EV maker Rivian said that only 14 R2 SUVs are affected by the high-voltage fastener inspections, for which it grounded and towed some vehicles last week.
“Rivian has reached out to clarify that as of right now, only 14 R2 vehicles are impacted,” the blog ‘RivianTrackr’ wrote on X.
Rivian has not commented publicly on the inspections. EV reported the groundings on Monday, before the number was known.
The count is small against the pace of the R2 ramp.
The highest R2 serial linked to owner-run tracker Rivian Roamer had reached the 13,1XX range by late Tuesday, up from 13,0XX earlier in the day.
Roamer sees only the R2s that owners link to it, and a VIN does not mean a car has been built or delivered. Rivian does not report R2 deliveries separately.
A Service Source’s Account
‘RivianTrackr’ said a source on the service side described “a run of assembly problems” with the R2’s high-voltage pack.
Those included packs “that weren’t bolted and sealed properly, missing bolts, and fasteners that were under tightened, over tightened, or stripped,” it reported.
In some cases the whole pack has to come out and a replacement is shipped, which is slow because new packs are “going straight to the production line in Normal,” the site said.
Most checks are simple, with a technician inspecting the fasteners and digging deeper only if they fail, according to the same source. The source also said most service centres have only one technician fully trained to work in depth on an R2, ‘RivianTrackr’ reported.
Rivian has not confirmed any of those details.
The service request in owners’ Rivian apps described the work as a “high voltage circuit fastener inspection.”
Owners Still Waiting
Partial VINs posted by owners put affected vehicles in at least three ranges, 54XX, 58XX and 74XX.
Rivian has not published a VIN list, or said whether all 14 vehicles had been delivered to customers.
An owner with VIN 5473, a Launch Edition Performance delivered on August 28, said in a comment on ‘RivianTrackr’s report that Rivian called on Friday and told them to stop driving immediately.
“Tow truck came and got it and is at the service center with an appointment tomorrow,” the owner wrote, adding that they had been given “no explanation on what was wrong and how long it could be.”
Another customer, who described the R2 at the centre of RivianTrackr’s report as theirs, said the service centre had escalated the case to a regional manager, who said they “should receive next steps on Friday.”
“The lack of communication at this stage is unacceptable,” the owner wrote.
The owner praised the local service centre but said Rivian corporate “simply need to do better.”
A third commenter, who has not yet taken delivery, said the service centre told them it had “an extended QC checklist” to go through when their R2 arrives, so delivery “will take a bit longer than ‘normal.'”
Still No Recall
NHTSA’s recall database still listed only one recall covering the R2 on Wednesday, the rear-camera display fix delivered over the air.
Manufacturers must file a defect report within five working days of determining that a defect is safety related.
Rivian has not said whether it considers the fastener issue a safety defect.
It is the second time in about a month that Rivian has acted on R2 high-voltage hardware without a formal recall, after it told some owners to stop DC fast charging until their charging connector had been inspected.
That August campaign called for technicians to inspect the “DCFC Connector-to-Header joint for gap and thermal abnormalities” and, if it failed, to replace the header and connector assemblies, according to an in-app message an owner shared.
The high-voltage battery also featured among the five R2 quality issues EV had counted by late July, when a faulty battery communications module held up handovers.
New Invitations
Several reservation holders said on Reddit that Rivian sent them R2 order invitations on Tuesday, pointing to a new batch.
Invitations go out in batches, with reservation timing and delivery location weighing most, according to RivianTrackr’s summary of Rivian’s support page.
Once an order is confirmed, Rivian’s support page quotes delivery in four to eight weeks, rising to six to 10 weeks for Esker Silver paint and eight to 12 weeks for Borealis and Forest Green paint and the Coastal Cloud Signature interior.
Tuesday was also the eve of the deadline Rivian set for adding a second R2 production shift at its plant in Normal, Illinois.
“R2 production started with a single shift, and we expect to scale to two shifts by the end of the third quarter,” Founder and CEO RJ Scaringe said on the July 30 earnings call.
Rivian expects to deliver 65,000 to 70,000 vehicles in 2026, after delivering 22,559 in the first half.
