James May’s Beloved Tesla Model S Bricks Itself While He’s Away
The Top Gear and Grand Tour star found out about the existence of the 12-volt battery in his Tesla Model S the hard way.
It might seem a bit ironic that James May – of Top Gear and The Grand Tour fame – owns a Tesla Model S, one of the quickest cars on sale today. But as it turns out, May has owned and enjoyed his electric sedan for some time now and even made a video documenting a dozen gripes he has about the car, all of which are comically insignificant. Regardless, May did have one big problem on his hands when he recently returned from filming The Grand Tour‘s most recent adventure.
That problem, as it turns out, is that the Model S completely “bricked” itself while he was gone. This led to a discovery most Tesla owners are aware of, but it seems that May might not have been. “The Tesla has two batteries,” May says. “It’s got the great big battery under the floor which powers the car. It also has, here in the front trunk, a conventional 12-volt car battery which keeps all the systems alive and the memory in the computer.”
As is the case with ICE-powered vehicles, this battery also powers things like the door locks, and if it is left sitting for too long and drains to empty, those things don’t work. May didn’t bother to connect a battery tender to his Model S, and thus, he came home to a very expensive and useless piece of kit. May did leave his Tesla’s charger plugged in, but as the automaker explained to him, that isn’t good enough.
“That charger also keeps that battery charged. But when the big battery is fully charged, the charging system turns off,” May explains. “It doesn’t keep topping that one up, and that one, because it’s running the computer and so on in the background, goes flat.” Since the Tesla’s doors and even frunk are electronically operated, that left him in a bit of a bind.
Of course, there is a way around all of this. “You have to pull the two emergency releases which are in the wheel arches,” May explains. “To get to those, you actually have to lever the internal plastic trim off the wheel arch and expose these little cable pulls.” May is correct that this is a bit of a pain, and Tesla obviously needs to install some sort of easy-to-reach plug for a trickle charger to be connected. But for now, this is a good bit of information for Tesla owners that may not be aware of the “second” battery in their vehicle.