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Yet another quarter has almost passed and, according to the Bloomberg estimate [1], Tesla will yet again miss their goal of producing 5.000 cars a week -- by fa
by ckastner 8y ago
Yet another quarter has almost passed and, according to the Bloomberg estimate [1], Tesla will yet again miss their goal of producing 5.000 cars a week -- by far. In the most recent week, it was about half that, 2.560.
I guess some some people are just fed up with waiting.
[1] https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2018-tesla-tracker/ https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2018-tesla-tracker/
- danhak 8y agoFor some perspective, the Model 3 is already outselling the Chevy Bolt by a factor of > 5x, and has already set the record for greatest monthly deliveries EVER for a plug-in car in the U.S. https://insideevs.com/monthly-plug-in-sales-scorecard/ https://insideevs.com/monthly-plug-in-sales-scorecard/
- ams6110 8y agoThe Bolt is hideously ugly.
- stcredzero 8y agoNo. The Aztek is hideously ugly. The Bolt is nowhere near that ugly. Also, plenty of people don't care if something is ugly, if it's utilitarian. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=33AP0JnXSOA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=33AP0JnXSOA
- paganel 8y agoA link to a Doug DeMuro video on HN, that's nice! Back on topic, I think the Bolt looks cool, I think it has an utilitarian and slightly ahead-of-its-time feeling about it which is just cool (the same as Renault Espace and especially Renault Avantime had back in the late '80s - the '90s, when everyone was hating on them, but now they're cool).
- stcredzero 8y agoWhat's wrong with a link to a Doug DeMuro video on HN?
- paganel 8y agoNothing wrong with it, I was not trying to be condescending or anything, quite the contrary, it's just that English is not my primary language so maybe my comment got read the "wrong way", so to speak.
- dabockster 8y ago> plenty of people don't care if something is ugly, if it's utilitarian I am one of these people. I live in the Pacific Northwest, where it rains 7-8 months out of the year. A nice car will be totally ruined in a few weeks of rain around here. So everyone just drives ugly Honda Accords and AWD Subarus. Related side note, a teacher back when I was in HS about 10 years ago told a story about how she saw Bill Gates driving a beat up mid 1990s Accura around Seattle after he was crowned the world's wealthiest individual.
- dpark 8y ago> A nice car will be totally ruined in a few weeks of rain around here. What are you talking about? PNW rain isn’t going to hurt your car unless you leave the sunroof open. Tons of people in Seattle drive late model luxury cars.
- brett40324 8y agoWhether this is true, rumor, or else: this. You could buy 20 cars like this for under the price of a model 3. Really, at the end of the day, everything is about just getting from point A to B!
- mikestew 8y agoWe own an original Scion xB (lunchbox on wheels), a Nissan Leaf, and a VW Vanagon (which arguably could be a matter of taste). Utility uber alles at our house. And even we make fun of the Aztek, given that it lacks the utility to offset the hideous asthetics. But I don't think I'd have to try really hard to convince the wife to get a Bolt. It sure as hell is better looking than anything else we own. And despite owning way more TSLA than is healthy for our portfolio, I'm not terribly impressed by the looks of the 3. It's not ugly, but it doesn't stand out, either.
- stcredzero 8y agoI'm not terribly impressed by the looks of the 3. The front of the Tesla 3 keeps reminding me of this guy. (You see, when I look at the front of a car, there's supposed to be something there, but there's something less than what I expected.) https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/6/6e/Hannibal_Lecter_in_Silence_of_the_Lambs.jpg https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/6/6e/Hannibal_Lect... Someone should make a luggage rack for the Scion xB that looks like a handle from one of those old-school lunchboxes.
- aidenn0 8y agoI actually saw an Aztek in person for the first time in a while recently. One thing I noticed is that it looks less weird compared to when it first came out (a lot of cars share a vaguely similar shape to it now), but no less ugly. Apparently the desgin was both ahead of its time, and bad.
- stretchwithme 8y agoMaybe people got used to seeing it on Breaking Bad. It's still badly broken in the looks department if you ask me.
- tempestn 8y agoI just did some googling to remind myself how ugly the Aztek is and found this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zZ4llaTn-hk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zZ4llaTn-hk Video of a guy transforming an Aztek into a reasonably attractive sports car. Pretty impressive!
- mcguire 8y agoI don't get the "Aztek is ugly" thing. The front end is a little odd, but the back is Prius-ish and it is overall a generic small SUV crossover.
- mywittyname 8y agoThe Bolt is as boring as cars get. It's far from "hideously ugly," or even "ugly." It's basically as inoffensive and anonymous a car as you can get.
- aphextron 8y ago>The Bolt is hideously ugly. It truly is. It's easily the fugliest car GM has ever produced, and this is from someone who owns and loves a Nissan Leaf. Whatever their next-gen purpose built EV may be, I hope to god it's not the same platform.
- FussyZeus 8y agoThe bolt is a freaking work of art compared to many vehicles, the ones that immediately come to mind being the Juke, the Aztek, and the newer versions of the GMC Sierra.
- icc97 8y agoSaying that it's less ugly that absolute eyesores doesn't stop it being ugly.
- chaostheory 8y agoI think you're confusing that with the Nissan Leaf before its recent redesign. The Bolt doesn't look great but it's not ugly.
- icc97 8y agoI don't see why you're getting down voted so much. Other than it's a pretty vacuous comment with nothing to back up the statement. Nevertheless I do agree. I get really frustrated at how people are willing to accept cars that are so ugly. The Bolt is better than others, but I personally think it's still a really ugly car. It's a complement to say that it's only as ugly as most regular cars are, but still it's ugly. I'm impressed by the new leaf, it actually looks like a nice car. But the front of the first leaf looked ridiculous. Tesla somehow figured out that people who want to buy electric cars, like cars that look nice too. It's the most obvious piece of advice, yet no car company could think of it. Nice looking cars add something to the road scenery, bring pleasure to those who pass by them. What I'm most impressed about is that Tesla have done what almost no luxury sports car brand has done and try and sell a mass market car and keep the nice looks of the brand. I'd liken the Model S/X to more like a Porsche/Aston Martin than a BMW. It's actually a bit simialr to the Porsche Boxter but that only makes up 10-20% of sales [0]. Personally the major attraction for me is that for $35k (when it comes in 2035...) you can get a car that has similar styling to a luxury sports car. Making nice looking cars is worthwhile. The new Mini achieved it, the Fiat 500 managed it. Beauty is something to be cherished, and when you're going to make a million of the things and you only have to design it once, why not make it beautiful. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Porsche#North_American_sales https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Porsche#North_American_sales
- Coincoin 8y agoI never understood the obsession of all car makers to always design EV and hybrid cars with ugly shapes and black plastic all over the body. Can I just have a regular car that works on electricity please? Spare me the tacky from-the-future look please.
- JoeAltmaier 8y agoI think its to disguise the ultralight frame? Has to be plastic; sketchy frame means it has to stick out to cover all the bases.
- dingaling 8y agoI'd argue that no car is actually 'ugly', as in repulsive. Awkward perhaps, like the early versions of the Fiat Multipla and Ssangyong Rodius. But I'd rather look at something odd than something bland. You quote the new Mini and 500 as nice looking. To me they are bland and unadventurous, and the Mini looks ridiculously bloated. I'd walk past them in a carpark to look at an Aztec. Compare a 500 with a Panda on the same platform. The latter has much more internal volume and looks just as ... bland.
- lintroller 8y agoThe problem was never the demand for the Model 3. Tesla needs to hit specific benchmarks if it wishes to meet the expectations of its sky-high market cap and it simply hasn't been able to do so up to this point. I'm sure it's a difficult problem and I'm rooting for them to figure it out but until they start to produce more cars, there's going to be people asking questions.
- danhak 8y agoThe market cap is well off its highs, which is healthy given the slower-than-expected ramp. But the ramp is happening, and overly-aggressive targets notwithstanding, what we're seeing unfold right now is objectively impressive. The company will do just fine.
- Judgmentality 8y ago> The company will do just fine. Obviously people have strong feelings about Tesla one way or the other, as it's obviously a pillar for the high-risk-high-reward ethos that gets people excited, but the future of Tesla is incredibly uncertain at the moment. Elon Musk is likely to be fired from his own company, they have to pay over a billion dollars in loans next year, their cash flow is a mess, and there is no telling when they will actually be GAAP profitable. I don't own TSLA stock nor do I have any short/put positions - but TSLA is almost as volatile as some cryptocurrencies.
- RyanZAG 8y agoFiring Musk is never going to happen. It would collapse the share price, and investors know that. They can complain, but they can't fire him and not lose a fortune all around.
- ConceitedCode 8y agoThat's what they said about Steve Jobs the first time around.
- RobLach 8y agoBuilding hype was never a problem for Tesla. Building cars on the other hand...
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- chaostheory 8y agoLooking at the same chart, you really need to include the Volt as well. Comparing Model 3 vs Bolt/Volt sales, then it's only about 33%; about the same difference as the Prius Prime
- icc97 8y agoWow, the Model 3 has 25% of the total EV sales. When combined with the S/X it's over 33% of the monthly sales. For one car company to have such a large share of a car market monthly sales is pretty impressive. Plus that list includes hybrids. If you only include full electric Tesla has 9220 / 13074 ~ 70% of the monthly sales.
- gowld 8y agoModel 3 is only available in the US. Other cars are sold worldwide. For example, the Nissan produces 8K Leaf / month worldwide, and could produce more if there were more demand. Tesla is popular, for sure, but hard to produce at scale.
- Ryudas 8y agoI must say the bloomberg tracker can be highly inaccurate and vary its values depending on your location. Likely not the best place to judge current tesla production capabilities.
- mcot2 8y agoThey announced in the Q4 earnings that the target for 5k/week is the end of Q2 (End of June). They reiterated that they are on track for this in the Q1 earnings call. The Bloomberg tracker is accurate but it usually lags by a few weeks and the production has been volitale over the last several weeks as they had two planned retooling stopages in May. They also won’t admit it publically but all indications are that they are approaching 200,000 total sales in the U.S. which triggers the phase out of the federal tax rebates. It’s a little complicated but this may mean they build cars in Q2 but push some deliveries to early Q3 and also deliver more to Canada. Both of these will affect the tracker as well. All in all we are likely to see bursts of extrapolated 5k/week in late Q2 and steady 5k/week in early Q3. Don’t be surprised if it’s 4k or even 6k though :). http://files.shareholder.com/downloads/ABEA-4CW8X0/6295494786x0x970775/34923C55-6853-4223-ADDA-CB3CDC1B919F/TSLA_Update_Letter_2017-4Q.pdf http://files.shareholder.com/downloads/ABEA-4CW8X0/629549478...
- akmarinov 8y ago> and also deliver more to Canada. Just send some to Europe already, please.
- martin_bech 8y agoThat will require different headlights, different onboard charging, different software etc. Shipping some cars, north of the border is much, much easier.
- greglindahl 8y agoDifferent onboard charging, what? So far only China gets a different onboard charging interface from Tesla.
- martin_bech 8y agoIn Europe type 2 is the standard EV connector, and the cars can charge on 3 phases, when charging from AC. Fun Fact, first and second generation European Model S, dont have autoclosing charge ports, because the cargeport is bigger.
- this_user 8y agoThey did a scheduled production stop at the end of May though, and these have usually served to increase production afterwards. Before the latest one, they were at more then 3500 per week, so we might see them ramp up to over 4000 soon. That being said, they would still be trailing the trajectory needed to reach 5000 at the end of Q2, so it remains to be seen whether they can actually hit their target this time.
- Shivetya 8y agoThe issue people don't bring up is that Tesla's failure to execute has provided sufficient time for other manufactures to enter the game or have promises close enough to keep brand loyalist away from Tesla. However I don't think the refunds are much of an issue, we must remember they took full price deposits on the new sports car for first release versions (250k) and took 50k deposits on all following versions. There are also all the 5k/10k deposits on the semi. anecdotal insert : I have two friends with pending Jaguar i-Pace orders that hope to take delivery before October, one is ditching his X (which his wife calls it their "ex" as in they want it done) and the other just wants a Jag.
- greglindahl 8y agoSo, after looking at the graph, which has a series of peaks with factory shutdowns to increase production between them, you're boldly predicting that the most recent shutdown is going to lower peak production? Gotcha. To put this another way, they hit 70% of the goal mid-quarter, and the results of the latest shutdown are not yet known. In the previous quarter, they were at 40% of the goal mid-quarter. I don't know why I bother to comment on this since people appear to really differ about what the graph means.