Electric Vehicle Towing in San Diego: Why EVs Need Flatbed Towing

If you drive an electric vehicle in San Diego, there is one fact about your car you absolutely need to know before you ever break down: your EV must be transported on a flatbed tow truck. Not a wheel-lift. Not a dolly. Not "we'll just disconnect the driveshaft." A flatbed, with all four wheels off the ground, every single time.

This is not a preference or a best practice. It is a manufacturer requirement on every major EV sold in the United States, including Tesla Model S/3/X/Y, Rivian R1T/R1S, Hyundai Ioniq 5/6, Kia EV6 and EV9, Ford F-150 Lightning and Mustang Mach-E, Chevy Bolt, Nissan Leaf (with caveats), Polestar, Lucid, and essentially every other modern EV. The owner's manual says it in plain English. Towing the wrong way is the kind of mistake that turns a $200 service call into a $15,000 drivetrain replacement.

Here is why, what to do, and how to make sure the tow company you call is sending the right truck.

Why EVs require flatbed towing

A traditional gas car can usually be wheel-lift towed (front wheels lifted, rear wheels rolling on the ground) without harm — provided the rear wheels are the non-driven wheels. The transmission and engine are mechanically isolated when the car is in neutral, and rolling wheels just spin freely.

An EV is mechanically completely different.

The motor is always connected to the wheels. On an electric vehicle, the drive motor is directly geared to the axle — there is no neutral gear, no torque converter, no clutch that disconnects them. Any time the driven wheels are turning, the motor is turning. If the high-voltage system is offline (because the car is dead, or has been put in tow mode improperly), spinning that motor can push uncontrolled voltage into the inverter and damage the motor windings, position sensors, and power electronics.

Regenerative braking makes it worse. EVs use the drive motor as a generator any time the vehicle is decelerating or coasting. That generator pushes electricity back into the battery pack through a carefully managed power electronics module. When you drag an EV's wheels behind a wheel-lift truck — or worse, drag all four wheels behind a dolly setup — you're forcing that generator to spin without the management system being ready to receive the current. The result can be cooked diodes, blown inverters, or in some cases damage to the battery management system itself.

Most EVs are all-wheel drive. On AWD EVs (which is most premium configurations from Tesla, Rivian, Ford, Hyundai, and Kia), there are no "non-driven" wheels. Even a wheel-lift tow puts driven wheels on the ground, which is the worst possible scenario. There is no safe wheel-lift configuration for an AWD EV. Period.

Even FWD and RWD EVs are at risk. Some single-motor EVs technically could be wheel-lift towed in the same direction as a comparable gas car, but the manufacturers still prohibit it because the motor still spins, and the regen system still tries to recover energy. Tesla, Hyundai, and Kia all explicitly forbid wheel-lift on every model.

What every San Diego EV owner should know about transport mode

Every modern EV has some form of "tow mode" or "transport mode" — a setting that disengages the parking pawl in the gearbox so the vehicle can be safely winched onto a flatbed. Without it, the car is locked in park and the only way to move it is to physically drag it, which risks damaging the gearbox and tires.

The procedure varies:

• Tesla: Enter the touchscreen service menu, then Transport Mode. The 12-volt battery must have at least some charge. If the 12-volt is fully dead, the tow operator may need to jump the 12-volt circuit first to reach the touchscreen.
• Rivian: Enter the center display Service menu and activate Transport Mode. Similar 12-volt requirement.
• Ford F-150 Lightning / Mach-E: Specific brake-and-shift sequence documented in the manual. Newer models also expose Tow Mode through the SYNC display.
• Hyundai Ioniq / Kia EV6 / EV9: Manual shifter procedure with the brake pedal held.

Read your manual once before you ever need it. If you wait until you're stranded on I-805 with a dead car and no signal, you will not be able to look this up.

Common EV breakdown scenarios in San Diego

Out of charge. The single most common EV breakdown is running the battery flat. There is no walking to a gas station and bringing a jerrycan. Mobile EV chargers exist but are slow and rare. The realistic answer is a flatbed to the nearest DC fast charger — Electrify America stations along I-5 and I-15, Tesla Superchargers throughout the county, EVgo at various retail locations.

12-volt battery dead. EVs have a small 12-volt battery in addition to the high-voltage pack, and that 12-volt battery can die just like in a gas car. When it does, the car often cannot be unlocked, shifted out of park, or put in transport mode. A flatbed operator who knows EVs can jump the 12-volt circuit through the access port to wake the car up enough to load it.

Collision. Any EV in any collision should be flatbed towed. Even minor impacts can affect the high-voltage battery pack housing, and dragging a damaged EV creates fire risk. Modern EV battery fires are rare but extremely difficult to extinguish — getting a damaged EV onto a flatbed and away from the scene matters.

Heat-related shutdown. East County summer heat (Alpine, Pine Valley, the climb up the I-8) can push EV battery thermal management systems to their limits, especially after sustained fast driving. A car in thermal shutdown is not a car you want to keep driving — flatbed it to a charger.

Why the wrong tow company will damage your EV

Not every tow company in San Diego County operates flatbeds. Many smaller operators run wheel-lift trucks because they're cheaper to buy and operate. When dispatch is busy and they get an EV call, the temptation is to send what they have and "be careful." A driver who has been towing gas cars for twenty years and is towing his first Tesla may genuinely believe that lifting the front and rolling the rear "just to the off-ramp" is fine. It is not.

The damage is rarely visible at the scene. The motor sounds the same. The car looks fine. But weeks later, when service codes start appearing or the drive unit begins to fail, the dealer can pull the logs, see the wheel rotation history, and tie it directly to the tow event. At that point you are in a fight with the tow company's insurance, and the manufacturer warranty does not cover it.

The only way to protect your EV is to confirm flatbed before authorizing the tow. When you call dispatch, say the words: "I have an electric vehicle. I need a flatbed. Confirm you're sending a flatbed." If they hesitate, push back, or say "we'll sort it out when the truck gets there," call somebody else. A real San Diego tow company that handles EVs will confirm flatbed instantly because they get the call several times a day.

For the broader playbook on what to do during any breakdown — where to wait, how to stay safe, what to tell dispatch — see our full breakdown guide. And if you want to understand what FSP can and cannot do for an EV breakdown (short answer: very little), see the Freeway Service Patrol guide.

Bottom line for EV owners

Read your owner's manual once and learn how to put your specific car in transport mode. Save a flatbed-capable tow company in your phone before you need it. When you call, confirm the words "flatbed" out loud. Take photos of the loading process. And never, ever let anyone wheel-lift your EV "just a short distance" — there is no safe short distance, and the repair bill is always worse than the wait for the right truck.