Welcome to Tesla Motors Club
Discuss Tesla's Model S, Model 3, Model X, Model Y, Cybertruck, Roadster and More.
Register

In deep w/ Tesla CEO Elon Musk: Financials, Falcon doors & finding faults in Model S

This site may earn commission on affiliate links.
In deep w/ Tesla CEO Elon Musk: Financials, Falcon doors & finding faults in Model S

Lets see if we can scrape together any more yet-unknown info...

http://www.autoblog.com/2012/09/07/tesla-ceo-elon-musk-q-and-a/

- - - Updated - - -

Here's a taste:

"None of this, "J.D. Power found 80 defects" bullshit." - Elon

- - - Updated - - -

"So I was like, this doesn't seem right, this is off by like three millimeters." - Elon

I find these quintessential Elon quotes entertaining, anyone else feel the same? Post your favorites...


 
Great interview, gotta love the honesty, i.e.

Musk: Well, I don't want to get suppliers mad at me, but some of them are some pretty big name suppliers and you think, "How the heck can this big-name supplier not get their **** together?" and I call the CEO and he's like, "I promise I'll get my **** together," and I'm like, "Your **** is not together." It's quite vexing.
 
Interesting...
Since each car is literally like 98 percent new. Usually, when people say it's the all-new blah-blah-blah, whatever car, that's bullshit. 40 percent of that car, if not 60 percent of that car, if coming from some parts bin. In our case, two percent is coming from the parts bin. There are some Mercedes components, like the steering column and the light switches and some of the internal bits but, literally, 98 percent is totally new, the components are in nothing else on earth. So, of the 98 percent new stuff, 90 percent of those components, no problem, we can scale up to high-volume immediately. Five of those are slightly problematic. Two percent are problematic and one percent are really problematic and causing us headaches. Putting it all together and making sure you assemble this incredibly complex puzzle in the right way, is tricky.
 
Regarding panel fit...
3 millimeters is a lot
If he was talking about 0.3 or 0.03 millimeters, then we'd be in Audi/BMW territory IIRC.
Isn't 3mm about .1 inches?
Roughly, yes.

- - - Updated - - -

Roughly, yes.

An Orgy of Audi - Motor Trend Blog
Edward Loh said:
* For all Audi products including the R8, manufacturing tolerances cannot exceed 0.1 mm. To ensure this high standard, Audi employs laser measuring, x-ray, and computerized tomography (CT) technology — including the largest CT scanner in the world, capable of checking an entire A8 chassis.
 
tesla-model-s-gas-station.jpg

Rock Store, 30354 Mulholland Hwy, Cornell, CA
Rock_Store_pumps.jpg
 
Roughly, yes.

- - - Updated - - -



An Orgy of Audi - Motor Trend Blog

i assume (maybe i'm wrong?) that MT article is referring to manufacturing tolerances of parts, not assembly, which is what EM was referring to. an assembly tolerance of .1mm is a bit unrealistic for large moving part machines like cars. but a manu tolerance, for the stamping, cutting, etc, of .1mm is absolutely expected. usually more on the order of mils, .001s of an inch.

EM was talking about the fit of the headlamp assembly as it bolts to the chassis. 3mm is a lot of play there, but not off the wall. i like how honest he is, very forthright, which inspires confidence. if he's as picky as we are, or more so, then i feel very good. i knew there was a reason i reserved this car 4 years ago and bought stock at the IPO. this kind of company makes me HAPPY. go tesla.
 
Lets see if we can scrape together any more yet-unknown info...

Isn't it new(ish) news that the Superchargers will be at existing highway rest stops?

Here's the quote:

ABG: Where do you see the Superchagers being built?

Musk: Places where there's pretty good food available. Existing highway rest stops. So you just park, plug it in, go grab a bite to eat and a coffee and you're on your way.

I don't know what rest stops he knows that have "pretty good food available", but otherwise that sounds incredibly logical to me.
 
Tolerance merely means that the most one car can differ from another is 0.1 mm. That quote does not suggest that the panel gap is less than 0.1 mm.

Note that Musk didn't use the word "tolerance," which has a very specific meaning, and would require both + and - limits.

For instance, when he says: "calibrate the entire dimensions of the car within tenths of a millimeter" that is very general, and not only because he doesn't say how many tenths, but also because he doesn't specify whether the difference between the smallest acceptable and the largest acceptable is "tenths of a millimeter," of whether any instance varies from the specification by more than "tenths of a millimeter." The first is twice as restrictive as the second.
 
This is the first time I have seen Elon be totally off. He describes the LEAF as a 6 kWh charger. No, today it is 3.3 kWh for the AC connection but the DC fast charger is 50 kWh. So with the Supercharger at 90 kWh it is almost twice the power but in either case there is a limit to how much of the battery pack can charged at full power before you ramp down the power to considerably less. That why they talk about the half full charge time (full power) rather than the full charge time.