Of course, that's what any normal business would do. If Tesla had done the same there'd be no story here. But telling somebody a busted ball joint on a practically new car is "normal wear" and that the owner's going to have to pay for all or even part of the repair, then requiring a signed NDA, is unbelievable.
back in the early-mid 80’s my cousin bought a sweet expensive looking Saab... the front wheel fell off 3 weeks later in a parking lot.
6-7 years later had an uncle buy a similar Saab, he returned it soon after.
It’s not just Tesla...
The car wasn’t “practically new”, it was a 2013 with 70K miles.
Look at this video showing the Tesla owner demonstrating the bad ball joints on his car:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DgdKZMlzQog
With ball joints that bad, the front end of that car must have been making horrible clunking noises for a long, long time.
The owner was clearly negligent in not having the problem addressed until there was a catastrophic failure.
The owner needs to read the warranty pages of his owner’s manual where it talks about the owner’s responsibility to seek service when there is evidence of a problem or an impending failure.
What I believe is the current warranty appears here:
This is not necessarily the same as the one that was in effect for the 2013 model year, but it is certainly similar.
All that said, I am not defending Tesla for requiring an NDA or tying that to a reduced repair cost. That’s unacceptable.