1/ For the benefit of everyone on Twitter, I’ve made a New Year’s Resolution to not share my opinions on politics or Covid this year. (So many Twitter drafts deleted already!) So instead of opinion, I’d like to share this anecdote.
2/ Last Friday, I went to my doctor for my annual tune-up. We talk candidly on many subjects, including Tesla. We even took a short excursion to Mars this time. Of course, on topics of medicine I will always defer to his opinion. And he had definite opinions on Covid.
3/ We talked about the effectiveness of wearing masks. We talked about the effectiveness of early treatment drugs. We talked about the level of risk for an average person. We talked about the level of risk for me in particular. We agreed on everything.
4/ So to my amazement, it seems that I’ve been able to parse reasonable info from the enormous amount of noise on media sources. On the topic of Covid vaccination, he asked my opinion first. I shared it along with my rationale. He smiled, nodded in agreement, and said “exactly”.
5/ I received my shingles vaccine and left the building.
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1/ Now that the election has been called and voter fraud dismissed, it’s time to search for other frauds. Let’s look at $TSLA Full Self Drive. About 3 weeks ago, Tesla released its Beta version to a limited audience of Tesla influencers.
2/ The influencers were supposed to flood social media with praise and testimonial videos. Instead, FSD performance was so bad that every video contained errors, many requiring driver intervention.
3/ Excuses were made. “Remember, this is only Beta”. “I’m teaching it to drive down this street”. But the reality clear to everyone was that Tesla’s Beta FSD is anything but Full Self Drive.
1/ $TSLA Battery Day will "Blow Your Mind" said Elon Musk. I think the presentation would've been a lot more convincing had they actually shown one of the new 4680 cells. Maybe show what 1 kWh of the new cells looks like compared to 1 kWh of 2170 cells.
2/ The percentage improvements of the various elements seemed rather vague. It would've been nice to have a few hard numbers. Without hard numbers, you can't compare Tesla's technology to anyone else's. I assume that was on purpose.
3/ But it was most unsettling when they proceeded to add up all those percentages of different things to get an overall % improvement. That was purely deceptive.
This is what happens when the design process does not allow time for reading the supplier's application guideline. Failing to design it correctly in the first place, I wonder how much engineering went into this makeshift solution?
What is that strap wrapped around - will it deform?
Can the condenser stack carry mechanical load through the center like that?
How about the mechanical properties of the foam corner molding? Temperature range?
Once there's a little compliance in the strap assembly, the cantilevered mass will have vibrational movement. And there will be more compliance quickly. Will somebody tighten the strap periodically?
This is a fix you'd do to keep driving until the end of the semester.
1/ By now, it must be clear to both bulls and bears that exponential growth is becoming harder and harder to find at . Tesla’s avenue for growth now rests largely in the People’s Republic of China.
2/ Expansion at GF3 in Shanghai has been rapid and decisive. Ahead of schedule, production capacity surpassed 4,000 per week in mid-June. It’s safe to assume that they have Model 3 capacity for 20,000 per month today. tesmanian.com/blogs/tesmania…
3/ Meaningful production at GF3 began in March, when more almost 12,000 Model 3’s were delivered. Very impressive for sure – where do we stand today? We’re now at 11,800 in August, according to Reuters. reuters.com/article/us-tes…
I’d like to take a moment to share some Shorty Ground Force info-nuggets from a UK acquaintance who prefers to remain anonymous.
2/ The first EU ship of Q3 is scheduled to arrive in Zeebrugge tomorrow. Sales in July have been uninspiring, as inventories were pretty much drained by the end of June. So by the end of July, surely inventories are down to 0 given Tesla’s insatiable demand. Let’s check in.
3/ The first observation comes from Heathrow. It was not possible to get an precise inventory headcount. But adding up the inventory cars inside and more at the rear of the building, there appear to be well over 20.
Although Tesla’s customer deposits declined 10% this quarter, the reservation book still carries an attractive balance. Some of it is pent-up demand for Cybertruck, Semi, and Roadster.
2/ But a chunk of it is for Model 3 reservations in India, where deposits have been accumulating since Apr 2016. Opening up reservations in India was a bold move my Musk, who had no idea when or even if he could deliver.
3/ The usual promises of “next year, definitely” were enough to keep reservations flowing. In Sep of 2019, there was still optimism as recounted in this CleanTechinca article. cleantechnica.com/2019/09/18/tes…