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Elon Musk's Alleged Email To Employees on Tesla's Big Picture (jalopnik.com)
An email allegedly sent by Elon Musk to Tesla staff has announced that the Model 3, which has faced a number of production issues, will go into "24/7" production by June, resulting in 6,000 Model 3 units made per week. But apart from this update, in the email, Elon Musk sheds light on how much he values precision in his cars. An excerpt: Most of the design tolerances of the Model 3 are already better than any other car in the world. Soon, they will all be better. This is not enough. We will keep going until the Model 3 build precision is a factor of ten better than any other car in the world. I am not kidding.
Our car needs to be designed and built with such accuracy and precision that, if an owner measures dimensions, panel gaps and flushness, and their measurements don't match the Model 3 specs, it just means that their measuring tape is wrong.
Some parts suppliers will be unwilling or unable to achieve this level of precision. I understand that this will be considered an unreasonable request by some. That's ok, there are lots of other car companies with much lower standards. They just can't work with Tesla.
Our car needs to be designed and built with such accuracy and precision that, if an owner measures dimensions, panel gaps and flushness, and their measurements don't match the Model 3 specs, it just means that their measuring tape is wrong.
Some parts suppliers will be unwilling or unable to achieve this level of precision. I understand that this will be considered an unreasonable request by some. That's ok, there are lots of other car companies with much lower standards. They just can't work with Tesla.
As for reusable rockets, I see you're unfamiliar with NASAs space shuttle, a far more practical design than anything he's created. For starters, it doesn't lose several tons of lift capacity by having to reserve fuel for landing.
No, the shuttle lost several tons of lift capacity by having to lug up a giant, heavy orbiter. The shuttle was an impressive technical feat, and it provided unmatched capabilities (e.g. the Hubble repair mission), but i was an economic disaster. Especially since the orbiter essentially had to be rebuild after each mission. NASA in general suffers from too much congressional interference, which means they have to source their parts and labour from the constituencies of key congress critters. In particular, they are more-or-less forced to use and reuse old technologies, so that no existing contractor starts to whine to loud.
The Falcons are certainly not perfect, but they are impressive achievements.