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

[Cloxxki]

Just like they've been waiting for the past two years? Now was the time for Tesla to make the shift if they were going to (while they were retooling the lines). They didn't. Show of hands, who thinks they'll be taking down the lines yet again the day after tomorrow, to use cells that they have a shortage of (2170s) and not use cells that they have in surplus (18650s), both of which have the same energy density (as measured by Jack Rickard)?

There's simply no logic in it. As has been repeatedly pointed out.

The next thing that might be seen along these lines - not soon - is a change in the pack (not cell) architecture. But again, to reiterate: not soon. Now was the time for that if they were going to do it. Next up on the list is surely interior cosmetic features - which might well be phased in one at a time rather than all bundled together. There's little line downtime for such changes - they're GA, humans connecting the new part rather than the old one. More of a supplier headache than a Tesla headache (excepting parts made inhouse).

If apparently multiple Chinese suppliers will be sharing the load to fulfill 2170 orders by GF3, might those not put some 10 GWh on the boat to Sparks? Ought to be cheaper than from Japan.
It's been an error to show their hand technically making S+X sooo 2016. Anti selling was mostly in word, not deeds. How hard would it have been, really, to update S/X packs with better cooling and chemistry, fast track V3 charging?

 

[neroden]

You can not cut over 60 hertz AC without at least 1 cycle in between power sources, other wise you create a short. I think they try to keep it under 5 cycles in the UPS industry.

Hmmmmmmmm, I think you could cut it over, but it would be tricky...

 

[EVNow]

This means for these 2 it is 1 disengagement per 40 miles. Adam Jones reported a disengagement in his report.

I conservatively put the disengagement at 1 per 100 although it looked to be much higher at the event. And the event was in perfect conditions on their home turf.

Home turf or not doesn't matter, that much.

A generic solution will always take longer and has more bugs initially than a specific solution like Waymo's. But, it will take less time for the generic solution to become available everywhere compared to geofenced solutions using HD maps.

Knowing Tesla, I won't even be surprised if they have been testing on this particular route only for a few days. EM doesn't look like the type who gives his employees a lot of time to prepare for such events.

 

[Cloxxki]

Tesla's "loss" in 2019Q1 is mostly explained simply as Model 3s in-transit and total vehicles produced but unsold by end of quarter (they'll sell; don't worry).

Cheers!

Would you care to correct my math please?
$50K average, 10,000 cars, 20% margin. That accounts for a 100 million loss.

 

[Matias]

... he says, without mentioning the impact on cash flows.

How about $145 M missing profit for a quick approximation?

Cheers!

So it does not explain 700 million loss as you first wrote?

 

[Alexander Grea]

Well, then that's a great job comparing apples to chestnut-necklaced hill partridges.

Did any of them report a safety-related disengagement? Because those are the only ones that get reported, e.g. by Waymo.

Do you have a reference for what you just said? That Waymo is only reporting safety-related disengagements. Because the law says this:

By law, all companies that are actively testing self-driving cars on public roads in California are required to disclose the number of miles driven and the frequency in which human drivers were forced to take control of their driverless vehicles

Galileo described a situation where the driver was forced to take control because the car did not know where to go on a 3 lane 1 way road. IMO it would fall under a disengagement that would need to be reported under the California's disengagement reporting rules.

Or do you have any other reference to prove that only safety-related disengagements need to be reported?

 

[Boomer19]

mid day dip - rally fading?

 

[CorneliusXX]

Need a big day considering how damaged the technicals and confidence is after last week's disaster. Ending the day at 240+ and hopefully daily highs. This would be a great start to ride out some recovery rally this week.

If we fall back to near 235 it means that institutions are still selling as the volume is massive.

Another new account banging on about insto sales. Did your last account get banned?

 

[Cloxxki]

500k all vehicle types
7k 3 at Fremont, 2k S/X at Fremont, 2k 3 at GF3 = 11k.

With great progress on GF3 construction, guidance is now for 1-2k from GF3...if not early 2020.
His infamous tweet was not only out of context but in jeopardy of being a false prophecy. And I'll repeat, GF3 construction is going well. No delays reported. What's the point of using your official investor information outlet for such a tweet then? Glad the lawyers are brought in. A company is only as strong as its weakest link and it's been long identified.

 

[Alexander Grea]

Another new account banging on about insto sales. Did your last account get banned?

Not so new as you can see. From January. But have been lurking TMC for years and following TSLA since 2012.

Just got me over the edge when a member of the forum said that the 700mUSD was due to 700mUSD addition to inventory and nobody corrected that for good half an hour.

And now can't stop rolling when I am in it already.

 

[KarenRei]

Do you have a reference for what you just said? That Waymo is only reporting safety-related disengagements. Because the law says this:

By law, all companies that are actively testing self-driving cars on public roads in California are required to disclose the number of miles driven and the frequency in which human drivers were forced to take control of their driverless vehicles

Do you actually think laws sound like that? That's clearly not a law; you're quoting from some news article, written by someone with a poor grasp of the actual law and DMV regulations. I actually dug up the actual regulations before (required to be created, but not spelled out, by VEH 38750 - 38755 in the California code), and this was discussed extensively in this thread. Do I need to do so again?

And again, it's easy to rig the reports for a geofenced vehicle, simply by excluding any road or intersection that your vehicle struggles with from the routes it is allowed to take. Indeed, you can still test said roads and intersections - without having to report disengagements - not just in simulators, but simply by operating the car with the driver's hands on the wheel (e.g. not in full-autonomous mode).

 

[defc0n]

Waymo was at 0.64 disengagements per 1000 miles in 2015. Tesla is at best 10 disengagements per 1000 miles according to the investor day. And Waymo is still not done with the fully self driving product even in Phoenix. How could Tesla go from 10 disengagements per thousand miles to 0 in one year or even 2-4 years when Waymo has taken 4 years to go from 0.64 disengagements to 0.09 disengagements.

PS. I know that Waymo is geofenced. For customer sitting in a Robotaxi it is not important if it is geofenced or not.

Not important that it is geo-fenced????? Do you really believe that??

 

[lklundin]

Wow, that's great. With the Michigan anti-Tesla laws, I've been saying Toledo made tons of sense for years.

It's like they've got someone in charge of geographic distribution of service centers now

As it often happens TMC is too optimistic.

What really happened is that Elon Musk recently wrote an internal email:

"Look, it kills me that TMC is cluttered by this otherwise reasonable guy 'neroden' who goes on and on about something called 'service'. Somebody needs to find out what this is and change it so that guy stops complaining".

 

[Alexander Grea]

Not important that it is geo-fenced????? Do you really believe that??

If you are in that geofenced area and you want to get to another point in that geofenced are then what is the problem? Most likely the first actual FSD taxis will be within geofenced areas like Airport - City center and it is a huge step in the right direction.

 

[Remus]

PS. I know that Waymo is geofenced. For customer sitting in a Robotaxi it is not important if it is geofenced or not.

geofencing may not matter to the customers (somecases it does), it does create bias in disengagement data.

if you have about 500 Tesla engineering fleet cars running in a quiet Phoenix burb all day, you bet the disengagement data would be drastically different. Fortunately Tesla is not wasting money creating meaningless data for public stunt.

 

[defc0n]

If you are in that geofenced area and you want to get to another point in that geofenced are then what is the problem? Most likely the first actual FSD taxis will be within geofenced areas like Airport - City center and it is a huge step in the right direction.

It is a huge step in the wrong direction! Unless you think everywhere meaningful will be geofenced.

 

[EVNow]

Tesla's "loss" in 2019Q1 is mostly explained simply as Model 3s in-transit and total vehicles produced but unsold by end of quarter (they'll sell; don't worry).

Cheers!

That is not the entire story. There was the 90M loss due to price guarantee reserves. Loss of margin due to low production, larger services loss etc.

By my very rough calculation, Tesla needs about 100k deliveries with 22% margin in Q2 to breakeven. That is why they are guiding a small loss in Q2. With the unwinding of the wave, we should also expect larger inventory of cars.

 

[Cloxxki]

Maxwell has DEMONSTRATED 1.2x capacity in 15 Ahr sided pouch cells. JB Straubel is personally involved with overseeing battery tech. Tesla would not be buying Maxwell if this tech wasn't real.

How might cost/kWh work our for 60 Wh pouch cells compared to today's, what, 18 Wh cells?
Also, where to make pouch cells in case those are the way to go for this chemistry, can production be scaled easily in-house?
How might this tech translate to 2170 cells which until now have been the chosen way to go?

 

[Alexander Grea]

Do you actually think laws sound like that? That's clearly not a law; you're quoting from some news article, written by someone with a poor grasp of the actual law. I actually dug up the actual regulations before, and this was discussed extensively in this thread. Do I need to do so again?

And again, it's easy to rig the reports for a geofenced vehicle, simply by excluding any road or intersection that your vehicle struggles with from the routes it is allowed to take. Indeed, you can still test said roads and intersections - without having to report disengagements - not just in simulators, but simply by operating the car with the driver's hands on the wheel (e.g. not in full-autonomous mode).

Correct. Here is the raw text from the law:
(a) Upon receipt of a Manufacturer’s Testing Permit or a Manufacturer’s Testing Permit – Driverless Vehicles, a manufacturer shall commence retaining data related to the disengagement of the autonomous mode. For the purposes of this section, “disengagement” means a deactivation of the autonomous mode when a failure of the autonomous technology is detected OR Autonomous Vehicles Order to Adopt Page 17 of 31 when the safe operation of the vehicle requires that the autonomous vehicle test driver disengage the autonomous mode and take immediate manual control of the vehicle, OR in the case of driverless vehicles, when the safety of the vehicle, the occupants of the vehicle, or the public requires that the autonomous technology be deactivated.

So the disengagement needs to be reported when the autonomus mode fails OR if the safety of the vehicle and/or passengers is threatened. It can be only one of the 2.

 

[MarcusMaximus]

If you are in that geofenced area and you want to get to another point in that geofenced are then what is the problem? Most likely the first actual FSD taxis will be within geofenced areas like Airport - City center and it is a huge step in the right direction.

If you have memorized the entire map of exactly what is within the fence and what isn’t, then there’s no problem. If you don’t have such a photographic memory, I imagine it’s a pain to have to pull up the app, put in end point, find that “oh, no, that one won’t work” and then find another ride share app to actually get where you need to go.