RE:RE:RE:Automobile buyers will be the real winners. Imagine that
Hightowntrader wrote: I see this as an "every motive has an ulterior motive" scenerio.
If you want to see exactly what the cost implications of using 2 Giga pieces instead of 400 pieces are simply buy a Tesla and get into a fender bender. Instead of replacing 5 to 10 pieces, you will be replacing one Giga piece. Fender benders will become Giga benders, and the Giga price will astound you as well as the Giga waste!
Made in house and installed in house? Am I driving my totalled car all the way to Texas for replacement or is Elon shipping a large replacement part 3000 miles to my house or local dealership? This really does sound cheaper doesn't it?
I'm pretty sure everybody realizes why manufaturers put endless amounts of useless gizmo options around the entire perimeter of every vehicle right? A person could swivel their head, or buy a $3 convex mirror, but the sensing mirrors/lane departure/cruise braking sensors all cost a fortune to replace evey time any part of the vehicle is massaged. It's especially profiable on entry level models the newly licensed teens get for University.
Keep remembering that nobody does anything to "help" you. Elon bought Twitter and wanted everyone to pay for a monthly memebership. Is anyone naive enough to think that he is throwing out freebies for Tesla's?
LOL!
you raised a good example of improving efficiency, it tend to reduces flexibility.
This 1 piece gigacasting and proprietary manufacturing does drive down cost of production but it drives out flexibility and fixability. Tesla EV becomes like a disposable product (in consumer point of view) and only certain agents with the proprietary specss and equop can frix and/or recycle them,
frame
technically, a giga cast frame can be fixed but when tesla withhold frame specs, no stand alone body shops can fix the frame when they dunno the OEM specs to get back to. Just like apple product, one of many story i heard was apple want 450 USD to fix a tablet. A computer shop can fix it with a 10 cents plastic part but apple refuse to sell the part. Apple want you to buy a new tablet. It seem like tesla EV is becoming like that. There are youtubes showing EV mechanics need to go buy crashed or flooded tersla EV just to get the parts (involved risk that the parts could be not functional) become tesla refuse to sell parts, let alone tell them how to fix it.
battery
this part is even more complicated and costly to fix. In an auto accident, how do one be assured that the battery isn't damaged? Who would use a battery after an accident and still give a warranty? Would a later battery fire negate any proper repair done on the frame? LOL The new structual battery pack is so integrated and laminated with glue and wire and coolant conduits, you have to rip everything out to find/test the damaged components but by then you have destroyed the battery. LOL
Tesla 4860 Structural Battery Packs Are Not Designed to Be Repaired | NextBigFuture.com
Try to even to scrap out and recycle the good parts of the battery, not easy. It cost more to properly recycle and extract what's left of good battery material than the labor invested. Tesla (and/or the government) need to pay recyclers to recycle tesla EV battery and other brands structural battery but tesla battery is the most challenging.
here is tesla fanboy Sandy Munro, automotive guru of guru, discussing about fixing tesla structural battery.
(2) Is Tesla's Structural Battery Repairable? - YouTube
To paraphrase, 'over time, battery may encounter just 1 defective cell that make the whole module out of specs. Trying to test, isolate, remove and replace that 1 defective cell is a nightmare'