13 ms·

Tesla’s New Car Smell

214 points by okket 9y ago

rtpg 9y ago
I wonder if there are many side effects from this sort of schedule slippage apart from just needing more time. If the only result is the schedule slipping, then investors can continue giving to Tesla with the assurance that things happen "eventually". If this is actually indicative of greater disorganization, then perhaps we'll see more issues later on. But my impression is that this is _the_ major issue for Tesla... and ultimately it's an issue that can be solved with more money.
- dilemma 9y ago
  Production issues in car manufacturing can be solved by adding more resources just like adding more programmers to a software project can. Nope, not at all.
  - rtpg 9y ago
    What I'm saying isn't that the production issues get solved. What I'm saying is that if you have enough money, delays aren't as much of an issue in itself. You can wait things out. Valve surely has a lot of developement issues leading to delays, but they still got Half Life 2 out and made a bunch of money off of it.
    - dilemma 9y ago
      No, you did say that money solves production issues.
      - rtpg 9y ago
        to clarify, what I meant by "issue" is production delays. There are underlying issues for sure, and those won't be solved just with money. But many side effects of delays are mitigated by throwing money at it. And spending money is usually an easy option, if you have a lot of it.
        dilemma 9y ago
        It's getting less and less clear.
- cloakandswagger 9y ago
  The biggest problem is the one the author mentioned at the end of the article: If Tesla takes too long, they might be outpaced by more mature competitors. That demand will move elsewhere or dissipate if it isn't capitalized on.
cateye 9y ago
I really thought that the article was literally about the smell of the cars :)
- xiphias 9y ago
  I wasn't sure, but now that I checked, it's clickbait, and flagged it
  - deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]
  - matt4077 9y ago
    It's not a very good article so I'm really not invested in this, but the title isn't "clickbait". It's a play on words, a rather creative use of the ambiguity of language.
- asciimo 9y ago
  Me too. I wondered if it was related to this discovery about China's revulsion to that fragrance. http://www.npr.org/2017/07/29/540214689/chinese-buyers-don-t-like-the-new-car-smell http://www.npr.org/2017/07/29/540214689/chinese-buyers-don-t...
carlivar 9y ago
The author is only comparing production ability and basic mechanical stats with the Bolt and Leaf. I am on the Model 3 waiting list for the Autopilot. Heck, it could be gas powered and I'd be on the waiting list for the Autopilot. I don't need full autonomous. I just want the best system, and currently Tesla has it. So hopefully they figure out their production issues. I also just bought a 2018 Honda Odyssey as our main family car and it can't even do adaptive cruise control under 20 mph. I think people underrate how far ahead Tesla is in these areas. Their competition is currently Google and Uber, not Chevy, Nissan, etc.
- rtpg 9y ago
  Don't the BMWs of the world have this tech integrated into their cars too? I get Tesla's cars are really good, but my understanding was that it wasn't "miles ahead".
  - eclipxe 9y ago
    Yes many other's have autopilot-like tech. BMW's system on the 7-series and newer 5-series is about as good as Tesla's AP1 and better than AP2. AP2 is still far behind the curve.
    - carlivar 9y ago
      I compared Tesla Model 3 to Bolt and Leaf. 7-series and 5-series are simply too expensive. If BMW can get it in the 3-series at a Tesla Model 3 price, things will get interesting.
      - mantas 9y ago
        Even VW Golf has (as options) quite a bit of these things. obstacles radar(adaptive cruise control/city safety), blind spot and lane departure warning, self parking...
  - ucaetano 9y ago
    Yes, actually, most of the "Autopilot" features have been available in production cars for over a decade. Tesla is really late to this game, although people can't seem to realize it because of the distortion field. And that's before we get into disengagements per 1000 miles, where Tesla trails most of the industry by far. No wonder Musk tries to demonize AI. Self-driving is a race to the bottom, with its development slashing car sales by an order of magnitude. That would be bad for an established, mature, car maker, but would be crushing for a company relying purely on future growth. Not only Tesla is behind most in self-driving, it is the most exposed to the downsides of it.
sschueller 9y ago
A greater problem may be the insider trading that might be going on according to the author.
- matt4077 9y ago
  That allegation is completely unproven. An with that set of facts ("some people know more than others", "the stock price changes") you can literally find "insider trading" for any given stock, in any given week.
LAMike 9y ago
"If a part has a problem, only a small quantity needs to be shipped back to the supplier who can inspect, correct, and quickly adjust their own production process." Isn't one of the advantages of having a minimal, electric vehicle that there are fewer moving parts? Telsa is in a interesting position as a software/car maker. There production line is like an algorithm they are adjusting on the fly, and it's obviously going to be messy when you don't have multiple decades of manufacturing experience. Still, Tesla's learning curve is steep, and the M3 is a much more simpler car. Don't be against Elon, it's quite possible he'll be able to figure out how to make 10K/week once the kinks are figured out.
- dilemma 9y ago
  The world's leading assembler of cars, Toyota, doesn't use artificial intelligence but human intelligence to make its processes run smooth and continuously improve them. A large human component is necessary in production and this idea of using software and full automation to optimize it is a pipedream.
  - deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]
  - nostalgiac 9y ago
    Isn't a pipedream basically exactly what Elon is always trying to produce? Why is this a bad thing and why isn't software/full automation achievable?
- batushka 9y ago
  Electric car is simpler, has less moving parts, needs less service and will be more reliable than gasoline - they claim. All of this will be lessened by enormous amounts of software Tesla puts and a barrier to fix.
matt4077 9y ago
In taking delivery of my wife’s Model S, we were treated to a group tour of the site. Everyone marveled at the robot porn,[...] Everyone but yours truly. I couldn’t help check off the sins against the “Toyota Bible” And I can't help but notice that his truly is still putting his wife's truly into a Tesla, not a Toyota. There seems to be a wave of stories critical of Musk currently, and most seem to be rooted in some sort of ill will towards the man. Other than that, I just can't wrap my head around these alarmist screeds, considering a few months' delay is, if anything, so little one wonders if Musk is spending too much time on production... It's annoying for customers, but hey: at least you're not one of those customers whose vehicle gets blown up 5 miles off the coast of Florida. I ca
- FullMtlAlcoholc 9y ago
  There has definitely been a wave of backlash against him. The pro union crowd and those who hope his car company fails
- majormajor 9y ago
  If you've got money you might also buy a Rolls Royce, Aston Martin, Lambo, BMW, Jaguar, etc, instead of a Toyota too, because who cares about things like quality control at that point, and you want something different, but you'd be laughed out of the room if you said "I know Alfa Romeos are better made than Toyotas because they're fancier and cost more."
Hypx 9y ago
> I couldn’t help check off the sins against the “Toyota Bible”, prescriptions for car manufacturers that are lucidly detailed in The Machine That Changed The World (a great and, in parts, sad read). In particular, one mustn’t stockpile parts on the floor, they must be fed in small quantities at small time intervals. If a part has a problem, only a small quantity needs to be shipped back to the supplier who can inspect, correct, and quickly adjust their own production process. This isn't just a minor set of sins. Tesla apparently fundamentally does not grasp the concept of Lean Manufacturing+ as developed by Toyota, also known as the Toyota Production System++. +https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lean_manufacturing https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lean_manufacturing ++https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toyota_Production_System https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toyota_Production_System
- carlivar 9y ago
  What makes you think Tesla doesn't fundamentally grasp it? This anecdote? The plural of anecdote is not data. Your wikipedia link on the Toyota Production System says it was developed between 1948 and 1975. So it look 27 years to develop. Working for a startup myself, I'm very aware of Kanban and other TPS-inspired work processes. Sometimes in startup-hair-on-fire-mode that all goes out the window and I think that's where Tesla is in company maturity right now.
  - muglug 9y ago
    Tesla has been designing and producing road-worthy vehicles for 14 years. If they're in startup-hair-on-fire mode right now, something is very wrong.
    - carlivar 9y ago
      Which new automaker of the past 40 years do you compare them to as far as measuring what is wrong?
      - majormajor 9y ago
        Hyundai turned their quality around pretty massively in 10 to 20 years after entering the US market. So is our new bar for Tesla "do they run out of money before they can replicate what Hyundai did"? Doesn't seem like shooting for the stars. Seems like blind replication isn't the answer alone ( http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00207540701223493?src=recsys&journalCode=tprs20#_i5 http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00207540701223493... ), which is unsurprising, but Tesla's sales targets and their current production line process as-reported seem at odds. This stuff is very well-studied and making basic errors seems like a problem of hubris coming from a software industry that's in a much less mature state.
DavidAdams 9y ago
Tesla is trying to "lean startup" the Model 3. Not clear whether that was originally their intention, but the fact that they're building parts of the Model 3 by hand immediately brings to mind the kind of non-scaleable stuff that people in the software industry do at early phases of their evolution (things that are hailed as "the right thing to do). Maybe Tesla's undoing is that there's a little too much of the Silicon Valley ethos going on there.
- danmaz74 9y ago
  I don't think that's a fair comparison; I'm sure they had a plan for mass-scale production for model 3 from the start, the problem is if that plan/approach will work or not in a reasonable time. The non-scaleable stuff was most likely done in parallel not to delay initial deliveries, they don't need to validate the product idea.
deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
csours 9y ago
Disclaimer up front: I work for a Tesla competitor. People believe funny things about Tesla and Elon. But before I talk about that, let me say: I've been extremely impressed with Tesla and Elon for their ability to eventually deliver, and to build unparalleled excitement around electric vehicles. I believe Elon is truly a visionary. Now for the funny things: 1. You can throw money at problems to fix them: If you do this you end up with a 1980's Jaguar - lovely and fast and fun, but unreliable, and overly expensive, and your competition will eat your lunch. 2. Tesla shouldn't be graded on cars or car production, they are an X company (X= software, technology, etc): Whatever kind of company you think Tesla is, right now they make cars and that's all you can grade them on right now. If you want to make a bet about the future, go for it, but realize that it is a bet. 3. Automation will solve this: GM spent about $60 Billion on advanced automation in the 1980's because they could not believe that Toyota was building cars at the cost and quality with human labor (this is a gross simplification). 10-15 years later, GM basically adopted the Toyota Production System. It may be possible to build quality cars in a cost effective manner with near 100% automation, but I do not believe it is possible to build them BECAUSE OF automation. You must have a good quality process first. Elon's previous comments about having a bed near the end of the production line rings alarm bells for anyone who has been in manufacturing. You cannot inspect your way to quality.
- QAPereo 9y ago
  Just to 3 Unknown to analysts, investors and the hundreds of thousands of customers who signed up to buy it, as recently as early September major portions of the Model 3 were still being banged out by hand, away from the automated production line, according to people familiar with the matter.” https://www.wsj.com/articles/behind-teslas-production-delays-parts-of-model-3-were-being-made-by-hand-1507321057 https://www.wsj.com/articles/behind-teslas-production-delays...
  - toomuchtodo 9y ago
    > still being banged out by hand, away from the automated production line, according to people familiar with the matter.” The press is up and running: https://www.instagram.com/p/BaInXGBg9G7/ https://www.instagram.com/p/BaInXGBg9G7/ Based on a 3.7 second cycle time, they can bang out 5,837,837 body panels per year (assuming some math an automotive engineer on /r/teslamotors provided that takes into account downtime and typical automotive labor scheduling: 50 weeks/year * 5 days/week * 24 hours/day * 3600 seconds/hour)/3.7 second panel cycle EDIT: csours: Thanks! I removed my grossly inaccurate prediction of per-vehicle pressed components. in_cahoots: Original response was to comment that Tesla is still banging out components by hand; this is possible, my rebuttal is that they do have parts of the line that are fully operational.
QAPereo 9y ago
I just kept thinking, “well yeah, but the optimists might be right, and Musk has done amazing things before.” Then... Unknown to analysts, investors and the hundreds of thousands of customers who signed up to buy it, as recently as early September major portions of the Model 3 were still being banged out by hand, away from the automated production line, according to people familiar with the matter. That reeks of fundamental issues at odds with “It is important to emphasize that there are no fundamental issues with the Model 3 production or supply chain. We understand what needs to be fixed and we are confident of addressing the manufacturing bottleneck issues in the near-term.” Maybe mass production is that one step too far.
abalone 9y ago
> What seriously worried me was a July 2016 visit to Tesla’s manufacturing plant... In an exchange with a trusted industry observer, I found out that he had had exactly the same experience only weeks ago, but he couldn’t write about it by “virtue” of the NDA he’d signed. Did Gassée's NDA expire or what? He's certainly divulging details about the factory. He previously wrote that he couldn't write about his visit due to an NDA.[1] [1] https://mondaynote.com/chairman-elons-great-leap-forward-68f49ffde372 https://mondaynote.com/chairman-elons-great-leap-forward-68f...
xenadu02 9y ago
Manufacturing ramp-up is exactly this sort of thing. Building by-hand as you work out the process and employ more automation. I'm not sure this is unexpected? As an investor I know full well Tesla has a ticking clock. They must achieve scale before the giants can catch up. People underestimate how god-awful slow the big car makers are. They haven't even come to terms with what Tesla is really doing yet. None have anything like the software experience. My guess is Tesla has 5 more years before the big makers can truly become competitive (assuming they all fire their software engineers and hire new ones today). Time will tell. If they're still fumbling a year from now then I'll start to get concerned. If they can't churn out at least 250,000 vehicles per year within two years I'll be very concerned.
- Analemma_ 9y ago
  > People underestimate how god-awful slow the big car makers are I think it’s exactly the opposite. People enamoured with Tesla and Musk tend to over-estimate how slow the old car makers are, because they’re so used to the “Silicon Valley story” that we will inevitably come in and take over everything. Look: it’s 2017. Everybody has read the Innovator’s Dilemma, everybody knows how fast e.g. Palm, Nokia, etc. went out of business. The old companies aren’t stupid, and they aren’t sitting around waiting for Tesla to eat their lunch. > None have anything like the software experience. GM is arguably in the lead right now as far as autonomous driving capability. They’re at least tied with Google and certainly ahead of Tesla. I’m going to be blunt: you don’t sound like a very good investor. You sound like someone who makes decisions based on hype and wishful thinking instead of real evidence. My recommendation would be to get out now before you lose your shirt.
  - r00fus 9y ago
    This may be true, but why don't they have auto-pilot (or at least adaptive cruise) on their Bolt? One reason I didn't buy one - why pay ~$40k pre-incentives for something without a key luxury feature?
  - erk__ 9y ago
    And companies like VW, BMW and Toyota are also investing a large amount om money into autonomous driving, they just keep it more behind curtains than Tesla.
KKKKkkkk1 9y ago
> As I watched Tesla’s messy, hiccuping line, with workers dashing in to fix faulty parts in place, my mind travelled back to the Honda plant I had visited years ago in Marysville, Ohio. Clean, calm, everything moved smoothly. I was so shocked by the contrast that I imprudently voiced my concern. That didn’t go over well with my fellow Tesla owners. I was a killjoy, I was calling their choice into question. Well, it's exactly the experience you get when you criticize Tesla on HN.
- bjelkeman-again 9y ago
  I am under the impression that the criticism here on HN is more nuanced than I normally read on the web.
  - pvdebbe 9y ago
    It is. Always when we are not talking about Tesla, Apple or self driving vehicles.
- joelthelion 9y ago
  The difference is that Honda doesn't make interesting cars. People are ready to cut Tesla some slack because they are truly innovating.
  - selectodude 9y ago
    Because they put a battery in a car?
    - TeMPOraL 9y ago
      Because they single-handedly forced the market against its will to accept electric cars, and we're all better off thanks to it, now that regular car companies decided to join the party too.
      - Cthulhu_ 9y ago
locusm 9y ago
Makes some good points except for the competition, I think its weak. Always wondered why Nissan intentionally made such an ugly car, I think the Leaf is no longer sold in Australia due to poor numbers. Isn't the Bolt a hybrid?
- shirro 9y ago
  No it is an EV. The Volt was the hybrid. Confusing naming. Decent range and acceleration but no RHD model so not an option for Australia. Sad to have a GM plant going idle in Adelaide and no electric car subsidies.
bobbles 9y ago
You can complain about Tesla missing a deadline by a year but you need to also consider them pulling the rest of the industry forward by 10 years when they do it
- tptacek 9y ago
  That may be a compelling HN argument about the heroism of Elon Musk, but for a competitive car company, "pulling the rest of the industry forward 10 years in the span of 1 year" is a very bad thing.
andrewtbham 9y ago
People that are caught up on this "miss" obviously do not follow the guidance very closely. On the last conference call they repeatedly downplayed the importance of the Q3 delivery guidance and repeatedly stated it would be difficult to predict and that there was a high degree of uncertainty. They repeated this ad nauseam. Here is a sample: >So, I would simply urge people to not get too caught up in what exactly falls within the exact calendar boundaries of a quarter, one quarter or the next, because when you have an exponentially growing production ramp, slight changes of a few weeks here or there can appear to have dramatic changes, but that is simply because of the arbitrary nature of when a quarter ends. That is why there has been little stock movement despite this miss. Run rate at the end of Q4 is a different story. That is very important guidance. https://seekingalpha.com/article/4094115-tesla-tsla-q2-2017-results-earnings-call-transcript https://seekingalpha.com/article/4094115-tesla-tsla-q2-2017-... Also, another indication that this guy know anything about Tesla's goals or guidane... Tesla has repeatedly stated they are not going to increase Model S/X production beyond 25k per quarter. They think that's close to the total addressable market and it's costly to expand production beyond that.
jaimex2 9y ago
Why is this on HN? Guy goes to a group tour and is suddenly an expert in auto manufacturing. "Sees chaos" and stock piled parts.
- bsaul 9y ago
  I think because the guy is jean louis gassée, former ceo of BeInc , which did built their own computers ( as well as an ex apple high ranked employee). So he has experience both with high tech and manufacturing issues. Granted, he's not an auto industry specialist but he's not the average joe either.
  - jaimex2 9y ago
    Ah, right. Still I feel like we get a lot of Tesla posts good or bad that aren't about tech innovation just "Look at what Tesla is doing now!"
RickJWagner 9y ago
Hmmmmm. If I were a short seller, this might help me make my game plan. Or not. Markets aren't rational, it could be costly.
phipa 9y ago
I worked for Tesla for 5 years, joining with a cohort a few months before Model S launch in 2012 and departing recently to take a rest. My role involved architecting, developing, and helping support many software systems focused in the financial domain. These systems process all of the downstream events arising from sales, procurement, production, and other activities of the company with financial effect. Many often wonder why large software system projects are difficult. Many often wonder why running large organizations such as governments is difficult. In this topic some wonder why large scale vehicle manufacturing processes are difficult. These fundamentally share properties. One key challenge is that system, organization, and process complexity do not grow in a linear manner. If you have ever tried to estimate software development time for larger projects you understand how wildly inaccurate it can be. The number of interaction points multiply with growth. Progress feels extremely fast at the beginning. As the system surface area grows it becomes increasing difficult to push incremental improvements forward. A single person or small team comprehensively understanding the entire system and keeping enough of it in working memory becomes a challenge. There are design and management strategies to combat the challenge but in my opinion only time and iteration can truly overcome. The single most important long-term factor here is whether quality and continuing improvement is part of the culture or not. I believe they are, as suggested by the production target miss. A process of prioritizing and then fixing sub-optimal system and process interaction points, both internally and externally, will drive the company to high output while maintaining quality over time. TPS [0] concepts are well known but one doesn't simply download and install it in an afternoon. It can take decades to optimize. The single worst decision the company could make is to pump out vehicles to meet a production target metric while sacrificing quality. That has been tried before in this country (and at the same factory several decades ago no less [1]) and did not work out well. For perspective: Competitive threats are just not a very big deal. Globally, 72 million cars were produced last year [2]. If Tesla captures just 1% of that market it is still a huge achievement - 720k cars per year. Even if we assume they sell only the lowest price Model 3 at $35k and ignore all other vehicle and energy products that would equate to over $25 billion in revenue - 10 times the 2016 annual figure. The market will also grow as the global economy does. There is plenty of room. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toyota_Production_System https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toyota_Production_System [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NUMMI#Background https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NUMMI#Background [2] https://www.statista.com/statistics/262747/worldwide-automobile-production-since-2000/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/262747/worldwide-automob...

214 points by okket 9y ago

rtpg 9y ago

I wonder if there are many side effects from this sort of schedule slippage apart from just needing more time. If the only result is the schedule slipping, then investors can continue giving to Tesla with the assurance that things happen "eventually". If this is actually indicative of greater disorganization, then perhaps we'll see more issues later on. But my impression is that this is _the_ major issue for Tesla... and ultimately it's an issue that can be solved with more money.

dilemma 9y ago
Production issues in car manufacturing can be solved by adding more resources just like adding more programmers to a software project can. Nope, not at all.
- rtpg 9y ago
  What I'm saying isn't that the production issues get solved. What I'm saying is that if you have enough money, delays aren't as much of an issue in itself. You can wait things out. Valve surely has a lot of developement issues leading to delays, but they still got Half Life 2 out and made a bunch of money off of it.
  - dilemma 9y ago
    No, you did say that money solves production issues.
    - rtpg 9y ago
      to clarify, what I meant by "issue" is production delays. There are underlying issues for sure, and those won't be solved just with money. But many side effects of delays are mitigated by throwing money at it. And spending money is usually an easy option, if you have a lot of it.
      - dilemma 9y ago
        It's getting less and less clear.
cloakandswagger 9y ago
The biggest problem is the one the author mentioned at the end of the article: If Tesla takes too long, they might be outpaced by more mature competitors. That demand will move elsewhere or dissipate if it isn't capitalized on.

cateye 9y ago

I really thought that the article was literally about the smell of the cars :)

xiphias 9y ago
I wasn't sure, but now that I checked, it's clickbait, and flagged it
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
- matt4077 9y ago
  It's not a very good article so I'm really not invested in this, but the title isn't "clickbait". It's a play on words, a rather creative use of the ambiguity of language.
asciimo 9y ago
Me too. I wondered if it was related to this discovery about China's revulsion to that fragrance. http://www.npr.org/2017/07/29/540214689/chinese-buyers-don-t-like-the-new-car-smell http://www.npr.org/2017/07/29/540214689/chinese-buyers-don-t...

carlivar 9y ago

The author is only comparing production ability and basic mechanical stats with the Bolt and Leaf. I am on the Model 3 waiting list for the Autopilot. Heck, it could be gas powered and I'd be on the waiting list for the Autopilot. I don't need full autonomous. I just want the best system, and currently Tesla has it. So hopefully they figure out their production issues. I also just bought a 2018 Honda Odyssey as our main family car and it can't even do adaptive cruise control under 20 mph. I think people underrate how far ahead Tesla is in these areas. Their competition is currently Google and Uber, not Chevy, Nissan, etc.

rtpg 9y ago
Don't the BMWs of the world have this tech integrated into their cars too? I get Tesla's cars are really good, but my understanding was that it wasn't "miles ahead".
- eclipxe 9y ago
  Yes many other's have autopilot-like tech. BMW's system on the 7-series and newer 5-series is about as good as Tesla's AP1 and better than AP2. AP2 is still far behind the curve.
  - carlivar 9y ago
    I compared Tesla Model 3 to Bolt and Leaf. 7-series and 5-series are simply too expensive. If BMW can get it in the 3-series at a Tesla Model 3 price, things will get interesting.
    - mantas 9y ago
      Even VW Golf has (as options) quite a bit of these things. obstacles radar(adaptive cruise control/city safety), blind spot and lane departure warning, self parking...
- ucaetano 9y ago
  Yes, actually, most of the "Autopilot" features have been available in production cars for over a decade. Tesla is really late to this game, although people can't seem to realize it because of the distortion field. And that's before we get into disengagements per 1000 miles, where Tesla trails most of the industry by far. No wonder Musk tries to demonize AI. Self-driving is a race to the bottom, with its development slashing car sales by an order of magnitude. That would be bad for an established, mature, car maker, but would be crushing for a company relying purely on future growth. Not only Tesla is behind most in self-driving, it is the most exposed to the downsides of it.

sschueller 9y ago

A greater problem may be the insider trading that might be going on according to the author.

matt4077 9y ago
That allegation is completely unproven. An with that set of facts ("some people know more than others", "the stock price changes") you can literally find "insider trading" for any given stock, in any given week.

LAMike 9y ago

"If a part has a problem, only a small quantity needs to be shipped back to the supplier who can inspect, correct, and quickly adjust their own production process." Isn't one of the advantages of having a minimal, electric vehicle that there are fewer moving parts? Telsa is in a interesting position as a software/car maker. There production line is like an algorithm they are adjusting on the fly, and it's obviously going to be messy when you don't have multiple decades of manufacturing experience. Still, Tesla's learning curve is steep, and the M3 is a much more simpler car. Don't be against Elon, it's quite possible he'll be able to figure out how to make 10K/week once the kinks are figured out.

dilemma 9y ago
The world's leading assembler of cars, Toyota, doesn't use artificial intelligence but human intelligence to make its processes run smooth and continuously improve them. A large human component is necessary in production and this idea of using software and full automation to optimize it is a pipedream.
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
- nostalgiac 9y ago
  Isn't a pipedream basically exactly what Elon is always trying to produce? Why is this a bad thing and why isn't software/full automation achievable?
batushka 9y ago
Electric car is simpler, has less moving parts, needs less service and will be more reliable than gasoline - they claim. All of this will be lessened by enormous amounts of software Tesla puts and a barrier to fix.

matt4077 9y ago

In taking delivery of my wife’s Model S, we were treated to a group tour of the site. Everyone marveled at the robot porn,[...] Everyone but yours truly. I couldn’t help check off the sins against the “Toyota Bible” And I can't help but notice that his truly is still putting his wife's truly into a Tesla, not a Toyota. There seems to be a wave of stories critical of Musk currently, and most seem to be rooted in some sort of ill will towards the man. Other than that, I just can't wrap my head around these alarmist screeds, considering a few months' delay is, if anything, so little one wonders if Musk is spending too much time on production... It's annoying for customers, but hey: at least you're not one of those customers whose vehicle gets blown up 5 miles off the coast of Florida. I ca

FullMtlAlcoholc 9y ago
There has definitely been a wave of backlash against him. The pro union crowd and those who hope his car company fails
majormajor 9y ago
If you've got money you might also buy a Rolls Royce, Aston Martin, Lambo, BMW, Jaguar, etc, instead of a Toyota too, because who cares about things like quality control at that point, and you want something different, but you'd be laughed out of the room if you said "I know Alfa Romeos are better made than Toyotas because they're fancier and cost more."

Hypx 9y ago

> I couldn’t help check off the sins against the “Toyota Bible”, prescriptions for car manufacturers that are lucidly detailed in The Machine That Changed The World (a great and, in parts, sad read). In particular, one mustn’t stockpile parts on the floor, they must be fed in small quantities at small time intervals. If a part has a problem, only a small quantity needs to be shipped back to the supplier who can inspect, correct, and quickly adjust their own production process. This isn't just a minor set of sins. Tesla apparently fundamentally does not grasp the concept of Lean Manufacturing+ as developed by Toyota, also known as the Toyota Production System++. +https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lean_manufacturing https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lean_manufacturing ++https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toyota_Production_System https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toyota_Production_System

carlivar 9y ago
What makes you think Tesla doesn't fundamentally grasp it? This anecdote? The plural of anecdote is not data. Your wikipedia link on the Toyota Production System says it was developed between 1948 and 1975. So it look 27 years to develop. Working for a startup myself, I'm very aware of Kanban and other TPS-inspired work processes. Sometimes in startup-hair-on-fire-mode that all goes out the window and I think that's where Tesla is in company maturity right now.
- muglug 9y ago
  Tesla has been designing and producing road-worthy vehicles for 14 years. If they're in startup-hair-on-fire mode right now, something is very wrong.
  - carlivar 9y ago
    Which new automaker of the past 40 years do you compare them to as far as measuring what is wrong?
    - majormajor 9y ago
      Hyundai turned their quality around pretty massively in 10 to 20 years after entering the US market. So is our new bar for Tesla "do they run out of money before they can replicate what Hyundai did"? Doesn't seem like shooting for the stars. Seems like blind replication isn't the answer alone ( http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00207540701223493?src=recsys&journalCode=tprs20#_i5 http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00207540701223493... ), which is unsurprising, but Tesla's sales targets and their current production line process as-reported seem at odds. This stuff is very well-studied and making basic errors seems like a problem of hubris coming from a software industry that's in a much less mature state.

DavidAdams 9y ago

Tesla is trying to "lean startup" the Model 3. Not clear whether that was originally their intention, but the fact that they're building parts of the Model 3 by hand immediately brings to mind the kind of non-scaleable stuff that people in the software industry do at early phases of their evolution (things that are hailed as "the right thing to do). Maybe Tesla's undoing is that there's a little too much of the Silicon Valley ethos going on there.

danmaz74 9y ago
I don't think that's a fair comparison; I'm sure they had a plan for mass-scale production for model 3 from the start, the problem is if that plan/approach will work or not in a reasonable time. The non-scaleable stuff was most likely done in parallel not to delay initial deliveries, they don't need to validate the product idea.

deleted 9y ago

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csours 9y ago

Disclaimer up front: I work for a Tesla competitor. People believe funny things about Tesla and Elon. But before I talk about that, let me say: I've been extremely impressed with Tesla and Elon for their ability to eventually deliver, and to build unparalleled excitement around electric vehicles. I believe Elon is truly a visionary. Now for the funny things: 1. You can throw money at problems to fix them: If you do this you end up with a 1980's Jaguar - lovely and fast and fun, but unreliable, and overly expensive, and your competition will eat your lunch. 2. Tesla shouldn't be graded on cars or car production, they are an X company (X= software, technology, etc): Whatever kind of company you think Tesla is, right now they make cars and that's all you can grade them on right now. If you want to make a bet about the future, go for it, but realize that it is a bet. 3. Automation will solve this: GM spent about $60 Billion on advanced automation in the 1980's because they could not believe that Toyota was building cars at the cost and quality with human labor (this is a gross simplification). 10-15 years later, GM basically adopted the Toyota Production System. It may be possible to build quality cars in a cost effective manner with near 100% automation, but I do not believe it is possible to build them BECAUSE OF automation. You must have a good quality process first. Elon's previous comments about having a bed near the end of the production line rings alarm bells for anyone who has been in manufacturing. You cannot inspect your way to quality.

QAPereo 9y ago
Just to 3 Unknown to analysts, investors and the hundreds of thousands of customers who signed up to buy it, as recently as early September major portions of the Model 3 were still being banged out by hand, away from the automated production line, according to people familiar with the matter.” https://www.wsj.com/articles/behind-teslas-production-delays-parts-of-model-3-were-being-made-by-hand-1507321057 https://www.wsj.com/articles/behind-teslas-production-delays...
- toomuchtodo 9y ago
  > still being banged out by hand, away from the automated production line, according to people familiar with the matter.” The press is up and running: https://www.instagram.com/p/BaInXGBg9G7/ https://www.instagram.com/p/BaInXGBg9G7/ Based on a 3.7 second cycle time, they can bang out 5,837,837 body panels per year (assuming some math an automotive engineer on /r/teslamotors provided that takes into account downtime and typical automotive labor scheduling: 50 weeks/year * 5 days/week * 24 hours/day * 3600 seconds/hour)/3.7 second panel cycle EDIT: csours: Thanks! I removed my grossly inaccurate prediction of per-vehicle pressed components. in_cahoots: Original response was to comment that Tesla is still banging out components by hand; this is possible, my rebuttal is that they do have parts of the line that are fully operational.

QAPereo 9y ago

I just kept thinking, “well yeah, but the optimists might be right, and Musk has done amazing things before.” Then... Unknown to analysts, investors and the hundreds of thousands of customers who signed up to buy it, as recently as early September major portions of the Model 3 were still being banged out by hand, away from the automated production line, according to people familiar with the matter. That reeks of fundamental issues at odds with “It is important to emphasize that there are no fundamental issues with the Model 3 production or supply chain. We understand what needs to be fixed and we are confident of addressing the manufacturing bottleneck issues in the near-term.” Maybe mass production is that one step too far.

abalone 9y ago

> What seriously worried me was a July 2016 visit to Tesla’s manufacturing plant... In an exchange with a trusted industry observer, I found out that he had had exactly the same experience only weeks ago, but he couldn’t write about it by “virtue” of the NDA he’d signed. Did Gassée's NDA expire or what? He's certainly divulging details about the factory. He previously wrote that he couldn't write about his visit due to an NDA.[1] [1] https://mondaynote.com/chairman-elons-great-leap-forward-68f49ffde372 https://mondaynote.com/chairman-elons-great-leap-forward-68f...

xenadu02 9y ago

Manufacturing ramp-up is exactly this sort of thing. Building by-hand as you work out the process and employ more automation. I'm not sure this is unexpected? As an investor I know full well Tesla has a ticking clock. They must achieve scale before the giants can catch up. People underestimate how god-awful slow the big car makers are. They haven't even come to terms with what Tesla is really doing yet. None have anything like the software experience. My guess is Tesla has 5 more years before the big makers can truly become competitive (assuming they all fire their software engineers and hire new ones today). Time will tell. If they're still fumbling a year from now then I'll start to get concerned. If they can't churn out at least 250,000 vehicles per year within two years I'll be very concerned.

Analemma_ 9y ago
> People underestimate how god-awful slow the big car makers are I think it’s exactly the opposite. People enamoured with Tesla and Musk tend to over-estimate how slow the old car makers are, because they’re so used to the “Silicon Valley story” that we will inevitably come in and take over everything. Look: it’s 2017. Everybody has read the Innovator’s Dilemma, everybody knows how fast e.g. Palm, Nokia, etc. went out of business. The old companies aren’t stupid, and they aren’t sitting around waiting for Tesla to eat their lunch. > None have anything like the software experience. GM is arguably in the lead right now as far as autonomous driving capability. They’re at least tied with Google and certainly ahead of Tesla. I’m going to be blunt: you don’t sound like a very good investor. You sound like someone who makes decisions based on hype and wishful thinking instead of real evidence. My recommendation would be to get out now before you lose your shirt.
- r00fus 9y ago
  This may be true, but why don't they have auto-pilot (or at least adaptive cruise) on their Bolt? One reason I didn't buy one - why pay ~$40k pre-incentives for something without a key luxury feature?
- erk__ 9y ago
  And companies like VW, BMW and Toyota are also investing a large amount om money into autonomous driving, they just keep it more behind curtains than Tesla.

KKKKkkkk1 9y ago

> As I watched Tesla’s messy, hiccuping line, with workers dashing in to fix faulty parts in place, my mind travelled back to the Honda plant I had visited years ago in Marysville, Ohio. Clean, calm, everything moved smoothly. I was so shocked by the contrast that I imprudently voiced my concern. That didn’t go over well with my fellow Tesla owners. I was a killjoy, I was calling their choice into question. Well, it's exactly the experience you get when you criticize Tesla on HN.

bjelkeman-again 9y ago
I am under the impression that the criticism here on HN is more nuanced than I normally read on the web.
- pvdebbe 9y ago
  It is. Always when we are not talking about Tesla, Apple or self driving vehicles.
joelthelion 9y ago
The difference is that Honda doesn't make interesting cars. People are ready to cut Tesla some slack because they are truly innovating.
- selectodude 9y ago
  Because they put a battery in a car?
  - TeMPOraL 9y ago
    Because they single-handedly forced the market against its will to accept electric cars, and we're all better off thanks to it, now that regular car companies decided to join the party too.
    - Cthulhu_ 9y ago

locusm 9y ago

Makes some good points except for the competition, I think its weak. Always wondered why Nissan intentionally made such an ugly car, I think the Leaf is no longer sold in Australia due to poor numbers. Isn't the Bolt a hybrid?

shirro 9y ago
No it is an EV. The Volt was the hybrid. Confusing naming. Decent range and acceleration but no RHD model so not an option for Australia. Sad to have a GM plant going idle in Adelaide and no electric car subsidies.

bobbles 9y ago

You can complain about Tesla missing a deadline by a year but you need to also consider them pulling the rest of the industry forward by 10 years when they do it

tptacek 9y ago
That may be a compelling HN argument about the heroism of Elon Musk, but for a competitive car company, "pulling the rest of the industry forward 10 years in the span of 1 year" is a very bad thing.

andrewtbham 9y ago

People that are caught up on this "miss" obviously do not follow the guidance very closely. On the last conference call they repeatedly downplayed the importance of the Q3 delivery guidance and repeatedly stated it would be difficult to predict and that there was a high degree of uncertainty. They repeated this ad nauseam. Here is a sample: >So, I would simply urge people to not get too caught up in what exactly falls within the exact calendar boundaries of a quarter, one quarter or the next, because when you have an exponentially growing production ramp, slight changes of a few weeks here or there can appear to have dramatic changes, but that is simply because of the arbitrary nature of when a quarter ends. That is why there has been little stock movement despite this miss. Run rate at the end of Q4 is a different story. That is very important guidance. https://seekingalpha.com/article/4094115-tesla-tsla-q2-2017-results-earnings-call-transcript https://seekingalpha.com/article/4094115-tesla-tsla-q2-2017-... Also, another indication that this guy know anything about Tesla's goals or guidane... Tesla has repeatedly stated they are not going to increase Model S/X production beyond 25k per quarter. They think that's close to the total addressable market and it's costly to expand production beyond that.

jaimex2 9y ago

Why is this on HN? Guy goes to a group tour and is suddenly an expert in auto manufacturing. "Sees chaos" and stock piled parts.

bsaul 9y ago
I think because the guy is jean louis gassée, former ceo of BeInc , which did built their own computers ( as well as an ex apple high ranked employee). So he has experience both with high tech and manufacturing issues. Granted, he's not an auto industry specialist but he's not the average joe either.
- jaimex2 9y ago
  Ah, right. Still I feel like we get a lot of Tesla posts good or bad that aren't about tech innovation just "Look at what Tesla is doing now!"

RickJWagner 9y ago

Hmmmmm. If I were a short seller, this might help me make my game plan. Or not. Markets aren't rational, it could be costly.

phipa 9y ago

I worked for Tesla for 5 years, joining with a cohort a few months before Model S launch in 2012 and departing recently to take a rest. My role involved architecting, developing, and helping support many software systems focused in the financial domain. These systems process all of the downstream events arising from sales, procurement, production, and other activities of the company with financial effect. Many often wonder why large software system projects are difficult. Many often wonder why running large organizations such as governments is difficult. In this topic some wonder why large scale vehicle manufacturing processes are difficult. These fundamentally share properties. One key challenge is that system, organization, and process complexity do not grow in a linear manner. If you have ever tried to estimate software development time for larger projects you understand how wildly inaccurate it can be. The number of interaction points multiply with growth. Progress feels extremely fast at the beginning. As the system surface area grows it becomes increasing difficult to push incremental improvements forward. A single person or small team comprehensively understanding the entire system and keeping enough of it in working memory becomes a challenge. There are design and management strategies to combat the challenge but in my opinion only time and iteration can truly overcome. The single most important long-term factor here is whether quality and continuing improvement is part of the culture or not. I believe they are, as suggested by the production target miss. A process of prioritizing and then fixing sub-optimal system and process interaction points, both internally and externally, will drive the company to high output while maintaining quality over time. TPS [0] concepts are well known but one doesn't simply download and install it in an afternoon. It can take decades to optimize. The single worst decision the company could make is to pump out vehicles to meet a production target metric while sacrificing quality. That has been tried before in this country (and at the same factory several decades ago no less [1]) and did not work out well. For perspective: Competitive threats are just not a very big deal. Globally, 72 million cars were produced last year [2]. If Tesla captures just 1% of that market it is still a huge achievement - 720k cars per year. Even if we assume they sell only the lowest price Model 3 at $35k and ignore all other vehicle and energy products that would equate to over $25 billion in revenue - 10 times the 2016 annual figure. The market will also grow as the global economy does. There is plenty of room. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toyota_Production_System https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toyota_Production_System [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NUMMI#Background https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NUMMI#Background [2] https://www.statista.com/statistics/262747/worldwide-automobile-production-since-2000/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/262747/worldwide-automob...