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

[SmokyPeat]

Tesla Cybertruck’s Race Against A Porsche 911 Was Apparently An 1/8-Mile Run

Tesla raced its brand-new Cybertruck against a Porsche 911 while towing an identical 911 and won. However, it doesn't appear to be over a quarter mile at all.

insideevs.com

This seems a bit self-owny?

Like, other than bragging this wasn't a comparison buyers were gonna care about anyway- but even then they could've just said what the race actually was, or run it without the trailer over the distance claimed.

Instead they just fed Q an actual seemingly legit criticism of what Tesla said vs what they actually did.

I don't think Tesla said it was a quarter mile drag race. I've watched a fair amount of drag races, so it was pretty apparent to me that it was 1/8 mile. They did put up the Cybertrucks quarter mile time at the end of that demo, so maybe you could interpret that as misleading, I suppose. But it was obvious that was the unladen 1/4 mile time to me, not the demo time. The bouncy ball demo is the one I could have done without.

 

[Knightshade]

You are claiming a public company made a decision based on its benefit to a private company controlled by its CEO ?

What, like sending Tesla engineers to do work at Twitter?

I don't think Tesla said it was a quarter mile drag race.

It can tow a Porsche 911 across a quarter mile faster than the Porsche 911 can go by itself

(bold added for emphasis)

 

[Tony73]

Tesla Cybertruck’s Race Against A Porsche 911 Was Apparently An 1/8-Mile Run

Tesla raced its brand-new Cybertruck against a Porsche 911 while towing an identical 911 and won. However, it doesn't appear to be over a quarter mile at all.

insideevs.com

This seems a bit self-owny?

Like, other than bragging this wasn't a comparison buyers were gonna care about anyway- but even then they could've just said what the race actually was, or run it without the trailer over the distance claimed.

Instead they just fed Q an actual seemingly legit criticism of what Tesla said vs what they actually did.

Completely unnecessary. Beating a 911 over an eighth of a mile while towing a 911 is impressive enough. Why embellish ?
Right there, I knew it smelt funny.

 

[Skryll]

What's the rocket made of? Economies of scale.

Also Tesla benefits from materials science already done

 

[EQC_]

I am curious tho....if the reason the glass broke 4 years ago was because "the hammer weakened the glass"....what was the reason not to repeat the demonstration since no hammers were used in last week's demonstration? Is it possible that "the hammer weakened the glass" isn't the whole story?

The hammer weakening the glass was a nice theory...but if I remember correctly, didn't the hammer only hit the front door? But then the glass broke on the front door with one ball throw...and then the back window broke too on the next ball throw?

A couple thoughts I had on that:
- Maybe only the front window had the special glass for that demo truck...and the hammer was indeed the factor that weakened it. And the back window was regular glass and wasn't supposed to be used at all that day.

- Or, maybe there was a "fluke" with the strange nature of glass...so that a "real world" test had variables that they hadn't yet seen in the behind-the-scenes testing.


On that second note, I mean that glass really is sortof a strange material. It can be very strong under the right conditions, but shatter very easily if the right sort of hit happens. You can find videos online of reporters trying to show how easy it is to break into a car...and they hit a window with a standard metal carpenter's hammer multiple times and it just doesn't break. I've seen videos of people standing and sortof bouncy-jumping on the glass roof of a Tesla and it doesn't break (NOTE: I would never try that!). But I've also seen that if the right small shard of ceramic is thrown at a car window, it can shatter -- the little ceramic shard just does a better job of dinging the lattice structure of the glass, and allowing cracks to propogate.

In the original Cybertruck reveal, the first demo showed a clean metal ball dropped down a glass tube and hitting a sample of the glass. No damage. Maybe that ball was perfectly clean? I have vague memories of the ball being picked up off the floor before at least one of Franz's throws -- maybe the heavy metal ball picked up some grit from the floor, and that grit acted like the ceramic shard and dinged the lattice allowing cracks to propogate?

 

[SmokyPeat]

What, like sending Tesla engineers to do work at Twitter?







(bold added for emphasis)

I guess I missed that. Yeah, that is definitely misleading then.

 

[navguy12]

City of Vancouver (BC) announces their first BEV firetruck.

The short video description includes “being able to stand straight up (unless you are over 6’5”)” and sounds of the crowd reacting to the unexpected rate of acceleration.

I wonder if Tesla feels there would be a market for the rolling chassis (such as what is/will be used for, in the standard range semi) to be the basis for things like this and other municipal heavy vehicles:

https://www.cbc.ca/player/play/2289273923784

 

[GrandEnigma]

City of Vancouver (BC) announces their first BEV firetruck.

The short video description includes “being able to stand straight up (unless you are over 6’5”)” and sounds of the crowd reacting to the unexpected rate of acceleration.

I wonder if Tesla feels there would be a market for the rolling chassis (such as what is/will be used for, in the standard range semi) to be the basis for things like this and other municipal heavy vehicles:

https://www.cbc.ca/player/play/2289273923784

Can it put it self out when it catches on fire?

Wonder what the efficiency is of such a thing.

 

[EQC_]

It can tow a Porsche 911 across a quarter mile faster than the Porsche 911 can go by itself

(bold added for emphasis)

Ha ha ha! But you see, the Porsche 911 can't "go by itself" at all. With the Cybertruck, you could turn on autopilot/FSD, and as soon as the light turns green the Cybertruck could drive itself to the finish line at whatever speed; the driver just supervises. But the 911 would just sit there until the driver hit the gas pedal.

Honestly, I do think Elon made an unintentional mistake here...he probably didn't even realize it was an 1/8th mile demo. But, it is funny that in the most literal sense, he is correct.

There are a lot of Tesla-related tweets that people have complained about (cough "broken promises") that, upon re-reading, the "promise" was more in the interpretation that somebody read, and Elon's literal words were still accurate.

 

[navguy12]

Can it put it self out when it catches on fire?

Wonder what the efficiency is of such a thing.

Don’t know the answer to the first observation, but I can guarantee that it’s more efficient that whatever it replaced.

 

[Usain]

FTFY

I know a lot of people always say Elon is sandbagging. But I don't buy it. I think his Asperger's doesn't allow him to play sandbagging games.

It seems to me that Elon tends to say exactly what he thinks. Sometimes that's good. Sometimes it's a problem. But that's who he is.

 

[Usain]

I'm still curious if people think they will unveil the "Model 2" as a surprise CT-stainless steel type body, rather than the traditional 3/Y type body. Is that possible cost-wise? Production speed-wise? Seems unlikely to me, but as they have been so good at keeping this new production line under wraps, I would be pleasantly shocked. That decision would draw some headlines, I would think.

On the one hand, stainless would make a lot of sense for a Robotaxi. If you want a car that just keeps going for years and years, stainless might be a good choice.

On the other hand, it would make the car a lot more expensive to produce and I believe either Elon or Drew already publicly said it would not be like the Cybertruck?

 

[Christine69420]

Looks like a date was set in Denmark for 3F Union to also block Tesla shipments. (I'm assuming they mean Trains). They can still drive them in on car carriers right? Would Norway also be impacted then?

Edit: Adding Map.

Spoiler: Map

View attachment 996634

On Tuesday, 3F, Denmark's largest union, said that its transport workers will launch a strike in solidarity with Tesla workers in Sweden if the company does not reach a collective wage agreement with them by December 18. ​

Danish port workers have vowed to neither unload nor load Tesla vehicles and drivers will not receive and transport Tesla cars going through Denmark. ​

Most cars to Norway come by ship from further south - Benelux or Germany.

 

[Usain]

I am curious tho....if the reason the glass broke 4 years ago was because "the hammer weakened the glass"....what was the reason not to repeat the demonstration since no hammers were used in last week's demonstration? Is it possible that "the hammer weakened the glass" isn't the whole story?

Sort answer: Yes, it's possible that the hammer was not the whole story.

Longer answer: They didn't want to take any chances this time around lest a failed demo become the talk of the planet. Note that there were no live demos except the lame baseball toss. They wanted a low-risk event. I'm surprised they even let Elon jump into the bed of the Cybertruck. What if he slipped and fell?

 

[scaesare]

I am curious tho....if the reason the glass broke 4 years ago was because "the hammer weakened the glass"....what was the reason not to repeat the demonstration since no hammers were used in last week's demonstration? Is it possible that "the hammer weakened the glass" isn't the whole story?

I wondered that too.

One possibility is that the setting (kinda in the middle of a crowd) didn't make hucking a 10lb steel ball all that safe. Kinda maybe why the baseball throw was so lame too... or maybe that was just Franz flubbing it.

 

[Usain]

Today's update on the view counts for Cybertruck reviewers (in millions):

Date	Top Gear	Hagerty	Marques Brownlee
12/3/2023	2.0	2.8	9.7
12/4/2023	2.4	3.3	12.0
12/5/2023	2.8	3.7	14.0

I don't know how much longer I'll keep posting this. Maybe another day or two. Brownlee's top five videos of all time should include his CT video by then.

 

[FastCompany]

I was disappointed by that interview honestly. I was listening on my walk, so no video. The 'paid advertisement' portion went on so long (6+ minutes!), I wondered if I had butt-dialed to the next video in my queue! Also, I thought Sandy should have listened more and talked less.

 

[Gigapress]

Yes I agree that SS has lots of benefits. There was some commentary from Franz that they were able to redesign the body to take advantage of the SS exterior, but overall I'm still not seeing any evidence of weight savings.

Curb weight of the cybertruck AWD is ~6600 lbs vs. ~5000lbs for an F150 Supercrew 4x4 V8

The F150 Lighting with extended battery is 6400 to 6900lbs depending on trim level

Won't matter very much if they can get production ramped and battery performance up 15%

Comparing to ICE truck is not fair because the battery mass makes a big difference. This is evidenced by the F-150 Lightning weighing about 35% more than the ICE equivalent.

Also, the weight efficiency of a stressed-skin design does not necessarily result in overall weight savings, because there are so many variables. It is an exercise in futility to estimate without more information. What it does for sure is free up mass budget for making design trades. Tesla included several CT design features that should save mass, but then added other features that add mass.

Here are some examples of trades Tesla engineers chose for CT that cost extra mass vs the Lightning and Rivian:

1) At the delivery event, it was revealed that the CT has more torsional rigidity than a McLaren P1. Traditional ladder-frame trucks are nowhere close to this. Combined with air suspension, this should majorly improve handling both on and off road, and especially while towing and hauling heavy loads.​

​

2) Almost double the motor power (vs Lightning, but matches top-trim quadmotor Rivian)​

​

3) Rated to tow, haul and pull substantially more​

​

4) Rear-wheel steering and all the accompanying hardware​

​

5) Sturdy (heavy) glass​

​

6) Superior crash safety (I speculate)​

​

7) 5 inches more bed length​

Tesla could have saved mass by reducing these key performance metrics. Instead, they apparently decided to design a tough, high-performing beast that comes in line with the competition on mass and length/width/height. Only a teardown and system analysis like Munro & Associates will do can give us a clear picture of how much the design overall was mass-efficient.

But the cargo/hauling capacity does not appear to actually be better than similar sized non-SS-exo trucks. The production cargo capacity is 1000 lbs less than the 2019 announcement, and towing max is 3000 lbs less.

What numbers are you looking at?

Cybertruck is rated to tow 11000 lbs and haul 2500 lbs. It's not as good as the original plan, but still market-leading in its class.

Below are the specs for F-150 Lightning. Even the maxed-out trim for towing only does 10000 and the maxed trim for hauling is 2235, and you can't get both in the same truck.

The Rivian tows up to 11000, but hauls only 1764, despite weighing more than CT and being smaller.

 

[Cosmacelf]

I'm still curious if people think they will unveil the "Model 2" as a surprise CT-stainless steel type body, rather than the traditional 3/Y type body. Is that possible cost-wise? Production speed-wise? Seems unlikely to me, but as they have been so good at keeping this new production line under wraps, I would be pleasantly shocked. That decision would draw some headlines, I would think.

My guess is no. People want specific paint colors for their cars. Also SS would require Model 2 to look really angular. CT customers will put up with the look since the SS is functional for a truck. SS provides no benefits for a run about car.

 

[SmokyPeat]

They wanted a low-risk event. I'm surprised they even let Elon jump into the bed of the Cybertruck. What if he slipped and fell?

Absolutely agree that they wanted low risk. I'm not sure "they" had much say in Elon jumping into the truck bed, though. Elon will do Elon. "They" probably would have preferred that he didn't hide in the shadows for part of the presentation either, but ....