Tesla has just released short videos from inside the Shanghai Gigafactory showing many steps of the production line and manufacturing processes of the Tesla Model 3. Let’s take a look.
The above video, first appearing on Tesla’s Weibo profile (and in fairly modest resolution), shows paint, battery, and powertrain prep, various general assembly processes, wheel fitting, badging, and final inspection under lighting. The video passes quickly, so you may like to pause certain sections to have time to take in the details.
The second video, again from Teslas’s Weibo page, shows underbody inspection, the vehicle screen displaying “factory mode,” an automated bodywork quality check, a rolling road test, a recharging test, a wash/rinse process, final inspection, and outdoor driving/suspension check:
We saw last week that Tesla has already delivered a handful of Shanghai Gigafactory Model 3 vehicles to employees. Volume deliveries to general customers are scheduled to begin tomorrow, January 7th.
Tesla’s 2019 Q4 production and delivery report communicated that the peak production rate at the Shanghai Gigafactory has already hit 3,000 units per week. Whilst this is peak rate and not steady state rate, it still bodes well for Tesla’s ability to ramp up the production volume of the Model 3 from Shanghai.
We also saw news last week of Tesla further tweaking the price of the Shanghai-made Model 3, down to 299,050 RMB (a little under $43,000) after subsidies, which strongly outcompetes the price of alleged rivals such as the BMW 3 Series and Mercedes C-Class (also both locally made in China).
Folks experienced in auto manufacturing will be able to spot further details in the above two videos that I may have missed. Please jump into the comments and tell us what you can see.
Article images and videos courtesy of Tesla.
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