Tesla, TSLA & the Investment World: the Perpetual Investors' Roundtable

[elasalle]

Tesla has long pooh-poohed the notion of pairing ultracapacitors with li-ion cells, and IMHO with very good reason. Maxwell appears to have been focused these past several years on adapting their electrode tech for li-ion cells (see the above link), and it looks quite useful.

Yup, year back I heard the same talk. But I think they are gonna do more R&D to research and integrate.
Also what Tesla says in public might not be what it is really doing in reality.

My understanding is Ultracapacitors can charge/store energy faster, but they cannot hold the energy as efficiently as Li cells. So I think there are good efficiencies to be derived from using them both.(charging time&efficiency) ..

Maxwell Technologies Transportation Solutions: Automobile

~ cheers

 

[bhtooefr]

Damn, I figured that arbitrage opportunity wasn't gonna work, but I had to try anyway.

(It jumped from $3.07 to $4.75 right at 9 AM.)

 

[KarenRei]

The Offer will value each share of Maxwell common stock at $4.75 per share. Pursuant to the Offer, each share of Maxwell common stock will be exchanged for a fraction of a share of Tesla's common stock...

Read: dilution, not cash.

equal to the quotient obtained by dividing $4.75 by a volume weighted average price of one share of Tesla's common stock as reported on the NASDAQ Global Select Market for the five consecutive trading days preceding the expiration of the Offer...

Hmm, what is "the expiration of the Offer"? Today? Or five trading days from now? If it's the average over the past five days, they're getting a rotten deal on Tesla stock :Þ

, and which is subject to a floor that has been set at 80% of a volume weighted average price of Tesla common stock calculated prior to signing.

 

[KarenRei]

Yup, year back I heard the same talk. But I think they are gonna do more R&D to research and integrate.
Also what Tesla says in public might not be what it is really doing in reality.

My understanding is Ultracapacitors can charge/store energy faster, but they cannot hold the energy as efficiently as Li cells. So I think there are good efficiencies to be derived from using them both.(charging time&efficiency) ..

Maxwell Technologies Transportation Solutions: Automobile

~ cheers

It's almost always better just to use more li-ion batteries in place of whatever ultracapacitor you might considering using. You end up with a better, cheaper vehicle from almost every perspective.

Note that even Maxwell has been shifting their ultracapacitor electrode tech into li-ion battery electrodes.

 

[anthonyj]

Wow, Maxwell has an E just like Enron. BK secured! *laughs in tslaq*
Can’t wait to see the tweets on this one

 

[lklundin]

There is not going to be a chemistry improvement that makes a Model X have 400 miles range this year.

Look, I'm as optimistic as the next person here, but this is getting into silly season.

Speaking of silly season, I can see the headlines now:

Tesla fails to deliver on its 400 mile range Model X.

 

[JRP3]

Yup, year back I heard the same talk. But I think they are gonna do more R&D to research and integrate.
Also what Tesla says in public might not be what it is really doing in reality.

My understanding is Ultracapacitors can charge/store energy faster, but they cannot hold the energy as efficiently as Li cells. So I think there are good efficiencies to be derived from using them both.(charging time&efficiency) ..

Maxwell Technologies Transportation Solutions: Automobile

~ cheers

Caps have terrible energy density, pack capacity is much more important than regen potential, and charge speed will not be improved by adding caps because it's still limited by how fast the batteries can accept the charge.

 

[elasalle]

It's almost always better just to use more li-ion batteries in place of whatever ultracapacitor you might considering using. You end up with a better, cheaper vehicle from almost every perspective.

Note that even Maxwell has been shifting their ultracapacitor electrode tech into li-ion battery electrodes.

(Final thoughts..)
I'm thinking more like Semi (where we need to reduce charging time), or roadster (where coast doesn't matter but super performance does)
Also other scenarios more in storage space. But ya not needed for 35K SR M3

 

[bhtooefr]

Recharging time isn't helped by ultracaps unless they make up a significant percentage of the pack, which is nonsensical.

Performance for short bursts can be, but eh, Li-ion batteries are good enough with how big the Roadster pack is planned to be.

 

[lklundin]

Breaking news:

Tesla to but Maxwell Technologies for $4.75 a share

That's going to do wonders for regenerative braking, especially on the track where the power will be put to use again without (de)charging the actual battery at a would-be-destructive Charge-rate.

 

[Hock1]

I've owned Maxwell (hundreds of shares) for years as it's share price has slowly decayed. There was an announcement a month or so ago that it was going sell its division that makes ultra-capcitors. Interesting arbitrage opportunity?

So have I---about 5 years. I'll lose a point or so. but will be adding about another 400 TSLA. Thank you very much.

Edit: MXWL has recently talked about getting potential design wins with major OEMs. I believe this merger is a pre-emptive move on TSLA's part.

 

[KarenRei]

(Final thoughts..)
I'm thinking more like Semi (where we need to reduce charging time)

It does not do that. Your li-ion pack is your limit, and all that space / weight you dedicated to an ultracapacitor could have instead been more li-ion cells to spread the charge out among for a lower C-rate.

or roadster (where coast doesn't matter but super performance does)

Nobody wants a Roadster that can only accelerate but can't maintain speed. The more space / mass you dedicate to ultracapacitors, the less sustained power the pack can provide (to say nothing of range or cost - ultracaps are crazy expensive)

It's not just not a reasonable solution, to anything. Run the numbers.

 

[uselesslogin]

I don’t understand your numbers panasonic just reported that their new battery lines will be running by next month and will produce 36 GWh worth not 22 to 23 you report in your comment

I think we need a reminder of what 36 GWh of production in 2019 means:

(This is from February 2014.)

And it is only at 30% of its planned footprint today. I thought Elon was never on time and never kept his promises.

 

[KarenRei]

So basically, from my reading of this, we have a bit over $1 in dilution. I think we'll well more than make up for that today; I had already been suspecting a good trading day before this news.

 

[HG Wells]

Maxwell doesn't have any silver hamers do they ?

 

[KarenRei]

Maxwell doesn't have any silver hamers do they ?

Okay, if we're cracking nerdy jokes: I imagine that rather than distributing the TSLA shares evenly, the vast majority of MXWL shareholders will get a low number of TSLA shares, but there will be a "long tail" and some shareholders will end up with vastly more TSLA shares than average. Unfortunately for them, they'll be so excited that they'll run into other shareholders at such high speeds that their TSLa shares will quantum tunnel through their accounts and fuse together into TSFl, releasing gamma radiation and killing them.

 

[lascavarian]

There is energy being left behind due to reduced regen for every EV driving in cold weather. Whatever MIGHT be recovered with capacitors MIGHT mean something. Not sure about use of capacitors but there is clearly a loss of efficiency that begs to be solved..

 

[scaesare]

Maga - Make all German-autos great again.

MAGAGA?

 

[elasalle]

.

Caps have terrible energy density, pack capacity is much more important than regen potential, and charge speed will not be improved by adding caps because it's still limited by how fast the batteries can accept the charge.

Out of Box thought, but the UC can act as reservoir, and then can discharge into the battery even as the Semi is moving cheers !!

 

[mongo]

.


Out of Box thought, but the UC can act as reservoir, and then can discharge into the battery even as the Semi is moving cheers !!

A small reserve, better off waiting for another minute of charge.