Tesla readies revamped Model 3

[WannabeOwner]

I can’t believe there will be anything about a new M3 which will be better than a MS

The suspension comfort of MS (and larger cabin) make it my tool of choice for longer journeys. Even if M3 had the range, now that I have experienced how much fresher we arrive on a 12 hour MS journey (which we used to do in Golf-size car for decades) I'd still want a "tourer"

If E fuels is a cleaner alternative for them to use then that's good news.

I despair at the "profit over morals" route that capitalism has gone. Supermarkets should have phased out plastic bags long before government mandated it. Airlines should already have done likewise with eFuels / bio-fuels. They say "Too expensive" which translates to "We want someone else to pay for it"

As has been proven many times, if you get on and JFDI the economies of scale help you out, as do breakthroughs in technology and so on.

North Sea Oil? Drilling will never be cost effective.

North Sea Wind Turbines? That will never be cost effective. ("But we have skills from North Sea Oil" A=That will never be cost effective )

Those seem to have gone OK ...

the fundamental issues that synthetic fuels need to solve is how they grow the crops needed along side existing food requirements without cutting down what little natural habitat is left on the planet and the cost of it compared to oil.

USA agriculture is (from memory, but ChatGPT gave a similar figure - FWTW) 10% for Vegetables and Fruit. The rest is, I presume, either Beef (well "meat") or growing the feed for the animals.

Small shift to more meat-free meals (ultimately vegetarianism, if you will) would free up the land for bio-fuel crops.

I'm anti taking land out of food production Solar panels / eFuels) - hikes up the food prices and tends to be a race for subsidy-money - but it may be that diet is going to change enough, over that period, to mean that its even-stevens.

Just checked on the Corn production in USA (largest USA crop by production and area). 44% animal feed, 36% for ethanol production, 8% exported. Wheat is only 13% the crop size of maize, but 75% of that goes to "food"

 

[Tony Hoyle]

If that happens it will be madness!

We've been here before.. biodiesel increased corn prices.. people preferring to sell for oil production rather than food. It became the ethical thing *not* to use biodiesel. Even now 45% of the US corn crop goes to fuel. (source)

 

[Tony Hoyle]

USA agriculture is (from memory, but ChatGPT gave a similar figure - FWTW) 10% for Vegetables and Fruit. The rest is, I presume, either Beef (well "meat") or growing the feed for the animals.

I saw a chart that calculated that if you cut out beef alone you make 94% of the CO2 saving that a vegetarian makes with their diet. I'm not sure that translates so much outside the US though... we're as big on beef here.

 

[MrBadger]

We've been here before.. biodiesel increased corn prices.. people preferring to sell for oil production rather than food. It became the ethical thing *not* to use biodiesel. Even now 45% of the US corn crop goes to fuel.

And animal feed. I can’t remember the stat, but was shocked at the proportion of crops that is used in meat farming. I’m not a vegetarian, but it certainly made me cut down dramatically on certain meats (and probably increase consumption of others )

 

[pgkevet]

Unless someone is finally prepared to limit population growth then biofuels are not going to work...the land is needed for food production. A more logical approach would be solar fuels.. recycling CO2 and water into energy dense hydrocarbons..ideally in desert locations where land has limited value. There are pilot studies in hand.

 

[ZenRockGarden]

Unless someone is finally prepared to limit population growth then biofuels are not going to work...the land is needed for food production. A more logical approach would be solar fuels.. recycling CO2 and water into energy dense hydrocarbons..ideally in desert locations where land has limited value. There are pilot studies in hand.

I gotta go the opposite of this bio-fuel narrative.

In the future, hydro-carbon based burnable fuels will be seen as a really primitive form of energy storage which is obsolete outside a few very niche cases and a certain amount of nostalgia. Energy storage devices (batteries of many future formats) will be safer, cleaner, fully recyclable, and basically better. Yes, we need a 2x to 5x increase from current energy densities. That looks pretty realistic given the money being poured into finding those gains.

Meanwhile, back to the pending Model 3 revision - I believe we're gonna see a small cosmetic update, just enough to give folks a reason to want the "new" one and see that it's updated. But mostly it will be a manufacturing-efficiency update, with fewer parts under the covers, some selected feature-deletes or simplifications (see missing ultrasound parking sensors), and maybe even cost-oriented tweaks to battery and motors. Tesla is working to get rid of rare-earth magnets, and similarly reduce the expensive metals in the battery chemistry. I would not be shocked to actually see range go down slightly on some models at the lower end in the name of costs. LR models should retain their max-density focus but Tesla might end up selling fewer of them in favor of a bargain option at slightly less range (see MY 4680 AWD).

 

[qwickshot]

As someone who is thinking about buying a caravan, I’d honestly prefer a long range RWD option with a higher towing capacity in line with the Model Y.

0-60 in 6 seconds is plenty of performance for normal roads and the model 3 is more than enough car.

As it stands, I’ll probably be trading in my RWD 3 for an AWD Y.

 

[Jason71]

I despair at the "profit over morals" route that capitalism has gone.

As someone once said. Capitalism is like fire. Harness it and it can do great things for you. But fail to control it and it will consume everything in its path.

 

[SalisburySam]

Maybe for consumer vehicles but construction, agriculture and haulage will continue to use ICE as they are tried, tested and do the job without needing to stop and recharge every few hours for hours at a time.

Perhaps, though electrification is making inroads into both construction and ag uses:
Suncar makes electric 16ton excavators and 55ton drilling rigs, among other heavy equipment, operating today.
Bobcat has introduced electric skid steers, track loaders, and small excavators.
Epiroc and others have produced BEV mining equipment for years.
Komatsu has delivered a BEV 50ton (empty weight) dump truck with a 600kWh battery that hauls an additional 60ton payload.
Caterpillar delivered in 2019 a 26ton excavator to the market and expanded its mining equipment portfolio with BEVs.
Caterpillar (nèe Bucyrus before 2010) also makes draglines for mining with a working weight up to almost 8,000tons with bucket loads of 152 cubic yards. This is the weight equivalent to the maximum loads of 80 rail cars. The bucket is a bit larger than an intercity bus and bucket capacity is roughly that of 1½ fully-loaded boxcars…per load. These have been fully electric for years, though they are certainly not BEVs as each dragline requires a dedicated 24kV power line.

 

[Zilla91]

Perhaps, though electrification is making inroads into both construction and ag uses:
Suncar makes electric 16ton excavators and 55ton drilling rigs, among other heavy equipment, operating today.
Bobcat has introduced electric skid steers, track loaders, and small excavators.
Epiroc and others have produced BEV mining equipment for years.
Komatsu has delivered a BEV 50ton (empty weight) dump truck with a 600kWh battery that hauls an additional 60ton payload.
Caterpillar delivered in 2019 a 26ton excavator to the market and expanded its mining equipment portfolio with BEVs.
Caterpillar (nèe Bucyrus before 2010) also makes draglines for mining with a working weight up to almost 8,000tons with bucket loads of 152 cubic yards. This is the weight equivalent to the maximum loads of 80 rail cars. The bucket is a bit larger than an intercity bus and bucket capacity is roughly that of 1½ fully-loaded boxcars…per load. These have been fully electric for years, though they are certainly not BEVs as each dragline requires a dedicated 24kV power line.

Great. So how long until all of those are actually ready, affordable and in use in developing nations?

 

[SalisburySam]

Great. So how long until all of those are actually ready, affordable and in use in developing nations?

Ready? Today, and are operating everywhere, including developing nations.
Affordable? Depends on your definition of affordable. The larger draglines are 9-figure investments, are assembled at the mine site wherever it is on the planet, remain in the mine until it is closed, then are disassembled and scrapped, likely a couple of decades after installation. For the mining companies, that’s affordable indeed necessary. The small devices like electric skid steers today have a slight premium over their ICE counterparts, much like the automotive world. Also like cars, they’ll ride the same pricing curves.
In use in developing nations? To be seen but given lower operating costs expectations are certainly good.

But does it matter? Your post that I replied to mentioned nothing about any of those factors. You spoke of industries, not countries. I was merely trying to point out that electrification has begun to penetrate those industries as well as automotive, and in some cases like mine boring has done so for many years to the exclusion of ICE machines.

 

[Zilla91]

You spoke of industries, not countries

I did earlier on but fair enough, I can't expect you to read through everything posted beforehand

 

[SalisburySam]

I did earlier on but fair enough, I can't expect you to read through everything posted beforehand

Thank you. I was replying to a post, not a thread.

 

[ZenRockGarden]

Back to the main thread topic - updated Model 3.

I see the Tesla ordering website now lists plain "Model 3" (former SR+) and "Model 3 LR" with only a $3750 tax rebate, while the M3P retains the full $7500. I assume this confirms a switch to non-domestic battery supplier for everything except the M3P.

 

[DoricJim]

Back to the main thread topic - updated Model 3.

I see the Tesla ordering website now lists plain "Model 3" (former SR+) and "Model 3 LR" with only a $3750 tax rebate, while the M3P retains the full $7500. I assume this confirms a switch to non-domestic battery supplier for everything except the M3P.

You’ve wandered into a UK forum thread so not so relevant here.