Tesla Model 3 Earns Five-Star Crash Safety Rating From NHTSA (jalopnik.com)

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has awarded the Tesla Model 3 with a five-star safety rating -- the highest possible score. This means that every car Tesla has built has earned a five-star rating. Jalopnik reports: The NHTSA tests cover three primary categories: Frontal Crash, Side Crash, and Rollover, and the Model 3 received the highest ratings in all categories. For some categories, it's easy to understand why Teslas do so well. Rollover resistance, for example, makes sense for cars that carry most of their weight at the very bottom, in the batteries sandwiched in the Tesla's chassis design. Other reasons for the remarkable crash safety may be that, without the need for a heavy chunk of metal as a drivetrain, effective and large crumple zones can be designed in, front and rear. The NHTSA has released videos of their frontal collision test, side pole collision test, and side collision test, for those who like watching these sort of things.

Comments

Any people wonder why the model 3 is hot

[SuperKendall]

In other stories, people have scoffed at the notion model 3 cars could possibly be more popular than luxury electric models coming out.

Yet here we have another reason beyond just top acceleration numbers why people may want to get a Tesla rather than something else...

Re:Any people wonder why the model 3 is hot

[Rei]

Hey, when you sell cars below cost

Model 3 had a positive margin in Q2, and is expected to have a 15% margin this quarter - higher than the industry average.

$717 million loss last quarter

Why yes, let's totally take R&D, SG&A, capex, etc on a line that last quarter was operating at a small fraction of its design volumes and pretend like they increase linearly with vehicle volume! Because that's totally a reasonable thing to do. Let's also ignore that last quarter they A) soaked restructuring expenses, which were a cost in Q2 but a benefit from Q3 onwards, B) deliberately held back over 10k cars to avoid tolling the 200k US tax credit limit, C) weren't yet selling the very-high margin AWD and P variants, which now make up the majority of their sales. Let's also totally ignore that the very short argument for why Tesla can't make money - "they have high scrap and rework rates" (typical of new lines; this decreases as lines mature) - actually argues precisely the opposite. Because if you're making positive margins, and then 15% margins with high scrap and rework rates, tell me, what does that mean for margins as production processes get refined over time? Scrap and rework are part of COGS Gross margins are (Revenue - COGS) / Revenue.

I know, you're in the group which has this notion that everything simply scales linearly with volume, on a line designed for far higher volumes, and all costs remain the same, no matter how much faster they run the lines (which has been seen dramatically over this quarter), no matter how much lower the scrap and rework rates, etc. And this linear spending is supposed to come out of thin air, too. Because Tesla spending over Q2 would mean that they've practically doubled their workforce and built half of a new factory, so I'm looking forward to hearing where Tesla has been secretly recruiting for all the jobs they haven't been posting on their website and where they've been storing these tens of thousands of people and new lines, given that no new line has been built at Fremont since Q2. That's going to be really exciting to find out, no? I'm voting for an underground volcano lair! ;)

You're in for a rude awakening first with the Q3 report, and then especially the Q4 report.

Time for a breath of fresh air

[drinkypoo]

Now can we finally see the end of the morons claiming that Tesla doesn't know how to build cars, because it's harrrrrrrd? Sure, it's a hard job. That's why Tesla hired people who know how to do it.

Re: Time for a breath of fresh air

[Luckyo]

The lies are getting rather desperate considering that the only two automotive majors that haven't gone bankrupt are Ford and Tesla. All others have.

You have to at least try to make it look like you're not just lying through your teeth you know.

Re: Time for a breath of fresh air

[SuperKendall]

Tesla still doesn't know how to build cars. As in, in volume

Can you build 8000 cars a month? Because Tesla is almost there.

You see, once they figured out how to actually produce in volume, from there it's very easy to scale up (as long as you are not constrained by suppliers).

Building them for sale without going broke is what is hard, and what Tesla cannot do.

That sounds scary! Lucky for Tesla what you are saying is a bald-faced lie. But then you are an AC so I'm sure no-one believed what you were saying anyway.