Like many of its experimental products, Tesla’s Solar Roof — a solar panel array engineered to look like discreet roof tiles — has been a stunning failure. Nowhere is that flop more apparent than on the roof of Ambrose Conroy, a California homeowner who’s spent over six years battling with Tesla over the solar installation from hell.
According to Electrek, the whole saga began back in 2020, when Conroy entered an agreement to buy a 13.1 kW photovoltaic system from Tesla. Though the process was supposed to take a few weeks, it ran years late, as compounding errors and logistical disasters threw the project into chaos.
A year into the grueling setup, costs had overrun by the tens of thousands of dollars as no less than seven project managers cycled in and out, making communication and accountability nearly impossible. By Spring of 2021, Conroy was ultimately on the hook for a $110,000 bill — nearly $30,000 more than the initial price he agreed to pay.
By April of 2022, Tesla was offering to buy Conroy out of his contract with a paltry settlement of just $5,000 — after the company’s technicians had obliterated his roof and left it covered in damaged solar panels (during the lawsuit, an expert witness went on to testify that the unit’s roughshod wiring created a short-circuit and fire risk.)
That’s when Conroy decided to file a lawsuit, which is only now nearing the trial phase. A judge has now ruled Tesla acted fraudulently when it sold Conroy the initial $82,000 rooftop solar panel system, which the lawsuit says went on to cause an astounding $2.5 million in total damages.
Tesla has conceded to breaching its contact, as well as general negligence. But the company has fought on nearly every other claim of the case, earning it two sanctions from the judge for failing to produce internal documents.
Those withheld documents may be damning — as Electrek notes, previous filings indicate that executives including Tesla’s director of model engineering Bobby Yang and possibly even Elon Musk himself were being kept abreast of the disastrous installation.
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