Model S Nose Cone Designs (Prototype, Alpha, Beta and beyond)

[Lloyd]

Presumably there could be a range of after-market grills available in a variety of different styles. Much like alloys.

Check out the custom Grillz!

[tomanik]

I don't believe the black nose cose will be the production grill. It may have the shape of the intended grill but probably looks nothing like it.

[Todd Burch]

Not to hijack this thread, but I still wonder where I'll put the front license plate that the Commonwealth of Virginia requires...

[Todd Burch]

I wonder how much the front end gets "locked in" after crash testing?
Some things have to be left alone unless they want to do another round of crash testing later.
Or maybe they area already planning to re-do crash tests on the betas too?

I doubt they're planning on crashing in the beta stage unless they failed a test (highly doubtful given the allegedly "very successful" computer simulations.

I don't know for sure, but I'd suspect that non-structural changes (such as aluminum stampings around the front and changing the grill) have no effect on the crash testing, since they're completely non-structural elements. Just my suspicion.

[JRod0802]

I doubt they're planning on crashing in the beta stage unless they failed a test (highly doubtful given the allegedly "very successful" computer simulations.

I don't know for sure, but I'd suspect that non-structural changes (such as aluminum stampings around the front and changing the grill) have no effect on the crash testing, since they're completely non-structural elements. Just my suspicion.

Q4 Earnings Call Transcript

...Then there is going to be another period of intense crash testing for the betas starting towards the end of summer, and then yet more crash testing that takes place once we have our release candidates, because the beta is in sort of '89%, 90% production design,' but it isn't entire made with production tooling. So we have to get confirmation step with the release candidate articles which should be kind of in the roughly 11 to 12 months from now. That’s just to confirm that the process used to manufacture the cars results in cars that are consistently of the design intent. So, there is a whole lot of crash – there is a tremendous amount of crash testing taking place, because our standards that we're – what we're aiming for here with Model S is pretty extraordinary in terms of safety.

[TEG]

Thanks, JRod0802.
So they can make adjustments to the "nose" even if it could trigger a need to retest since they are planning to retest anyways.

[Todd Burch]

Well there you go. I sit corrected.

[suxxer]

1) I would think that if the alphas are representative of the new grill, then they'd change the gallery pics on their website...but they aren't.

yes, they did. Now both designs are mixed in the gallery ;(

[Cobos]

Not to hijack this thread, but I still wonder where I'll put the front license plate that the Commonwealth of Virginia requires...

A very good question as Norwegian law also requires a front license plate. Especially the Alfa Romeo with their sometimes excellent designs looks really wierd with the offset license plate that seems to have been thrown on in the last minute. A bit like the first version of the Roadster actually :-|

Cobos

[Eberhard]

Why not place the plate inside of a transparent nose?