[EV Vision Report]Tesla Model Y had planned to use a single casting process to simplify the structure of the rear half of the car body. Half of them use new technology.
In 2020, Tesla CEO Elon Musk said that it will introduce innovative car manufacturing methods, using single-piece casting, and directly cast more than 70 components in the lower part of the rear of the car to match the new battery structure. The modular design can not only reduce weight and noise, but more importantly, it can also avoid assembly errors and multiple processes.
In order to achieve its goal, Tesla designed the world’s largest die-casting machine. This machine is available in California and Shanghai factories, allowing the innovative manufacturing process to be realized. No major flaws have been reported so far.
Tesla’s 2021 second quarter financial report released a photo of the progress of the Texas plant. A former Tesla employee pointed out that from this photo, it can be seen that Model Y not only uses one-piece castings for the rear half of the body, but also the front half of the body. The department also uses one-piece castings.
If the speculation is true, a new history of automotive technology will be written again. More importantly, this can save factory space, assembly steps, reduce body weight, reduce production line maintenance costs, and make it easier to manage the supply chain. For consumers, it is possible to increase vehicle endurance while reducing costs and creating room for price reductions.
Tesla’s new manufacturing process cannot be imitated by simply relying on a giant casting machine. The alloy technology and related knowledge provided by the SpaceX team is an exclusive method that is difficult for other automotive peers to replicate. It is assumed that the new 4680 battery will be mass-produced smoothly with a new body , The competitiveness of Model Y will be terrible.
On the contrary, the one-piece casting also has a hidden concern, which is the high maintenance cost that is difficult to estimate. In general, after a collision accident occurs in a vehicle, the repair shop will evaluate whether to replace each part according to the degree of damage. But if all the parts are a huge piece of cast metal and deformed by impact, how to repair it is a problem.
According to the first principle Musk often said, the fundamental problem is not how to fix it, but how to solve the cause of the car accident. If all vehicles have Level 5 fully automated driving capabilities, there will be no car accidents, and naturally there will be no need for maintenance. Before this dream comes true, Model Y owners still drive more carefully.