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Series Production starts today!?

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I've not heard anything to indicate they shouldn't start on the 17th. Though they've always said their first cars should be slowly produced and they want to slowly ramp up production. So P2 might take a few weeks to finish, especially since this is easter holiday and it seems UK citizens often don't work this friday and next monday. Not to mention they don't want to make that many cars before the drivetrain 1,5 is finished.

Cobos
 
Not to mention they don't want to make that many cars before the drivetrain 1,5 is finished.

Cobos


Yep, I've never understood the logic of producing cars they know are not the final product. Of course I don't have a voucher in my hot little hand either. Sounds like an expensive undertaking and hope only a few cars need the upgrade.

I thought there would be a party or something with the start of production...or at least an email. It's almost quitting time over there (time zones), and not a word. Hm.
 
Yep, I've never understood the logic of producing cars they know are not the final product.

I suspect they are fighting a credibility gap if they don't start production now.
Too many delays and people start to wonder if it will ever happen.

They probably want to produce as few cars as they can and still say that they are in production, but without having to carry too much of a burden of expensive retrofit candidates. I wonder how many signature 100 customers said they want the 1.0 version car now, versus being OK to wait for 1.5 to get done.
 
So how does this translate into a delivery date for Martin?

Assuming they ship this one by boat, not plane, I woud guess about May 1st.

I'm still wondering if Ze'ev is getting one. At the last town hall, I recall it was mentioned that he still hadn't even gone for a drive yet. I would certainly have done that before taking the CEO job.
 
"I'm still wondering if Ze'ev is getting one. At the last town hall, I recall it was mentioned that he still hadn't even gone for a drive yet. I would certainly have done that before taking the CEO job."

Especially since I thought he was a little snippy with a customer (asking for a discount to be passed to him). If Ze'ev does not have a Roadster on order then how can he relate with the concerns of the person with $100K in Tesla's bank account.
 
I have to say that this announcement feels rather lackluster and arbitrary. What's going on today that's fundamentally different than say a week ago? Seems they have been making VP's that are identical to production intent (at least for the early cars) for a while now. It would have been nice to at least include a few pics of P2 on the production line to solidify the announcement as a legitimate milestone.
 
I haven't seen any official mention of Ze'ev's roadster order, but my guess is that they dropped him in at the end of the Founder's Series (which is in front of the Signature 100 and the rest).

The production rate of 1 a week is unimpressive, but it serves two worthwhile purposes: 1) lets them work out any last minute kinks and perfect the procedure, and 2) limits the amount of cars that have to be retrofitted with Drivetrain 1.5 (and seats 1.5?) later, saving money.

On a historical note, even at this pace of production, by this time next year they'll have surpassed Tucker in cars built. Much sooner than that if you count prototypes. They'll need to pick up the pace if they want to go after DeLorean, though...

-Ryan
 
Originally Posted by TEG viewpost.gif
I wonder how many signature 100 customers said they want the 1.0 version car now, versus being OK to wait for 1.5 to get done.

It was their choice?

Yes, I think at a Townhall they said they were planning to give the option to people to wait until trans 1.5 is ready instead of taking the car now. I think it was implied that you would hold your spot and be at the front of the line when drivetrain 1.5 is ready. I think they also suggested there might be some monetary incentive to wait rather than get the car now and save Tesla the time and expense of having to do the retrofit later.
 
Originally Posted by TEG viewpost.gif
I wonder how many signature 100 customers said they want the 1.0 version car now, versus being OK to wait for 1.5 to get done.



Yes, I think at a Townhall they said they were planning to give the option to people to wait until trans 1.5 is ready instead of taking the car now. I think it was implied that you would hold your spot and be at the front of the line when drivetrain 1.5 is ready. I think they also suggested there might be some monetary incentive to wait rather than get the car now and save Tesla the time and expense of having to do the retrofit later.

Wonder how long until 1.5 will be ready? If I were Tesla, I'd get crackin'.

On another note, 900 pre-orders is a LOT of cars and a LOT of deposits.
 
Wonder how long until 1.5 will be ready? If I were Tesla, I'd get crackin'.
I haven't heard any estimates. No doubt there's a lot of pressure on that team. They can't go to mass production until it's ready.

On another note, 900 pre-orders is a LOT of cars and a LOT of deposits.
I think at least 300 of those are little $5000 deposits. I could do that. My problem would be coming up with the remaining $100000. Hopefully Tesla has budgeted for a lot of those people to drop out when their number comes up...

-Ryan
 
I think at least 300 of those are little $5000 deposits. I could do that. My problem would be coming up with the remaining $100000. Hopefully Tesla has budgeted for a lot of those people to drop out when their number comes up...

-Ryan


If you're referring to the economy, I'd agree. However, Let's not forget the Smart $99 deposits. As I understand it, supply is not keeping pace with demand. So that seemed to work out just fine. I do agree the Roadster is 4x more expensive, but you're dealing with an entirely different customer in the first place.

As it stands, Tesla wouldn't have a problem unloading a Roadster if they had any excess inventory. Of that I'm sure.
 
Yes any Roadster delivery that gets cancelled or any owner that want to sell I beleive can easily sell for 150k right now. There might actually be quite a few that are waiting for the first 150 cars to reach customers and seeing the responses there before they order. The fact that you by ordering now and putting down a deposit still only get the car in a year, means that if I had 100k lying around I would consider waiting anyway since when they are producing 100 cars a month I expect them to get down to a few months delivery time.
So what I'm trying to say is that there might be some serious yet "untapped" demand waiting for the supply.

Cobos
 
Wonder how long until 1.5 will be ready? If I were Tesla, I'd get crackin'.

My understanding is that drivetrain 1.5 prototypes are already in some of the newer VPs, so they are definitely working on it. I imagine it is a rather high priority within Tesla right now. A proper durability testing cycle could take some months, so it might be a while, but barring any unforseen problems (crossing fingers) I hope they can switch to 1.5 by the end of the summer.

Let see if they drive one hundred miles an hour for 41 days straight they could get to 100k miles. Oh wait, at 100mph range might only be 100 miles, so they have to do a 3.5 hour recharge every 100 miles... So one hour of driving, 3.5 hours not. So we are up to 4 months of non-stop driving just to validate that it can get to 100k miles. Real durability tests probably involve a lot of stop and go, uphill/downhill, etc. I wonder when they started testing it?
 
I too have wondered how they get the maximum miles per day out of a roadster given the 3.5 hour recharge issue.
Tossing aside a multiple car scheme or swapping batteries, don't forget that Tesla has said the batteries will charge in a short amount of time (10 minutes?). It certainly would be worth it to set up a willing car and mega charger arragement for this kind of mileage testing. After all the test is not a battery test, it's everything but -like the 1.5 gearbox.

I imagine all this at the test track.
 
I think they have some Lotus test track running cars 24x7. Also, prototypes have been known to drive back and forth up/down highway 5 between LA and SF repeatedly. I doubt they get anywhere near 100mph average. That was just me saying "if they were in a serious hurry to get 100k miles of testing".
Maybe they don't even need 100k miles to feel the job is done. They could have a whole 1.5 drivetrain churning away at redline on a dyno or test jig without the rest of the car to prove some of what they need.