Tesla Temporarily Stops Model 3 Production Line (theverge.com)

An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Verge: Tesla is temporarily stopping production of its Model 3 electric car, amid a long waiting list and several missed targets. The company, however, says the shutdown is intended to resolve some of the problems that have contributed to the numerous delays in getting the cars to hundreds of thousands of reservation holders. The automaker said Monday it would halt production of the Model 3 sedan for 4-5 days at its Fremont, California assembly plant, BuzzFeed reported. Tesla, however, says this is part of a planned period of downtime that was similar to another shutdown in February, and it isn't intended to have an affect on the company's current production targets for the car. "Our Model 3 production plan includes periods of planned downtime in both Fremont and Gigafactory 1," a Tesla spokesperson told The Verge. "These periods are used to improve automation and systematically address bottlenecks in order to increase production rates. This is not unusual and is in fact common in production ramps like this."

Comments

It's not trivial

[Anonymous Coward]

Why such obsession over trivial and routine manufacturing decisions at Tesla?

Experienced automakers wouldn't be going through that. They know how to deal with it. This is yet another sign that Tesla has incompetent management.

Also, Tesla is going to have a huge cash shortfall - enough for it to go bust. Musk seems to think that Model 3 sales will be enough to keep the company afloat - and then this happens - AGAIN. Musk insists that another cash infusion will not be necessary, but it looks like it will be.

See, the obsession is that investors have dumped BILLIONS into Tesla and it has been lost - yes, LOST - period.

The California State Teachers PENSION has a shit load of Tesla stock (WTF were they thinking?!?!) and others have billions in JUNK Tesla bonds on the line - and it ALL rests on Model 3 sales keeping the company afloat.

If the Musk/Tesla fanboys would STFU and actually read and understand a Tesla financial statement they would see the above FACTS.

Tesla is going to go bust by the end of the year and it's going to take out the shareholders and the bond holders.

And everyone who is a member of the California Teachers Pension should start to lawyer up.

Lastly, Musk is an idiot and his fanboys are gullible morons.

Re:It's not trivial

[vtcodger]

"See, the obsession is that investors have dumped BILLIONS into Tesla and it has been lost - yes, LOST - period."

The money hasn't been lost yet, but Tesla is burning through it's cash at a stunning rate. It looks to be a crapshoot as to whether Tesla will end this year flying high, dead broke, or struggling off into the future having sold off much of whatever it has in the way of marketable assets. See https://www.cnbc.com/2018/03/3...

Moody's downgraded Tesla's credit rating to "Negative" a few weeks ago. That's not good.

Re:Next - janitorial staffing updates

[Luckyo]

Stock pricing I imagine. There's a lot of people with short term investments in the company.

This isn't a "janitorial issue" either. This is about Tesla consistently failing to hit production targets by orders of magnitude, with stock that is prices mostly on assumptions of future performance and hence promises. This shut down actually appears to be the consequence of previous Tesla story of them actually managing to increase production to something close to a quarter or so of what they actually promised to deliver. Which followed the reports that this was done in unsustainable way that would force stoppage of production line in near future due to wear and tear.

Relevance comes from the fact that if even hitting a quarter of production which is needed to just even begin meeting the promises makes the production random inoperable in weeks as appears to have happened here, what is the basis of the stock price of Tesla?

Re: Next - janitorial staffing updates

[CrankyFool]

I was about to respond, snippily, that it's not like there's a whole lot of people cancelling, and then thought I'd google.

Turns out AC's right -- people are cancelling, and in many cases Tesla's taking a really really long time to refund their money (up to 3 months, it seems). More at https://www.wired.com/story/ca...

Not technically "not refunding", but still pretty poor.

Re:Next - janitorial staffing updates

[Rei]

Not my post, but:

"I know, right! The Model 3 is already the best selling (as in actual deliveries) EV." - Ref
Accura TLX: Pretty close. The TLX had a March sales jump, but with the new 3 production rate, there's no way it'll beat the 3 again.
Mercedes C/CLA: Model 3 sold over 50% more
Audi A4: Closer, but still a solid Model 3 win.
Lexus RC: Over an order of magnitude more Model 3 sales
BMW 2: 3 1/2 times more Model 3s.
BMW 3: Actually the 3-series edged out the Model 3... but it's unlikely to do so again.
BMW 4: Model 3 wins.

Why the incredulity? You've been reading too much doom-and-gloom from the Tesla shorts. Model 3 production has rapidly accelerated.

(Note: the GP was clearly talking about the US, so I used US market figures)

Re:Next - janitorial staffing updates

[Rei]

The S and X lines were down for one day. For periodic maintenance, because you have to take lines down periodically for maintenance.

S&X are neither production nor demand constrained; they're 18650 cell constrained. Neither Tesla nor Panasonic have an interest in the capital expenditure to increase 18650 production, since Tesla is moving to 2170s.