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OT What are the chances?? I saw THREE Rivian trucks charging at the Electrify America site besides the Gaylord, MI Supercharger. (We're on a road trip from Ottawa, ON to Chicago and back.)

I was like a kid as - for a change - I had all the questions! The first two below are new buyers, and at far right is the third truck driven by two Rivian employees that I didn't meet. Comments the middle owner gave me:
  • "It's exceeded all my expectations"
  • "It's totally modern and well thought-out, just like my Model Y"
  • "The range is pretty good, and the truck estimates better than my Model Y does, which tends to over-estimate range"
  • "Rivian's working on a full kitchen add-in that slides out of the compartment behind the seats"
  • "The only thing I'm a bit disappointed in is the automatic trunk cover - see? it's rubbing here, and the motor really grinds, I feel like it's going to break"
  • "I like the extra front camera pointing down off the front- there are 11 cameras or something, so their Sentry Mode equivalent is pretty amazing"
  • "I bought it because I want to be able to haul stuff from the store, and also to go camping, like we're doing this weekend. We're heading to Markette in UP (Michigan Upper Peninsula, 244 miles). I'm a bit worried as they're no chargers up there!"
Because he owns a Y, there was no animosity either way, and he was pretty fair. We were both just happy to share info.

As someone who cares most about the environment vs. beating other EV manufacturers, I say bring it on, Rivian. That said, I feel like I saw half of their June production in one place!

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A bit off topic here. I went to the Rivian flagstone near Venice Beach and spent some time in the display vehicles there.

I was so impressed with Rivian. Their infotainment system is almost on par with Tesla's and far superior to any legacy OEM. Navigation is Tesla like. Build quality is excellent.

Had Cybertruck not been introduced, I would get the Rivian R1T alongside the Model 3 as personal vehicles. That being said, I'm very looking forward to get the Cybertruck some time down the road.

At the same time, while I'm rooting for Rivian, I'm not 100% sure they will pull thru production hell. Their cash burn is crazy.
 
COVID appears to be seasonal, so another Shanghai shutdown, if one were to occur, probably wouldn’t happen until Q1/2 of 2023… however unless China abandons their dumb zero COVID policy I suspect the chance of that happening is probably better than not… 😕
COVID shows no signs of being seasonal. People keep saying this, but all the evidence says otherwise. So the next Shanghai shutdown may appear at any time.
 
Her first charging experience. At SuperCharger location in Newport Beach, she went to EVGo stall by mistake. Pathetic charging rate, hour later 8% to <50%. She was furious. Was going to cancel her order for a Y.
EVGo? Did she connect to a L2 charger with the J1772 adaptor?

Of course it would have been painfully slow.

Maybe her nav took her to a location where there are Superchargers and she didn’t see the Tesla ones? My first charging experience with my Model Y was surprisingly pleasant.
 
COVID shows no signs of being seasonal. People keep saying this, but all the evidence says otherwise. So the next Shanghai shutdown may appear at any time.
COVID 19 tends to expand when people are in close proximity indoors. School, traditional work environments and the use of transit (trains, buses, planes, etc.) encourage transmission. The present strains are more infectious than influenza and in that regard are similar to the classes of viruses that cause the common cold. Hence, there appears to be a higher baseline of COVID 19 infections and the seasonality (like as observed with the flu) is damped out. That's a simulation modelling based opinion and is not medical in nature. An infectious disease expert might see it differently.
 
COVID shows no signs of being seasonal. People keep saying this, but all the evidence says otherwise. So the next Shanghai shutdown may appear at any time.
Now that they have successfully implemented closed loop production once before, I suspect the next Shanghai lockdown will not be as consequential. This is doubly true because at some point Chairman Pooh must realize that crashing China's economy over and over again is going to cause him and his Party a lot of problems if he keeps doing it.
 
Now that they have successfully implemented closed loop production once before, I suspect the next Shanghai lockdown will not be as consequential. This is doubly true because at some point Chairman Pooh must realize that crashing China's economy over and over again is going to cause him and his Party a lot of problems if he keeps doing it.
possibly true, but it also depends on Tesla's suppliers doing likewise, which is an unknown,
 
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Batteries are the key to growing the business…in 2023.

Tesla has repeatedly said chip supply is the constraint until Q1 ‘23 when 4680s need to be in mass production. In the Q1 call they even said they had an inventory of unused battery cells because they didn’t have enough chips.

Besides, there is no evidence I’m aware of that Tesla lacks focus on the 4680 ramp.
The very optimistic view at this point would be they are battery constrained in 2023 only. A more moderate view is that they are constrained in 2024. Panasonic is not planning to deliver volume 4680 until 2024. A more pessimistic view is that they are constrained til 2025.

I believe that Tesla has a very small window left to grab a material slice of the energy business. The LFP capacity is arriving and already other companies are winning business because Tesla is unable to meet demand, the sector is not as hidebound and inflexible as the auto OEMs, the demand is there. It's great to see PG&E working with Tesla on a virtual power solution-why not 2 years ago? Tesla management took their eyes off the battery ball, hopefully they have refocused.

When the single greatest constraint to renewables is storage (not FSD ) and the single greatest constraint to sustainable transport is batteries (not FSD) than what should be the greatest focus of management?
 
My brother, who always dismissed EV's and rejected any suggestion to ever consider getting a Tesla when he was car shopping, recently just put a deposit on a Bolt. He said he's tired of paying $150 a week in gas and wants an economical commuter car.

I haven't really paid much attention to prices lately, but he's getting a new Bolt for about $30k and said GM will even pay up to $1k towards the installation of a home charging setup. It's crazy to think that the Bolt used to be a direct competitor to the Model 3, with a similar sticker price and now it's nearly $20k less.
Even cheaper to get a leaf sometimes. Some folks are going to have some sticker resale shock in 3-4 years I think as battery capacity catches up to demand and EV prices fall.
 
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When the single greatest constraint to renewables is storage (not FSD ) and the single greatest constraint to sustainable transport is batteries (not FSD) than what should be the greatest focus of management?
Do both. If there is no clear reason that doing so would delay either, and, there is no clear advantage to delaying one for the other.

This is a team sport and they have teams within teams working on many of these goals simultaneously. You are trying to make it appear that they are spread thin when the opposite is the actuality. They are spread thick, and have resources to devote more to either FSD or Batteries, and, any other aspect of the business (Cybertruck, Semi, Solar), as necessary.

Building factories is about the slowest thing Tesla does, and they do that faster than anyone else. Like the Tesla Economist recently said, "Tesla is the machine that builds the machine that builds the machines"

There isn't any other company on the planet devoting this amount of resources toward these types of projects. So, sure, there are some who are seeing the opportunity and moving into these spaces. So what? They are working toward achieving Tesla's Mission as well. Kudos for them!
 
The very optimistic view at this point would be they are battery constrained in 2023 only. A more moderate view is that they are constrained in 2024. Panasonic is not planning to deliver volume 4680 until 2024. A more pessimistic view is that they are constrained til 2025.

I believe that Tesla has a very small window left to grab a material slice of the energy business. The LFP capacity is arriving and already other companies are winning business because Tesla is unable to meet demand, the sector is not as hidebound and inflexible as the auto OEMs, the demand is there. It's great to see PG&E working with Tesla on a virtual power solution-why not 2 years ago? Tesla management took their eyes off the battery ball, hopefully they have refocused.

When the single greatest constraint to renewables is storage (not FSD ) and the single greatest constraint to sustainable transport is batteries (not FSD) than what should be the greatest focus of management?

The only person likely to be working on batteries and FSD is Elon.

On battery day some senior members of the team came up for the Q&A.

On autonomy day we met some of the team.

I am guessing little to no overlap in team members, no overlap in equipment. Adequate cash reserves to fund both projects, and all of the other projects.

Megapack storage is moving to LFP, perhaps that is overdue. Has the ball been dropped, or do things just take time?

IMO a lot of what Drew said on battery day did relate to energy storage, it is a target and part of the mission.
 
The very optimistic view at this point would be they are battery constrained in 2023 only. A more moderate view is that they are constrained in 2024. Panasonic is not planning to deliver volume 4680 until 2024. A more pessimistic view is that they are constrained til 2025.

I believe that Tesla has a very small window left to grab a material slice of the energy business. The LFP capacity is arriving and already other companies are winning business because Tesla is unable to meet demand, the sector is not as hidebound and inflexible as the auto OEMs, the demand is there. It's great to see PG&E working with Tesla on a virtual power solution-why not 2 years ago? Tesla management took their eyes off the battery ball, hopefully they have refocused.

When the single greatest constraint to renewables is storage (not FSD ) and the single greatest constraint to sustainable transport is batteries (not FSD) than what should be the greatest focus of management?
You are missing @Gigapress's point, and the reality of the situation. Other than the semiconductor shortage of the past few years, Tesla has been cell limited since the Model 3 launched with Automotive prioritized over Energy.
Tesla will put every cell it can buy or make into a product. In the future there may be a shift to manufacturing limited on the automotive side due to the new 4680 lines since they are less capital and floor space intensive; however, that can be offset by Semi and its thirst for kWh along with Powerwall if it stays in the non-LFP space.
 
Here for the one searching some green today.
 

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I expect in Europe and China similar weak numbers from 'the competition is coming"

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Bear Argument: The Tesla increase comes from Fremont only sending out 3 ships for export in Q2 2022 vs 10 ships in Q2 2021. Of course with more Fremont production dedicated to the US, they will show YoY growth.

Bull Argument: Tesla shipped 53% more cars into the US in Q2 2022 vs Q2 2021; this must mean that wait times and backlog have decreased.
No . . despite the 53% increase, backlog and wait times have doubled in the US since last year demonstrating that the best advertising for Tesla is a sold vehicle. For every car they sell, they generate 2 new sales 😁
 
The dangers of being dependent on ICE exports:

As Germany’s auto production has collapsed by half, its trade surplus (which a few years ago was the largest in the world IIRC) has completely disappeared.
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Japan isn’t fairing much better… the yen is losing so much value that Japan may join Argentina in the dubious status of being an un-developing nation.

EDIT-here’s Japan, it’s trade deficit last month was equal to about 5% of GDP
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New info via private sources of teslamag.de on Giga Berlin:
  • Two week shutdown starting next week for upgrades
  • Upgrades include doubling production clock from 90 to 45 seconds
  • Still only two shifts afterwards (there had been a rumor of 3 shifts/24hr operation)
  • 6% higher wages for everyone but management from Aug