"Free HV Heater Replacement for Your Taycan Now Available at your Porsche Center"

[Tooney]

While I was writing this, he texted me a screenshot of the campaign number:

Thanks for sharing service campaign numbers. Nothing about WPH4 or WPL8 in TSBs at NHTSA. WMP2 is an old one. Big question for me is why some pre-2023 cars in US are getting heater replacements - prior to failure in winter - and others are not.

Now that you and Hoffman Porsche are best buds, try to get photos of heater labels on the old and replacement heaters.

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[Jonathan S.]

I will report back on November 10!

By which time the free hub on my road bike might be fixed ... after two intermittent failures ... then a bike shop servicing with a clean bill of health ... followed by a short ~22-mile test ride with no problems ... followed by a ~53-mile ride during which the free hub failed again at mile 38 yet then eventually reengaged after walking up a long hill in my socks (since my road bike shoes are almost unwalkable) then coasting down it ... the bike shop contacted the component manufacturer, which ran the serial number and, "Oh, that batch -- they break, we'll replace it at no cost!"

 

[Jonathan S.]

Wow, Porsche really (Really (REALLY!)) wants Taycan owners to replace the heater on affected vehicles, as so far I have received:

• two emails
• one message in the app
• one postal letter (which my wife opened even though it was addressed to me and even though I was standing right next to her, since she was so excited to open a letter from Porsche -- yes, she actually said this)
• a phone call from an actual real person (not a robocall that waited for me to pick, and a nice pleasant unhurried person, etc.)

Also, when I emailed Porsche that Hoffman still wasn't getting back to me after almost a week, Porsche contacted Hoffman within a few hours (although by then Hoffman had already gotten back to me immediately after the sixth time was the charm, i.e., reaching out the sales director for the entire ten-dealership chain).

 

[whitex]

Wow, Porsche really (Really (REALLY!)) wants Taycan owners to replace the heater on affected vehicles, as so far I have received:

• two emails
• one message in the app
• one postal letter (which my wife opened even though it was addressed to me and even though I was standing right next to her, since she was so excited to open a letter from Porsche -- yes, she actually said this)
• a phone call from an actual real person (not a robocall that waited for me to pick, and a nice pleasant unhurried person, etc.)

Also, when I emailed Porsche that Hoffman still wasn't getting back to me after almost a week, Porsche contacted Hoffman within a few hours (although by then Hoffman had already gotten back to me immediately after the sixth time was the charm, i.e., reaching out the sales director for the entire ten-dealership chain).

For the battery recall I got 4 text messages, 0 app messages, 1 web notification, 1 snail-mail letter, all AFTER the dealer already ordered the parts for testing my car. I asked the dealer about the text messages, since all the txt messages say that there is a recall (but not what recall) and to contact the dealer. So far they say battery is the only recall on my car, and that they have no control over the text messages.

 

[Jonathan S.]

Here is the new replacement heater going into my Taycan.

Picture of the old replaced heater to be posted once it is replaced.

 

[Jonathan S.]

And here’s the old heater.
You can see that the model designation has gone from E to F and from 16 to 17.

The dealership has replaced about 15 to 20 failed heaters but this is their first replacement under the preemptive campaign.
Also mentioned that both the Taycan and Panamera had many port holds for their customers.

 

[Tooney]

And here’s the old heater.
You can see that the model designation has gone from E to F and from 16 to 17.
The dealership has replaced about 15 to 20 failed heaters but this is their first replacement under the preemptive campaign.
Also mentioned that both the Taycan and Panamera had many port holds for their customers.

The replacement heater was apparently manufactured/labeled in August 2023 vs the one replaced dated August 2021.

Any idea from the dealer about the pre-emptive campaign?
--have they had other cars headed in for the campaign?
--selection criteria for the campaign?

 

[Jonathan S.]

I am their first under the campaign.
I will ask about the selection criteria but I doubt they have any idea. The service manager though is very friendly and forthcoming (e.g., acknowledging Taycan electronics issues).

 

[Jonathan S.]

And the answers are:

• Hoffman Porsche has just one other Taycan owner currently scheduled for a heater replacement.
• The dealer can see the VIN range(s), but no way of knowing the underlying selection criteria.

Wrapping up ...

From arrival to departure was about seven hours.

Although part of that was cleaning the car.
I had been asked upon arrival if I wanted that, and warned that it might add ~20 minutes.
I was a bit confused by that, since I figured it was just a quick rinse.
But my car emerged quite pristine, both exterior (I had driven in the rain Wednesday coming back form skiing) and the inside (all the screens are wonderfully smudge-free now).

The service manager Ethan Gombossy was genuinely fun to talk with about all sorts of topics, and refreshingly frank about Porsche issues.
(And it wasn't just me, as I overheard some of his conversations with other waiting customers.)

I chatted a bit some other staff, both sales and service, and everyone was quite pleasant, in a genuine kind of way (i.e., not a stealership stereotype).

The dealership building is small (perhaps the smallest dealership of any brand I've ever visited), but will be one of the biggest once the new building is finished.
(Construction meanwhile makes all the outdoor spaces even tighter, although still enough room for the totally bonkers Rolls Royce SUV in for service, with the suicide doors, retractable hood ornament, orange interior, and rear passenger fuzzy carpet.)

Overall, except for the bizzarre email ghosting, this was a perfect warranty/recall experience.
(Perhaps the lesson is just not to bother with emailing them in the future!)

 

[whitex]

The dealer can see the VIN range(s), but no way of knowing the underlying selection criteria.

Do you know the VIN ranges?

 

[Jonathan S.]

Do you know the VIN ranges?

Sorry, I didn’t bother asking him to look it up, since I figured anyone who is affected has been notified, and that we would not be able to discern any pattern based on the VIN range(s).

 

[whitex]

Sorry, I didn’t bother asking him to look it up, since I figured anyone who is affected has been notified, and that we would not be able to discern any pattern based on the VIN range(s).

VIN ranges would tell us which model year and which models are affected (and not affected). The actual range of VINs could tell us approximately when the factory got new heaters, by correlating VIN serial numbers with production dates (from members here). Yes, the VINs are not always produced in sequence, but with a few data points a picture could emerge.

 

[Tooney]

Based on the heater versions @Jonathan S. posted above for campaign WPL8:
Removed: 9J1.963.507 E - built: Aug 2021 - HW: 11 - SW: 16
Replaced by: 9J1.963.507 F - built: Aug 2023 - HW: 11 - SW: 17

And photos from ebay:
E: 9J1.963.507 E - built Feb 2023 - HW: 11 - SW: 16
F: 9J1.963.507 F - built Apr 2023 - HW: 11 - SW: 17

Version E (SW 16) which was removed from @Jonathan S. car by campaign WPL8 was still being produced as late as February 2023.
Version F (SW 17) which was installed by campaign WPL8 was produced as early as April 2023.

Does this mean that heaters (other than version F with SW 17) produced before April 2023 are defective/more likely to fail?

EDIT: The Taycan recall in Canada for bad heaters occurred in May, 2023.

 

[allroadusa]

If I’m not mistaken, the root cause for the heater fails is still unknown and might as well be an internal defective piece of hardware involved in a portion of the units only and for which the failure intervenes under certains conditions only.
As the fail doesn’t seem to be fixable I highly doubt the software version is the culprit of this.

 

[whitex]

If I’m not mistaken, the root cause for the heater fails is still unknown and might as well be an internal defective piece of hardware involved in a portion of the units only and for which the failure intervenes under certains conditions only.
As the fail doesn’t seem to be fixable I highly doubt the software version is the culprit of this.

While I generally agree with you, it is also possible that the firmware is the cause of the issue but it cannot be updated (e.g. adjusting a max current threshold, or maybe fixing a bug where the firmware hangs leaving heating element on while the car doesn't think the heater is on, so no fluid is pumped through it to evacuate the heat, causing the element to burn out). I know to anyone who works in software industry or has been driving a Tesla, it might seem odd that a firmware on a device cannot be updated, but it is surprisingly common in automotive field. For example, I recently had my door handles replaced on the Taycan because whenever it got cold, the car would occasionally self-unlock after locking it, one time it took me few minutes and many retries to get the car to actually stay locked. This was the service invoice description for the fix (I highlighted the relevant portion):

This implies that either the software version cannot be upgraded, or simply that the software version is used to distinguish a hardware version which perhaps is not retrievable separately, or maybe even production date.

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