situation quickly. The yokes shape is extremely wide, and you have to reach hand over hand to turn. If you lose control on a icy road and need to keep the wheels facing in the direction that you wish to go, you will be unable to do so. Next, this yoke steering wheel has buttons for the horn and turn signals. I tried using my horn two days ago to tell someone in a parking lot that my car was close to theirs. I almost hit their car because the horn button was not working. Next, when I am steering, the turn signals and windshield wipers are accidentally triggered. This happens all the time. Furthermore, these issues do not make it safe to direct the vehicle under a high stress event. Having your windshield wipers triggered while trying to steer quickly is disorienting. It is only a matter of time till this steering wheel causes an accident on the roads.

During normal driving, I was unable to activate the horn on a regular basis. The yoke steering wheel does not have a horn activator in the traditional "center" part of the steering column, and the purported method of activating the horn by covering all of the buttons on the right side of the steering york never worked for me. It's dangerous and I found myself on multiple occasions not being able to activate the horn.