Tesla Voluntarily Recalling 53,000 Model S & Model X Vehicles Due To Potential Parking Brake Issue

The ludicrous acceleration of a Tesla is one thing, but you also need solid brakes to go the other way — and parking brakes, for keeping put on a hill or steep driveway. Regarding the latter, Tesla is voluntarily recalling 53,000 Model S and Model X vehicles over a potential issue with the parking brake that could prevent it from releasing. In other words, it’s not a dramatic issue, but it does entail a fairly large recall.

An email sent to Tesla owners and posted on the company website read, “Specifically, we have determined that the electric parking brakes installed on Model S and Model X vehicles built between February and October 2016 may contain a small gear that could have been manufactured improperly by our third‑party supplier.”

Tesla also said on its website Thursday and in the email, “If the gear were to break, the brake would remain engaged, but the parking brake would also be stuck in place. Tesla estimates that only 5 percent of the cars it is recalling will be affected and that the replacement will take about 45 minutes.”

Bloomberg reports that even this non-issue caused shares to drop just over 1% on the news. Also reported was the part supplier that had the issue: “The faulty part was supplied by a unit of Italy’s Brembo SpA, a spokeswoman for Brembo North America Inc. confirmed in an emailed statement: ‘We are working with Tesla to ensure the issue is resolved quickly,’ she said.”

You never know which way a stock will head in a moment, but at least one analyst covering Tesla thinks the 1% drop is even further than makes sense.

“Our initial take on Tesla’s announcement today is that the sell-off in shares may be overdone and would generally view this as a relative ‘non-event,” James Albertine, senior analyst at Consumer Edge Research, wrote in a note to clients.

The only potentially significant concern, one would imagine, is servicing so many vehicles. However, a tesla spokesperson says the company has that under control.

“Service capacity will not be an issue,” a Tesla spokeswoman said in an email. The company’s mobile technicians will be able to check the vehicles quickly and deal with any Model S or Model X customer cars that need a fix.

We’ll keep you updated if there’s any more news on this, but that seems unlikely.

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