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

[Tslynk67]

This weekend I visited a PhD friend of mine who has been working in the glue industry for many years. I wanted to know his thoughts on the torsion box. This torsion box is composed of metal (casings) of cells and plates, and the car will be subjected to a wide range of temperatures (from Death Valley to Alaskan winter), and Subjected to vibration and shocks. (ADDED: and hold up for many years). He didn’t see a problem with it. He said that polyurethane would be used (epoxy is too rigid), which does have to be shielded from light (easy, given its location) and water (think of rain or people fording a stream). Entirely doable, in his opinion.

As an aside he told me that the problem is similar to gluing wind shields in a car, where the coefficients of expansion are also very different. In fact, modern cars derive part of their rigidity from the windshields glued to the metal frame as well. For a wind shield, the glue is protected from light and water by EPDM rubber.

I rated this "Informative", but missed the "WTF?" option...

 

[Maitri982]

The new casting of the central chassis was in fact talked about and even shown on Battery Day.

That's what will be in the Y in Berlin initially, but not the new batteries. May see them in plaid eoy 2021, but that's the earliest.

 

[wipster]

With boring tunnels connecting the different buildings of course.

Loving the Boring tunnels! Hope they follow your advice. Then eventually all the employees will have Neuralinks as well... who needs text or email anymore eh?

 

[j6Lpi429@3j]

Dave Lee just made me believe 99% certitude than Elon is sandbagging to avoid Osborne effect

That video 100% mirrors what I've been thinking since battery day. Firstly, that the 'late 2021' deadline seems pretty safe, and likely very pessimistic, and secondly that given that the are making the new cells NOW, they must be earmarked for something. Dave reckons the semi, I would have guessed the plaid S, but as an investor I think the semi is the smarter move.

If I was elon, I'd be tempted to make a small number (100?) semis as soon as possible with the new cells, and both use some internally, and also get some out to actual paying customers. One-off demos are all very-well, but people seeing the semi actually out there in the real world delivering stuff for paying customers is the best possible way to drive demand for orders.

Something else thats occured to me since Battery Day. I have a 2015 model S 85D. My daily driving is all entrely home-powered. Maybe 8-10 times a year I drive to London and use a supercharger on the trip on the way out. If My next tesla had a 50% range boost, I wouldnt need to charge en-route. My supercharger usage would go from 10 visits a year to maybe one. Longer range is not just good for customers, it reduces the pressure on the supercharging network.

 

[Artful Dodger]

the 2170 packs could go to Model Y SR

Elon already said there are no plans for a Std Rge Model Y, 'too short range':

"Jul 13, 2020 - Tesla is scrapping plans for a bargain Model Y SUV because of its short range on a single charge, CEO Elon Musk said in a tweet ... No, as range would be unacceptably low (< 250 mile EPA). — Elon Musk (@elonmusk) July 13, 2020. Tesla says it is still planning a more affordable, single-engine version of Y"​

Tesla scraps plans for its bargain version of the Model Y - CNN

 

[Joe F]

i hit disagree by accident instead of funny.

my tmc trigger finger accuracy with comment reaction choices is ~70% on the iphone. am i the only one who can’t hit the broad side of a barn with likes, funnies, etc, using mobile? and i’m only 41, with good vision and motor skills. jeeze
(sorry, weekend thoughts)

Almost 24 hours behind so hopefully it’s not been pointed out to you already: One can zoom in to pick the right one, and I’m almost 30 years older than you and figured that out.

You’re welcome.

- A real boomer.

 

[UncaNed]

Dave Lee just made me believe 99% certitude than Elon is sandbagging to avoid Osborne effect

In 2023, the World will radically different

There will be more change in 3 years in automotive industry than in the last century

Those brief battery day video clips of the new cells being manufactured... weren't exactly some high school kid's science project. They looked like pretty impressive, well advanced automated banks of assembly line machines to me. I mean, if THAT'S their idea of just a pilot line...

 

[bkp_duke]

Those brief battery day video clips of the new cells being manufactured... weren't exactly some high school kid's science project. They looked like pretty impressive, well advanced automated banks of assembly line machines to me. I mean, if THAT'S their idea of just a pilot line...

I don't believe the machine automation is the hard part. Getting high yields, I believe that is going to be the overall rate limiting step. Elon didn't give out what % of cells at the end were usable, but he did pretty much state that the DBE was giving them some issues still. I would bet issues upstream like that would manifest as markedly lower yields when they go to charge/test the cells at the end of the process.

 

[j6Lpi429@3j]

Those brief battery day video clips of the new cells being manufactured... weren't exactly some high school kid's science project. They looked like pretty impressive, well advanced automated banks of assembly line machines to me. I mean, if THAT'S their idea of just a pilot line...

agreed 100%. Maybe I am a mass-production obsessive and tesla fanboy, but if they had a live webcam of that pilot line, I'd spend a scary amount of time just watching it

 

[Cosmacelf]

For your viewing pleasure

TLDR: Ravi demonstrates and breaks down how the new batteries are designed through the patents that were filed.

Sorry, but waaaay too long winded for me. Got up 10 minutes and they still hadn't said anything new. And he was just making guesses on energy density. And he didn't notice that volumetric energy density seems to have gone down.

Can someone summarize what new info was in that clip?

 

[Hock1]

Sorry, but waaaay too long winded for me. Got up 10 minutes and they still hadn't said anything new. And he was just making guesses on energy density. And he didn't notice that volumetric energy density seems to have gone down.

Can someone summarize what new info was in that clip?

No.

 

[MC3OZ]

I don't believe the machine automation is the hard part. Getting high yields, I believe that is going to be the overall rate limiting step. Elon didn't give out what % of cells at the end were usable, but he did pretty much state that the DBE was giving them some issues still. I would bet issues upstream like that would manifest as markedly lower yields when they go to charge/test the cells at the end of the process.

Keep in mind there were 3 phases:-

1. Bench process
2. Pilot line
3. Production line..

Yields could be good in 1. average in 2. and poor in 3.

If the bench process fundamentally achieved poor yields, my guess is they would solve the problem before proceeding to the next 2 phases...

So it is likely yields decrease when they attempt to speed up the process, or the perhaps bench process fluked good yields on a small sample size..

IMO raising the issue of yields was partially being honest and conservative, and partially sandbagging... as a form of sandbagging it was highly effective...

As you say we don't know the % of cells that were usable, low yields could mean anything in the range of 5%-80% usable...

 

[Unpilot]

Futures are green ATM.

 

[Right_Said_Fred]

Does anyone expect the Q3 financial report to come out on Wednesday 21 October or is that too early? Is 28 October more likely? I wonder if there has ever been a report coming out as early as three weeks after the end of a quarter.

Asking for a friend with options that expire on 23 October.

 

[wipster]

OT, but too cool!

InsideEVs : Watch This Amazing Cardboard Tesla Cybertruck Go Off Roading.
Watch This Amazing Cardboard Tesla Cybertruck Go Off Roading

 

[AlMc]

Does anyone expect the Q3 financial report to come out on Wednesday 21 October or is that too early? Is 28 October more likely? I wonder if there has ever been a report coming out as early as three weeks after the end of a quarter.

Asking for a friend with options that expire on 23 October.

for your friend.....TSLA Earnings Date, Forecast and Report (Tesla)...short answer..Yes, as recently as last quarter

 

[Artful Dodger]

How do you know the plaid in september was limited to 500 kW?

Tesla posted the data on Twitter:

@Tesla on Twitter | Sep 19, 2019​

"Data from our track tests indicates that Model S Plaid can achieve 7:20 at the Nürburgring. With some improvements, 7:05 may be possible when Model S returns next month."​

Sep 19, 2019​

"Until then, auf Wiedersehen Germany Here’s some of our initial Model S Plaid data to keep you buzzing until we return:"​

Read the Y-axis of this chart for 500 kW max power, then compare power to the various locations on the road course. This was discussed extensively here on TMC in Sep'19.

Cheers!

 

[AudubonB]

Is the course run clockwise or widdershins? From the power patterns, I’m going to guess clockwise.

 

[ggr]

Is the course run clockwise or widdershins? From the power patterns, I’m going to guess clockwise.

Surely you mean sunwise?

 

[ZachF]

IIRC Elon claimed on 3rd Row that almost all legacy auto profits came from parts... And that’s a disadvantage for a rapidly growing company like Tesla.

It's also likely a business model that can't be replicated on an EV with ~100x less moving parts.