Tesla Paint

[AP997S]

Just curious . . . . Are Model Y's robotically painted or are they painted the old fashioned way? Based on the number of paint issues posted I suspect they use human operated spray guns.

 

[ACA Man]

Well, when we visited their factory in Fremont, they didn’t allow us to go near their paint area citing some unknown reasons.

 

[AP997S]

Well, when we visited their factory in Fremont, they didn’t allow us to go near their paint area citing some unknown reasons.

Hmmm!

 

[qdeathstar]

yep...

 

[Ba2yev]

Well, when we visited their factory in Fremont, they didn’t allow us to go near their paint area citing some unknown reasons.

I would assume those areas are not safe without special equipment (toxic elements in the air?!)

Just curious . . . . Are Model Y's robotically painted or are they painted the old fashioned way? Based on the number of paint issues posted I suspect they use human operated spray guns.

..... and the QC team fixes imperfections with whiteouts. Passed Tesla Service Center saw at least three white MYs with mismatched paint on doors.

 

[Valore]

I would assume those areas are not safe without special equipment (toxic elements in the air?!)

I did a tour in the Porsche factory and their paint shop is so clean, you can eat from the floor.

Also, they have nice large windows so you can watch it in action.

The Porsche tour guy said the car gets a static negative charge and the paint gets a static positive charge so the paint particles get pulled towards the cars, so there is very little waste. Also, there is a constant laminar air flow from the ceiling to the floor.

But of course you have to pay for all this nice high end machinery in the Porsche factory as a customer.

 

[aburrows]

I did a tour in the Porsche factory and their paint shop is so clean, you can eat from the floor.

Also, they have nice large windows so you can watch it in action.

The Porsche tour guy said the car gets a static negative charge and the paint gets a static positive charge so the paint particles get pulled towards the cars, so there is very little waste. Also, there is a constant laminar air flow from the ceiling to the floor.

But of course you have to pay for all this nice high end machinery in the Porsche factory as a customer.

View attachment 556096

There are factory tours of Fremont online that you can watch and yes, it is a robotic paint shop with static negative panels and static positive paint. Its basically the same as the Porsche plant in the videos. Of note, I dont think they paint a single car's panels at the same time. Rather, they may paint a bunch of white doors at the same time and then a bunch of hoods at the same time etc. I am amazed at how unmatched the white paints are on Teslas. I'd like to say that white is a finicky color to paint but other car manufactureres have been doing it fine for decades. Maybe we are looking at old batches of doors from "pre shutdown" being put on "post shutdown" hoods and bumpers? Its the only thing I can imagine.

 

[aburrows]

This is from 2016 painting a model S. Obviously, the whole car gets painted at the same time so no panel should have a different color in this example...

 

[Aleks0404]

question is the model y also painted on the same line as S and X?

 

[MacZ]

This is from 2016 painting a model S. Obviously, the whole car gets painted at the same time so no panel should have a different color in this example...

For all door panels, they will disassemble them after paint job done to the trim line. And, put exactly same doors back to its body before final line. Tesla might mess up there?

Plus bumpers are painted at supplier site.

 

[goats]

i found this image on this site and showed it to my neighbor that paints for a ford dealer ... without pointing anything out to him... i asked him what is wrong with this paint... he said that the drivers door doesnt have enough paint on it and thus the gray base coat is showing through. He also pointed out that in the middle of the drivers door... there is a horizontal stripe that has more paint

 

[aburrows]

i found this image on this site and showed it to my neighbor that paints for a ford dealer ... without pointing anything out to him... i asked him what is wrong with this paint... he said that the drivers door doesnt have enough paint on it and thus the gray base coat is showing through. He also pointed out that in the middle of the drivers door... there is a horizontal stripe that has more paint

That sounds about right. And makes more sense that it would be too little paint on a section rather than somehow using a different color paint (Im sure Telsa uses massive tankers full of the same paint so the color shade should be uniform but the AMOUNT of paint put on a panel could vary). Glad you asked someone who knows this stuff!

 

[AP997S]

I'm sure the S & X are painted robotically. Since the Y is built in a tent, I question if Tesla has installed the same painting process infrastructure as they did in the old Toyota plant. Yugo's had better paint jobs then I'm seeing on the Model Y.

 

[aburrows]

That sounds about right. And makes more sense that it would be too little paint on a section rather than somehow using a different color paint (Im sure Telsa uses massive tankers full of the same paint so the color shade should be uniform but the AMOUNT of paint put on a panel could vary). Glad you asked someone who knows this stuff!

And I would also say, it is easier to see through white paint than the other colors which would explain why people are noticing the white paint issues and not the metalic silver, red, blue, etc. A slight decrease in white would allow you to see the grey primer coat underneath more easily than a slight decrease in black or red.

 

[Scooby24]

Robots from what I've seen, and there are instances of Blue ones that show the same poor flake lay down patterns on the driver's door specifically suggesting their process for painting is consistent (and consistently bad)

edit: These are two different cars. Notice the front door patterns...similar dark vs light zones.

 

[jsight]

They are painted by one dude with a can of rustoleum, of course!

Or maybe its the same paint shop that they've had for 8 years and is fully automated.

 

[Valore]

For all door panels, they will disassemble them after paint job done to the trim line. And, put exactly same doors back to its body before final line. Tesla might mess up there?

This is not how it is usually done. After painting, the car get's assembled without removing the doors again.
Not sure about Tesla though, the door screws sometimes look like they got removed again after painting as they are scratched and the paint broken/scratched.

 

[XLR82XS]

This is not how it is usually done. After painting, the car get's assembled without removing the doors again.
Not sure about Tesla though, the door screws sometimes look like they got removed again after painting as they are scratched and the paint broken/scratched.

Both my Model 3 have door screws that are not body color (painted) and upper hinges on front doors showed paint rubbed off even at delivery when brand new.

 

[raggedy]

the picture of the white car shows that the driver door doesn't match the rear door, and the rear door doesn't match the rear fender.

wow, just WOW

hahahahaha

 

[gundarx]

this is on my Y, built after shutdown.. Tesla service manager confirmed it’s painted by robots and the lack of good quality control allowed this to happen.

a hand-sprayed paint job on a carbon fiber McLaren this is not- any human operator with eyes would have caught these issues

after 2 weeks the exterior of my car was repainted, on pretty much every panel and my paint is now very uniform, and seems to be more vibrant than other deep blue metallic teslas- I have to deal with weeks of the car sitting in the garage to cure before risking damage to the softer uncured paint though