Latest From Musk: Production Cybertruck almost exactly same but better. No door handles. 4 wheel steering. Self opening doors.

[JBee]

All of these features are great but from from what I have researched the production of the CT probably won’t begin until Q2 2022. Look at some of the of the puzzle pieces that have yet to come together;
*8-ton Giga casting machine
*4680 cell manufacturing building
*Steel Dynamics stainless steel factory in Stinton (rumored to be the 3mm thick stainless steel supplier for the Cybertruck)
*Supply chain issues that the public is not privy to

Also, Rivian announced today that the all electric R1T pickup has now been delayed until September. It was scheduled to start production in June and then it slipped to July.

How many vehicles have Rivian built so far? I don't think they're a good measuring stick for CT progress.

I can generally agree with the 8k ton press, but as Cybergus pointed out they might have made the tooling for a 2 part CT cast in the Fremont line. Tooling is not cheap, but cheaper and faster to get than a new press. I think making the first structural pack will be in Keto rd or Fremont too. Until they get 4680 cell lines up in Austin and Berlin.

Its not uncommon at all to have parts or vehicle assembly groups made in different places and shipped to the final assembly line.

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[tidmutt]

First responders are typically other road users that don't have training or tools to get you out. A handle gives you a clear point of entry for those that don't know, and a place to exert some amount of force to open a door. Same for when the door is iced over. If its only a latch, i wonder how dirty and scratched up the door will get when you grab the edge to open it.

I'd like to see their solution for this.

As for V2G, V2H and V2V and battery and inverter less PV charging, Orca already make a solution for that. But Tesla really need to include it as it will cost them next to nothing in hardware it software to do.

We done some numbers on another thread and it works out that if you only have 10% of EVs plugged in via V2G at home at any time, you'd have enough capacity to run SC chargers for everyone else that needs them, who normally don't charge at home or work via a L2. And you'd be able to do that with only cycling the EV battery less than 15%.

That is scalable too, so small remote low capacity grids with even just 100 EVs would work. It would also allow greater PV penetration in those grids, which would in turn reduce power costs. No brainer... Tesla needs to do their numbers.

Yes, I feel like this should be mandatory. It's almost criminal to have those batteries sitting there doing nothing. The more EVs there are the better it will work, the less cycling of individuals batteries as well. It feels like a no-brainer, at least have the hardware there, ready.

 

[Ogre]

All of these features are great but from from what I have researched the production of the CT probably won’t begin until Q2 2022.

If it is truly that far off, then it is quite odd that when you order a new Cybertruck it still shows EOY 2021 as start of production.

Also, Rivian announced today that the all electric R1T pickup has now been delayed until September. It was scheduled to start production in June and then it slipped to July.

This is neither here nor there when it comes to Cybertruck production.

 

[JBee]

Yes, I feel like this should be mandatory. It's almost criminal to have those batteries sitting there doing nothing. The more EVs there are the better it will work, the less cycling of individuals batteries as well. It feels like a no-brainer, at least have the hardware there, ready.

I've said it before, and I'll say it again. No bigger waste of energy storage resource than a parked not connected EV. Most cars spend most of the time parked, not driven. So why not embed a return for parked EVs if the hardware is already there??

Just imagine you could get car park garages to pay you to park there in the city!

 

[tmeyer3]

Yes, I feel like this should be mandatory. It's almost criminal to have those batteries sitting there doing nothing. The more EVs there are the better it will work, the less cycling of individuals batteries as well. It feels like a no-brainer, at least have the hardware there, ready.

They should make home batteries and solar (and/or wind, depending on location) standard in house builds. I'm not a fan of "mandatory" anything, personally. But 25kwh battery storage and 8kw solar will come out to around $30k without a builder's discount. It makes sense to me to add that into a standard mortgage, just like the walls, foundation, etc etc.

In most areas, that kind of system would pay for itself in 10-15 years (again, depending on cost of electricity and area) while having a 25 year warranty.... I mean, this would add a much smaller cost to your monthly mortgage payment than the difference you'd owe in an electricity bill. Go do the math yourself! Why this isn't done already blows my mind. It will always come out cheaper / month to bundle power storage and generation into a 30 year mortgage than to pay an equivalent electricity bill.

Imo, this is the obvious way to go. But I very much doubt power companies will want this to become standard in the building industry.

Cheers

 

[tidmutt]

This friend of mine borrowed an old truck from his girlfriend, in which the outer door button didn't work on the driver's side.

He was picking up an old stove at the dump, but first had to get the stove out of the huge dumpster. Too heavy to lift, so he tied a rope to the stove and the hitch, and put the truck in drive to tighten up the rope, then got out to help unhook the stove from the lip of the dumpster.

The rope broke, the truck took off, and he went running after it trying to try and get his hand in the window before it hit the woman in the shack who worked there. Missed her, and stalled on a hill. So much for not having a door handle that works that day.

errrr.... I suspect the CT will freak out if you get out of it with it in D still. My car (not a Tesla) would freak out and engage the brake.

It's also a pretty silly thing to do, no offense to your friend. The danger inherent in that little stunt... ick... He left a vehicle essentially out of control. Could have ended much worse. There is zero reason why you should be chasing after a car and trying to get in. I suppose you could use the summon feature to tighten the rope... lol

 

[Crissa]

Remember, 90% of the parts at Shanghai were imported into the factory when they started production.

Tesla is quite willing and able to bootstrap early production with other factories. Kato is producing and testing 4680s, and has been for something like a year or so. Who knows how many they have squirreled away?

Like, has anyone noticed how many cast frame sections are stored around the Fremont factory? They do this all the time.

errrr.... I suspect the CT will freak out if you get out of it with it in D still. My car (not a Tesla) would freak out and engage the brake.

Tesla will just go into Park when you unbuckle, and FSD Beta will disengage if you lift your butt, and they've warned they're adding the internal camera to that system of checks, too.

But you could just use Summon mode.

-Crissa

Oh! It goes into park when you open your door, too.

 

[tidmutt]

They should make home batteries and solar (and/or wind, depending on location) standard in house builds. I'm not a fan of "mandatory" anything, personally. But 25kwh battery storage and 8kw solar will come out to around $30k without a builder's discount. It makes sense to me to add that into a standard mortgage, just like the walls, foundation, etc etc.

In most areas, that kind of system would pay for itself in 10-15 years (again, depending on cost of electricity and area) while having a 25 year warranty.... I mean, this would add a much smaller cost to your monthly mortgage payment than the difference you'd owe in an electricity bill. Go do the math yourself! Why this isn't done already blows my mind. It will always come out cheaper / month to bundle power storage and generation into a 30 year mortgage than to pay an equivalent electricity bill.

Imo, this is the obvious way to go. But I very much doubt power companies will want this to become standard in the building industry.

Cheers

No argument here! Given that it generates a return it's a pretty easy sell. In fact, the mortgage holders should be jumping at this opportunity. Guaranteed revenue generating asset... in fact, there has to be a way to structure it so the homeowner doesn't even take on the debt, unless they want to I guess.

If the world worked logically we would be working on systems like this. Instead we'll get politics, corruption, bribes in the form of campaign donations, FUD, fear mongering about socialism and so on ad nauseum.

 

[tmeyer3]

I've said it before, and I'll say it again. No bigger waste of energy storage resource than a parked not connected EV. Most cars spend most of the time parked, not driven. So why not embed a return for parked EVs if the hardware is already there??

Just imagine you could get car park garages to pay you to park there in the city!

OPINION:
I realize this will be an unpopular opinion, but I wouldn't use this option even it was available. Here's why:
1. I want my car charged when I need to use it, not discharged running my AC.
2. As batteries stand today, they do not have unlimited cycles. I'd prefer to isolate battery usage to miles since that's what they're optimized for. My home can have it's own batteries.
3. I can get a much better price on home battery backups per kWh by just buying batteries. When they're wrapped up in a car, I'd be paying quite the premium in the long term to run my house (or anyone else's!!) with my car. A 62 kWh car is around $45k, OR I could just get 62 kWh added to my refi for about $25k. I'd rather brutally cycle the cheaper ones WITHOUT the car premium.

Cheers!

 

[tidmutt]

I've said it before, and I'll say it again. No bigger waste of energy storage resource than a parked not connected EV. Most cars spend most of the time parked, not driven. So why not embed a return for parked EVs if the hardware is already there??

Just imagine you could get car park garages to pay you to park there in the city!

Agreed! The only real argument I've heard against it is the impact on cycle life but that can be mitigated by:

• Set agreements on capacity used/frequency
• More EVs on the road means less frequency
• Higher cycle life batteries

 

[tmeyer3]

No argument here! Given that it generates a return it's a pretty easy sell. In fact, the mortgage holders should be jumping at this opportunity. Guaranteed revenue generating asset... in fact, there has to be a way to structure it so the homeowner doesn't even take on the debt, unless they want to I guess.

If the world worked logically we would be working on systems like this. Instead we'll get politics, corruption, bribes in the form of campaign donations, FUD, fear mongering about socialism and so on ad nauseum.

The key here would be appealing to the powers that benefit: namely Banks. The mortgage lenders would benefit massively here. Counter lobbyists with more lobbyists!!

 

[Crissa]

1. I want my car charged when I need to use it, not discharged running my AC.
2. As batteries stand today, they do not have unlimited cycles. I'd prefer to isolate battery usage to miles since that's what they're optimized for. My home can have it's own batteries.
3. I can get a much better price on home battery backups per kWh by...

1. You're rarely using more than a few percent of your range at any time. You don't want it always charged to full, lest your batteries wear out faster. The rest of the time, it's just sitting around.
2. Batteries also don't have unlimited age either. If say, you just let it use the 40-60% SoC, you would see no additional degradation over a massive amount of time.
3. Cheaper? What's cheaper than 'I already paid for these batteries sitting in the driveway'?

Giving it 20% of a Model 3 would be ~15kWh which is over half what the average American house uses. That could move all your peak hour usage to non-peak hours.

-Crissa

 

[JBee]

They should make home batteries and solar (and/or wind, depending on location) standard in house builds. I'm not a fan of "mandatory" anything, personally. But 25kwh battery storage and 8kw solar will come out to around $30k without a builder's discount. It makes sense to me to add that into a standard mortgage, just like the walls, foundation, etc etc.

In most areas, that kind of system would pay for itself in 10-15 years (again, depending on cost of electricity and area) while having a 25 year warranty.... I mean, this would add a much smaller cost to your monthly mortgage payment than the difference you'd owe in an electricity bill. Go do the math yourself! Why this isn't done already blows my mind. It will always come out cheaper / month to bundle power storage and generation into a 30 year mortgage than to pay an equivalent electricity bill.

Imo, this is the obvious way to go. But I very much doubt power companies will want this to become standard in the building industry.

Cheers

Even better is that the property developer does not put in grid power saving you $10-15k on the property and that pays for your solar and storage on a passive home that uses less than 1kW continous, so you don't need to pay $30k for power you will just waste in a normal house. I paid $9k for 30Kw of offgrid inverters with 24kWh of battery, and got the panels from the gov for free.

 

[Ogre]

They should make home batteries and solar (and/or wind, depending on location) standard in house builds.

I think California did make solar mandatory.

The problem with making battery storage mandatory is currently Tesla can't make Powerwall's fast enough to meet demand. I don't know how other companies are in terms of production capacity, but I suspect they are similarly supply constrained.

Certainly once capacity is good enough it makes sense.

 

[tmeyer3]

1. You're rarely using more than a few percent of your range at any time. You don't want it always charged to full, lest your batteries wear out faster. The rest of the time, it's just sitting around.
2. Batteries also don't have unlimited age either. If say, you just let it use the 40-60% SoC, you would see no additional degradation over a massive amount of time.
3. Cheaper? What's cheaper than 'I already paid for these batteries sitting in the driveway'?

Giving it 20% of a Model 3 would be ~15kWh which is over half what the average American house uses. That could move all your peak hour usage to non-peak hours.

-Crissa

All great points! I'm just of the opinion houses should already have this equipped when built.

I'm my situation, I'm completely self powered. So I would hate to cycle my m3 as hard as I do my powerwalls. But I'm certainly not the majority there.

More options are always better!

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