7 ms·

Tesla Temporarily Stops Model 3 Production Line

98 points by scottie_m 9y ago

burger_moon 9y ago
>Tesla, however, says this is part of a planned period of downtime that was similar to another shutdown in February, and it isn’t intended to have an affect on the company’s current production targets for the car. This seems like a story that is being pushed just because sites know it will drive clicks but the actually news is well not really news.
- rconti 9y ago
  It's hard to say, given how Tesla spins things sometimes, though. That said, a stoppage like this COULD be totally normal.
- ryanbertrand 9y ago
  Seems to be the tactic of 90% of the news sites these days.
- danso 9y ago
  The original article said this: > The announcement of the four- to five-day production pause for the Model 3 came without warning, according to Tesla employees who spoke with BuzzFeed News. During the pause, workers are expected to use vacation days or stay home without pay; a small number of workers may be offered paid work elsewhere in the factory. https://www.buzzfeed.com/carolineodonovan/tesla-model-3-production-shutdown-delay-elon-musk https://www.buzzfeed.com/carolineodonovan/tesla-model-3-prod...
  - zik 9y ago
    Wow. Tesla's really bad to their employees.
  - burger_moon 9y ago
    Well that's a bit more damning than what I read. That's a really shitty practice to do to their employees.
    - agumonkey 9y ago
      joblesness on demand
  - bryanlarsen 9y ago
    Many of those workers have probably been racking up the overtime, so the break shouldn't be bad financially and good for the mental health. But to do it without warning is really shitty: a little bit of warning would have let a proper vacation be planned. You know that vacation requests will be denied once it gets started again.
    - ryanx435 9y ago
      Jeez. Most Americans are living paycheck to paycheck with less than $1000 cash in the accounts, and you think being forced to miss a week's pay with no notice isn't bad financially.
      - StaticRedux 9y ago
        That's not what he said. He said that bc they have been working a lot of overtime lately, their paycheck will probably work out to be around the same as they would normally get. He also said it was shitty that they did it without warning. But you already knew that. There's no reason to falsey attribute malice to what someone says just to flamebait.
        samastur 9y ago
        No, what he said is they might average the same as their normal pay check but that doesn't mean that what they earn normally is necessary enough and that overtime is some kind of fun money. What the person you responded to has pointed out is that a lot of workers do not earn enough to have savings. So waving away loss of income in such situations as just spending some money you might have earned previously is not exactly nice.
        wahern 9y ago
        People who work in these types of industries _expect_ these work stoppages. Though obviously it's preferable to have a heads-up. I have family members working on the new Vogtle Nuclear Power plants in Georgia. Week to week they never know for sure whether they'll be working 7 days, 3 days, or 0 days. Managers do try to plan work stoppages ahead of time, but it's not always practical or possible and workers know this. Except for the most junior guys everybody understands you need to prepare for stoppages, though that doesn't prevent many from crying foul. Wage workers do have it tough, but it's also true that poor planning skills exacerbate the situation, and all the overtime means you can't really compare the situation to a part-time, minimum wage worker who couldn't save money even if they tried.
RcouF1uZ4gsC 9y ago
From the BuzzFeed article that is linked [0]. > During the pause, workers are expected to use vacation days or stay home without pay; a small number of workers may be offered paid work elsewhere in the factory. For these downtimes that are planned by the company, is it typical across the industry that workers have to use vacation days or go without pay? Or is Tesla shortchanging workers relative to other car manufacturers? 0. https://www.buzzfeed.com/carolineodonovan/tesla-model-3-production-shutdown-delay-elon-musk?utm_term=.jnL1P5p2O#.xlqPwzjeG https://www.buzzfeed.com/carolineodonovan/tesla-model-3-prod...
- bluedino 9y ago
  GM, for instance, has a shutdown almost every summer. It's usually around two weeks. It can be more, and a few workers stick around for the machines they can't really turn off. They also get to do some maintenance as well as let workers take time off in the summer, without affecting regular production. Sometimes (when sales are slow and inventories are full) the shutdown lasts longer than two weeks.
  - mkempe 9y ago
    Volvo's summer factory shutdown in Sweden is even longer.
  - froindt 9y ago
    It's pretty typical for auto companies to shut down for ~2 weeks over the summer and in December. Ford does the same thing. It gives the companies two big windows for planned maintenance on their machinery which helps the plants run more consistently the rest of the year.
  - csours 9y ago
    To give a bit more context, hourly employees are laid off and draw unemployment during these planned shutdowns. It sounds super weird, but it's been happening for over 50 years, so everyone knows what they are getting into. The same hourly employees are hired back again at the end of the shutdown. I'm not exactly sure what happens for downtime more than a couple shifts, but I'm sure the union remembers it in the next negotiations.
paulcole 9y ago
I suspected this might happen after Musk said that Tesla would be profitable soon. If they’re losing money when they make cars, the logical choice should be to stop making cars. By doing so they should achieve profitability. This is why Musk is an icon. He sees opportunities others don’t and is willing to defy convention.
rawland 9y ago
My father is a shop floor worker at a major car manufacturer. Stopping a production line during a ramp up for days is a normal part of the business. When the line is already running, it is not the best of all news, because something malfunctioned -- like a big press putting errors into some bigger parts -- and needs to be reworked. Sometimes, however, they are reworking the line. So these stops are planned and there usually also exists a very detailed plan how to approach this. This is usually a high-stress situation due to a standing production line causing a loss to the company, and a separate specifically for this trained team is doing the rework with the workers being concerned with the parts of the production line being the 'consultants' to this other team. Resp., helping operationally. During the setup of the production line for a new model it is standing for weeks. Hence, no one is having unpaid enforced vacation whatsoever. At least in Germany. Smells like clickbait here.
- danso 9y ago
  It doesn’t seem like your dad’s experience applies. Tesla workers are being asked to take vacation days or to stay home. It’s also the second stoppage in 2 months. https://www.reuters.com/article/us-tesla-model-3/tesla-temporarily-shuts-down-model-3-production-in-fremont-idUSKBN1HN347 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-tesla-model-3/tesla-tempo...
  - rawland 9y ago
    They cite BuzzFeed: BuzzFeed, which first reported the news, said workers were expected to use vacation days or stay home without pay during the four- to five-day production pause. The thing is, during a ramp-up there are incentives to get the workers working seven days a week, because they want to minimize the time the line stands still. So usually he's taking that extra cash (and that's also how I found out, as I was wondering why he's gone for the weekends, too).
    - tudorw 9y ago
      wow, what a lousy cheap offer, if I turned up to work and they could not get the office door to open, I would go home and expect to get paid.
jmheinkle 9y ago
I’m surprised no one has mentioned the likely true reason behind this stoppage: the “burst rate” production and other shenanigans Tesla has put on at the end of its most recent quarters. These tricks artificially boost its weekly production for the quarterly reports. After the cameras are off, the burned out workers and other resources need time to recuperate. This shutdown period conveniently conceals this burnout. This is part of the shell games Tesla has played, robbing from its future self to manufacture the narrative it needs to maintain its share price in its stricken state.
- Rattled 9y ago
  Reminds me of working in a telecoms manufacturer in 2000 before the .com crash. There were times before end of quarter when unfinished devices were put in trucks and sent for a drive around town, to return after inspections were finished.
- pnloyd 9y ago
  This sounds a bit speculative to me. I'd expect that if it were true you'd see some discontinuity in production rate from the last time they halted production. Doesn't seem to be the case. https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2018-tesla-tracker/ https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2018-tesla-tracker/ If they "burst" 24/7 12 months a year then I'd just call it hauling ass.
- jsight 9y ago
  That doesn't really make sense to me. Yes, the end of last quarter was a bit of a scramble to come close to their stated goals without necessarily making it sustainable. But it is only really "robbing from its future self" if they don't end up sustaining them. My guess is that when production resumes, it will resume at a higher rate than the quarter end.
naskwo 9y ago
Related to this? https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2018-04-16/analyst-spots-14-billion-hole-teslas-balance-sheet https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2018-04-16/analyst-spots-14-b...

98 points by scottie_m 9y ago

>Tesla, however, says this is part of a planned period of downtime that was similar to another shutdown in February, and it isn’t intended to have an affect on the company’s current production targets for the car. This seems like a story that is being pushed just because sites know it will drive clicks but the actually news is well not really news.

rconti 9y ago
It's hard to say, given how Tesla spins things sometimes, though. That said, a stoppage like this COULD be totally normal.
ryanbertrand 9y ago
Seems to be the tactic of 90% of the news sites these days.
danso 9y ago
The original article said this: > The announcement of the four- to five-day production pause for the Model 3 came without warning, according to Tesla employees who spoke with BuzzFeed News. During the pause, workers are expected to use vacation days or stay home without pay; a small number of workers may be offered paid work elsewhere in the factory. https://www.buzzfeed.com/carolineodonovan/tesla-model-3-production-shutdown-delay-elon-musk https://www.buzzfeed.com/carolineodonovan/tesla-model-3-prod...
- zik 9y ago
  Wow. Tesla's really bad to their employees.
- burger_moon 9y ago
  Well that's a bit more damning than what I read. That's a really shitty practice to do to their employees.
  - agumonkey 9y ago
    joblesness on demand
- bryanlarsen 9y ago
  Many of those workers have probably been racking up the overtime, so the break shouldn't be bad financially and good for the mental health. But to do it without warning is really shitty: a little bit of warning would have let a proper vacation be planned. You know that vacation requests will be denied once it gets started again.
  - ryanx435 9y ago
    Jeez. Most Americans are living paycheck to paycheck with less than $1000 cash in the accounts, and you think being forced to miss a week's pay with no notice isn't bad financially.
    - StaticRedux 9y ago
      That's not what he said. He said that bc they have been working a lot of overtime lately, their paycheck will probably work out to be around the same as they would normally get. He also said it was shitty that they did it without warning. But you already knew that. There's no reason to falsey attribute malice to what someone says just to flamebait.
      - samastur 9y ago
        No, what he said is they might average the same as their normal pay check but that doesn't mean that what they earn normally is necessary enough and that overtime is some kind of fun money. What the person you responded to has pointed out is that a lot of workers do not earn enough to have savings. So waving away loss of income in such situations as just spending some money you might have earned previously is not exactly nice.
        wahern 9y ago
        People who work in these types of industries _expect_ these work stoppages. Though obviously it's preferable to have a heads-up. I have family members working on the new Vogtle Nuclear Power plants in Georgia. Week to week they never know for sure whether they'll be working 7 days, 3 days, or 0 days. Managers do try to plan work stoppages ahead of time, but it's not always practical or possible and workers know this. Except for the most junior guys everybody understands you need to prepare for stoppages, though that doesn't prevent many from crying foul. Wage workers do have it tough, but it's also true that poor planning skills exacerbate the situation, and all the overtime means you can't really compare the situation to a part-time, minimum wage worker who couldn't save money even if they tried.

RcouF1uZ4gsC 9y ago

From the BuzzFeed article that is linked [0]. > During the pause, workers are expected to use vacation days or stay home without pay; a small number of workers may be offered paid work elsewhere in the factory. For these downtimes that are planned by the company, is it typical across the industry that workers have to use vacation days or go without pay? Or is Tesla shortchanging workers relative to other car manufacturers? 0. https://www.buzzfeed.com/carolineodonovan/tesla-model-3-production-shutdown-delay-elon-musk?utm_term=.jnL1P5p2O#.xlqPwzjeG https://www.buzzfeed.com/carolineodonovan/tesla-model-3-prod...

bluedino 9y ago
GM, for instance, has a shutdown almost every summer. It's usually around two weeks. It can be more, and a few workers stick around for the machines they can't really turn off. They also get to do some maintenance as well as let workers take time off in the summer, without affecting regular production. Sometimes (when sales are slow and inventories are full) the shutdown lasts longer than two weeks.
- mkempe 9y ago
  Volvo's summer factory shutdown in Sweden is even longer.
- froindt 9y ago
  It's pretty typical for auto companies to shut down for ~2 weeks over the summer and in December. Ford does the same thing. It gives the companies two big windows for planned maintenance on their machinery which helps the plants run more consistently the rest of the year.
- csours 9y ago
  To give a bit more context, hourly employees are laid off and draw unemployment during these planned shutdowns. It sounds super weird, but it's been happening for over 50 years, so everyone knows what they are getting into. The same hourly employees are hired back again at the end of the shutdown. I'm not exactly sure what happens for downtime more than a couple shifts, but I'm sure the union remembers it in the next negotiations.

paulcole 9y ago

I suspected this might happen after Musk said that Tesla would be profitable soon. If they’re losing money when they make cars, the logical choice should be to stop making cars. By doing so they should achieve profitability. This is why Musk is an icon. He sees opportunities others don’t and is willing to defy convention.

rawland 9y ago

My father is a shop floor worker at a major car manufacturer. Stopping a production line during a ramp up for days is a normal part of the business. When the line is already running, it is not the best of all news, because something malfunctioned -- like a big press putting errors into some bigger parts -- and needs to be reworked. Sometimes, however, they are reworking the line. So these stops are planned and there usually also exists a very detailed plan how to approach this. This is usually a high-stress situation due to a standing production line causing a loss to the company, and a separate specifically for this trained team is doing the rework with the workers being concerned with the parts of the production line being the 'consultants' to this other team. Resp., helping operationally. During the setup of the production line for a new model it is standing for weeks. Hence, no one is having unpaid enforced vacation whatsoever. At least in Germany. Smells like clickbait here.

danso 9y ago
It doesn’t seem like your dad’s experience applies. Tesla workers are being asked to take vacation days or to stay home. It’s also the second stoppage in 2 months. https://www.reuters.com/article/us-tesla-model-3/tesla-temporarily-shuts-down-model-3-production-in-fremont-idUSKBN1HN347 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-tesla-model-3/tesla-tempo...
- rawland 9y ago
  They cite BuzzFeed: BuzzFeed, which first reported the news, said workers were expected to use vacation days or stay home without pay during the four- to five-day production pause. The thing is, during a ramp-up there are incentives to get the workers working seven days a week, because they want to minimize the time the line stands still. So usually he's taking that extra cash (and that's also how I found out, as I was wondering why he's gone for the weekends, too).
  - tudorw 9y ago
    wow, what a lousy cheap offer, if I turned up to work and they could not get the office door to open, I would go home and expect to get paid.

jmheinkle 9y ago

I’m surprised no one has mentioned the likely true reason behind this stoppage: the “burst rate” production and other shenanigans Tesla has put on at the end of its most recent quarters. These tricks artificially boost its weekly production for the quarterly reports. After the cameras are off, the burned out workers and other resources need time to recuperate. This shutdown period conveniently conceals this burnout. This is part of the shell games Tesla has played, robbing from its future self to manufacture the narrative it needs to maintain its share price in its stricken state.

Rattled 9y ago
Reminds me of working in a telecoms manufacturer in 2000 before the .com crash. There were times before end of quarter when unfinished devices were put in trucks and sent for a drive around town, to return after inspections were finished.
pnloyd 9y ago
This sounds a bit speculative to me. I'd expect that if it were true you'd see some discontinuity in production rate from the last time they halted production. Doesn't seem to be the case. https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2018-tesla-tracker/ https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2018-tesla-tracker/ If they "burst" 24/7 12 months a year then I'd just call it hauling ass.
jsight 9y ago
That doesn't really make sense to me. Yes, the end of last quarter was a bit of a scramble to come close to their stated goals without necessarily making it sustainable. But it is only really "robbing from its future self" if they don't end up sustaining them. My guess is that when production resumes, it will resume at a higher rate than the quarter end.

naskwo 9y ago

Related to this? https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2018-04-16/analyst-spots-14-billion-hole-teslas-balance-sheet https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2018-04-16/analyst-spots-14-b...