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There is an interview somewhere where Musk admits that their 100% automation plan was a bad idea. And the interviewer says 'well everyone told you it was a bad

• Aromasin 7y ago
  From watching some videos on the workings of their factory, it still seems like they've automated significantly more than their competitors. They reached for the stars and fell short, but that short is still ground-breaking.
  • hef19898 7y ago
    And resulted in production hell, didn't it?
    • Aromasin 7y ago
      This is only going off of what I've read from private interviews with Tesla employees (I'm sure there are some lurking on HN that can give a better idea), but it seems the production hell came mostly from the constant product updates that were rolling through. A connector on a wire harness becomes obsolete, and all of a sudden your camera that picks out that connector from a bucket needs updating, the arm that grips it needs changing, the milling machine that machines the hole for the connector needs changing etc. One up-issue knocks on to the entire production process. This isn't an issue with humans. You tell them the new part they need to use and that's it.
    • hi5eyes 7y ago
      building cars in a tent is called disruption
      • hef19898 7y ago
        That's called dilettantism at best combined with desperation. How would call manufacturing chips in a warehouse instead of a chip fab?
      • natch 7y ago
        Yep and scrappy, a very good attribute for a startup or even for a maturing silicon valley company.
  • golfer 7y ago
    Tesla's manufacturing capabilities are child's play in the automotive industry. Nothing Tesla has done here is revolutionary. Their quality control is abysmal compared to other major OEMs. They make the Model 3 in a tent. There are regular garbage fires at their Fremont plant. https://boingboing.net/2018/08/24/fire-breaks-out-at-tesla-facto.html https://boingboing.net/2018/08/24/fire-breaks-out-at-tesla-f... And there was another one in February this year.
    • tomnipotent 7y ago
      How are fires at a paint shop indicative of abysmal quality control?
      • hef19898 7y ago
        It is a sign for abysmal factory operations. And the first time pass rate is really bad compared to other OEMs.
        • tomnipotent 7y ago
          > It is a sign for abysmal factory operations. Not really. It's just a sign that their paint shop needs some work. > And the first time pass rate is really bad compared to other OEMs. For a few weeks in June. Great work taking isolated incidents and generalizing across the board.
          • golfer 7y ago
            The fires aren't just in the paint shop. They are all around the factory property. Inside and outside. Garbage fires on the lot happen about once a year. Regardless, you are trying to say that paint shop fires mean they just need a new paint shop. What I'm saying is that their entire manufacturing operation is amateurish compared to the rest of the auto industry.
            • jsight 7y ago
  • gamblor956 7y ago
    If you think Tesla's factory is amazing, you need to check out Toyota's factories. It's like the difference between a Fisher Price playset and Disneyland. Tesla talks big about automating...but Toyota actually did it, without fanfare, and managed to do so in a manner consistent with the kanban manufacturing philosophy that has defined their productivity and quality achievements of the past several decades
    • jsight 7y ago
      Toyota used to produce ~440k cars out of that plant. Tesla does ~360k. I'm not sure that "fisher price playset" vs disneyland is the analogy that I'd use for that difference.
      • gamblor956 7y ago
        NUMMI was Toyota's oldest and least productive US factory, and the cars were produced on contract for GM, which sold them under a GM brand. This is one of the reasons Toyota closed the plant and sold it to Tesla. NUMMI is also not the factory that Toyota shows off in its videos demonstrating the awesomeness of its manufacturing processes.
      • c0vfefe 7y ago
        There's more to plant quality than output alone. I'd expect a "disneyland" factory to have other metrics, like low rework, safety, worker satisfaction/retention, responsible procurement & disposal of raw materials, etc.
    • m463 7y ago
      Are there decent videos of both factories to compare them? It might be interesting to see the state of the practice for an established player like Toyota. I also remember way back when steve jobs tried to automate the production of NeXT cubes and broke his company doing it. I think a lot of folks do this sort of "follow one philosophy" into ruin. They want to be amazing and lose sight of what's doable/affordable/realistic.
  • c0vfefe 7y ago
    Often that's what it takes to achieve significant progress, even as an individual. Shoot for the stars and you'll likely see modest progress, but if you aim for mediocrity, you might not even attain that.
• grey-area 7y ago
  100% automation was a gamble that didn't pay off For now. When they have a solid product, and a lot more money in the bank, I'd expect them to be at the forefront of automation, and then it will pay dividends, they just tried to do it too soon.
  • hef19898 7y ago
    There are plenty of car companies out there with solid products and very deep pockets. Nobody is going this direction. All it will do is increasing the production issues ten fold if Tesla is facing the first facelift or model change.
    • fooker 7y ago
      Nobody went in the direction of seamless internet payments before PayPal, despite banking existing for centuries. Nobody went in the direction of landing boosters, despite rocketry existing for decades. 'Nobody is doing it', is more often than not, an argument for 'it' instead of against.
      • stcredzero 7y ago
        It's not enough to have, 'Nobody is doing it.' If you want the full Musk analysis, you also have to do a 1st principles analysis of the true cost. Then you have to identify the factors holding things up across the entire industry. Is it that government regulation and meddling is distorting the pricing and scaring away competitors? Is it an entrenched industry with no motivation to innovate? Often nobody's doing it, because "it" is truly stupid. What Musk is doing, is applying a formula for discovering when the majority are mistaken. http://paulgraham.com/say.html http://paulgraham.com/say.html
      • hef19898 7y ago
        True at first glance. But the better allogy would be a better way to process cheques in the case of PayPal. And in the case of producing cars ignoring the Toyota Production System, ignoring decades of experience in high volume car manufacturing is at best incredibly arrogant.