I think he is just too sensational. Is this guy doing actual engineering?
From whomever I talked, I hear the same: Tesla's engineering leaves mixed impressions.
One can say that the range is definitely good - Tesla scores very high in getting most range out of kw/h. But things like poor metalworking would be a recall worthy flaw for every other automaker.
For the interior, Model S feels way too American. Compare its interior and an actual luxury car, like a maxed out Benz S600.
Its engineering in overall is nothing groundbreaking, and saying that EVs are way more straightforward to engineer is true. Telsa just stands out as one EV maker that didn't make some "showstopper" omissions, unlike almost every other competitor.
Chinese and Japanese EVs are dead on arrival in US because most of them are really small for Americans... If an American buys an expensive car, it will most likely be a BIG car.
Poor driveabiliy chases other competitors. There are simply not so many makers with experience making 2.5t+ full sized sedans, nor compact car makers which can make a compact car suspension not to croak under 1.7t+ curb weight.
NIO for examples despite making a quite marketable SUV for China was delayed launch for 2 years because their first attempt at making SUV got so much bad reviews from test drivers, that they had to near completely redesign the body and suspension twice. Reportedly, after finding out that live axle is a completely inadequate for a 2t+ vehicle, and that unibody design can't handle the weight of a battery pack.
Leaf had both tiny battery, poor chemistry, and poor thermals.
Bolt - all bad things you normally expect from a US car maker other than Ford.
Mind substantiating the whole "recall worthy metalworking" claim? First I hear of it. Are you sure it's up to date?
All these flaws you talk about on other cars are not accidents. Everyone is running up against the same fundamental tradeoffs, and only one company has done the insane optimization of everything to get to the other side. It's not a matter of just deciding to do so. The nio example you mention for instance, Tesla famously was initially planning to use the lotus Elise body for the roadster, but ultimately had to redesign essentially every part to get to production, since the weight changes invalidated all the assumptions of the original.
Yes, they're not the best at every single thing. But producing the safest car ever for a newcomer is pretty nuts. Producing the most efficient electric car ever is pretty nuts. Producing the best OTA story ever is nuts. Producing the most advanced driver assist feature is pretty nuts. Doing all these things together requires explanation. It can't just be "oh, the others just made bad choices".
> It can't just be "oh, the others just made bad choices".
I'm afraid this is exactly what it is.
When the team works from a bigger setup of existing auto company, they will be held back on most expensive, but necessary design decisions.
In from-scratch EV companies, on other hand, lack of experience in everything else, and lack of manufacturing resources, is usually the origin of failure.
All big misses in EVs in recent years were conventional auto makers making silly stupid mistakes in electric drive trains, and "from scratch" EV makers making cars that are either unmanufacturable, or undriveable.
This a testbook examples of things not being "though through" and "MBA driven development."
Air cooling alone can be fine if battery chemistry is stable enough (lifepo.)
Using a novel battery chemistry in production with highly controlled settings is also fine enough.
Parachuting "big name management specialists" into an engineering project mid-way, and putting novel chemistry battery into an assembly specially designed with LiFePO cells in mind to send a PR signal of how "sophisticated you are," is not fine at all, and is a recipe for disaster.
From whomever I talked, I hear the same: Tesla's engineering leaves mixed impressions.
One can say that the range is definitely good - Tesla scores very high in getting most range out of kw/h. But things like poor metalworking would be a recall worthy flaw for every other automaker.
For the interior, Model S feels way too American. Compare its interior and an actual luxury car, like a maxed out Benz S600.
Its engineering in overall is nothing groundbreaking, and saying that EVs are way more straightforward to engineer is true. Telsa just stands out as one EV maker that didn't make some "showstopper" omissions, unlike almost every other competitor.
Chinese and Japanese EVs are dead on arrival in US because most of them are really small for Americans... If an American buys an expensive car, it will most likely be a BIG car.
Poor driveabiliy chases other competitors. There are simply not so many makers with experience making 2.5t+ full sized sedans, nor compact car makers which can make a compact car suspension not to croak under 1.7t+ curb weight.
NIO for examples despite making a quite marketable SUV for China was delayed launch for 2 years because their first attempt at making SUV got so much bad reviews from test drivers, that they had to near completely redesign the body and suspension twice. Reportedly, after finding out that live axle is a completely inadequate for a 2t+ vehicle, and that unibody design can't handle the weight of a battery pack.
Leaf had both tiny battery, poor chemistry, and poor thermals.
Bolt - all bad things you normally expect from a US car maker other than Ford.
And so on.