Recall · 21V834000
Tesla recalled the TESLA Model 3 over air bags
3
Vehicles covered
1
Model
3
Model years
October 25, 2021
Filed with NHTSA
AIR BAGS:SIDE/WINDOW:CURTAIN
- The defect
- Tesla, Inc. (Tesla) is recalling certain 2020-2021, 2023 Model 3 vehicles. The left and/or right side curtain air bag may have been improperly secured to the roof rail, which could result in a twisted air bag. As such, these vehicles fail to comply with the requirements of Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard numbers 214, "Side Impact Protection" and 226, "Ejection Mitigation."
- What it can cause
- A twisted side curtain air bag may improperly deploy, increasing the risk of injury or occupant ejection during a crash.
- What the dealer does
- Tesla Service will inspect and realign the left and right side curtain air bag as necessary, free of charge. Owner notification letters were mailed December 23, 2021. Owners may contact Tesla customer service at 1-877-798-3752. Tesla's number for this recall is SB-21-20-006.
- NHTSA's note
- Owners may also contact the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration Vehicle Safety Hotline at 1-888-327-4236 (TTY 1-800-424-9153), or go to www.nhtsa.gov.
The repair is free, whatever the age or mileage of the vehicle, and whether or not you are the original owner.
Which vehicles
A recall reaches a range of VINs inside these model years, not every car built in them. Yours may not be covered even if it is listed here, and the only way to find out is NHTSA's own VIN lookup .
How this campaign compares
At 3 vehicles this is a small campaign: 97% of the 19,818 vehicle recalls filed since 1995 whose size NHTSA published are as large or larger. The middle campaign on file covers 472. It covers model years 2020 to 2023, so the oldest vehicles on it were one model year old when the defect was reported to NHTSA.
Tesla vehicles have been recalled over the air bags 3 times before this, most recently in January 2019 as 19V002000. That is not evidence the earlier repair failed.
This site holds the complaint record for all 3 model years the campaign names. Their owners have filed 1,520 complaints with NHTSA, 84 of them before this campaign was filed. 55 of those name the air bags, the system this recall is about — a count of complaints, not of this defect. The earliest of them reached NHTSA in December 2019, 1 year before this filing.
The vehicles on this campaign carry 26 other recalls published here, the newest being: 26V507000 (exterior lighting), 26V283000 (back over prevention), 25V092000 (steering), 24V935000 (tires).
Check your own car
A VIN check is the only answer for a specific vehicle, and it also shows every other open recall on it, which is usually the reason it is worth doing rather than reading one campaign.
Filed by Tesla, Inc. with NHTSA on October 25, 2021 as campaign 21V834000. Every word of the defect, consequence and remedy above is NHTSA's published record of that filing, not a summary of it.
Compiled and maintained by guarledes . Data last checked 2021-10-25.
Independent developer and analyst