Tesla misses production target by 15% | Hacker News Reader

Tesla misses production target by 15%

bbc.co.uk

96 pointsdc35247 comments

The article is a bit confusing. Tesla produced more than 18k cars, but delivered 14k cars. So strictly speaking it was not the production but delivery target that got missed. There are some connections of course, if they had managed to ramp up production quicker, delivery could have progressed more. Production rates are said to have hit 2k cars per week in the last weeks.

In any case, this means that about 4k Teslas are currently in transit to their customers. The European Model X deliveries just started, so this would account for a lot of transit time, as shipping (literally!) cars takes it time.

Do they exclude from those numbera cars they produce that don't work off the line?

I would assume that to be counted as produced, a car has to have left the factory. In any case the free space inside of the factory puts an upper bound to the number of the cars which require further work after leaving the production line.

How about the cars that were on transit from Q1? Did they get counted towards the total in Q2? If yes, then I don't think the article is misleading.

The production rate in Q1 was lower than in Q2, so it could be misleading if there are still a number in transit.

In any case, the article should be clear on whether they're talking about production rates or delivery rates.

Tesla had 2,615 vehicles in transit at the end of Q1, and 5,150 at the end of Q2. So on net there are still 2,535 cars "missing" from the Q2 delivery number.

This chart shows the complete picture: http://i.imgur.com/NgwxG7Z.png

This. The "decline" is an artifact of the variability in the number of vehicles in transit.

http://i.imgur.com/NgwxG7Z.png

If you just look at deliveries (yellow line) you see the drop, but all the variation comes from the number of vehicles in transit quarter end (red line). Production (blue line) has been a remarkably smooth exponential ramp.

That amounts to trolling. Please don't do that here.

Substantive criticism is fine, offhand flamebait isn't.

Edit: looks like I misunderstood the comment https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12032290, so will detach this subthread and mark it off-topic instead. Sorry!

I think you're misinterpreting his statement. I think he's noting that missing production targets is better than rushing through production and then shipping poorly manufactured cars

I certainly thought it was misinterpreted, too. Although it is reasonable to interpret the statement both ways, why do we often assume the least charitable interpretation? Maybe it is best to ascertain a comment's intent first.

Could've been trolling. Seems like responding with "do you mean x or y?" would've been more constructive, though.

Oh good point. Charitable interpretation fail!

Is anyone surprised? Tesla and SpaceX have almost always missed their timeline goals. This is their MO. They do, however, always produce what they say they will.

tech companies...

I wonder why you're being downvoted. As far as I can tell, you're exactly right. They make amazing stuff and you can usually (even if not always) count on them doing what they say they will... but do not put any faith in timelines.

The classic joke is that Elon runs on Mars time, where 1 Mars year is about 1.8 Earth years. But yes, both Tesla and SpaceX deliver everything they say they will, and usually a lot more with all kinds of extra surprises - but it usually takes 1.8 times longer than they say it will. I'm okay with that, especially considering the incredible achievements of both companies at their beginnings. I think it's also reasonable to suggest that as both companies grow and stabilize their product lines and production facilities, their time estimates might get better. Or maybe not.

30 days ago you said they are producing 100,000 cars a year. You were quite confident then:

"They've sold well over 100,000 cars. The current total is around 140,000. They project 80,000 or 90,000 this year, with a slow start, so I think their current rate is 100,000 if not higher."

You shrugged off getting to 100,000 cars as no more difficult than other periods of time: " mikeash 26 days ago

Going from 2,700 to 22,000 in 12 months sounds difficult too, as does going from 22,000 to 32,000 and from 32,000 to 50,000.'

They built over 18,000 cars this quarter. They say half of that was done in the last four weeks of the quarter. That's 9,000 cars in four weeks, 2,250 cars per week, for an annualized rate of about 117,000/year.

Seems like my confidence was completely warranted.

>do not put any faith in timelines

In general that is totally true. They'll say 6 months and it's really 12. They'll say a year and it's really two or three. And I have no confidence in their stated objective of producing 500,000 cars in 2018. But when talking about the current production rate, that's hardly a "timeline" and doesn't much involve guessing the future.

I will admit that these sales numbers don't really look like a missed timeline. It is definitely a theme with these companies, but doesn't seem to apply here.

I really like that this is a nice example of having to choose either fixed scope or fixed time in which Tesla very much went with fixed scope and flexible time.

Missing production target is OK. Shipping crappy cars is not OK.

I can't tell if you're suggesting Tesla is shipping crappy cars, or if you're saying that missing the production target is OK because they aren't shipping crappy cars.

A Tesla Model S is about the furthest possible thing from a "crappy car".

Eh... by all accounts, it's pretty 'crappy' compared to other vehicles in its class. Lots of recurring issues that seem to have eluded quality control.

While I think it's mostly a symbolic gesture, it's clear from the fact that Elon has set up an office for himself (with a cot for sleeping) at the end of the Tesla production line that he agrees there is a lot of room for improvement in the quality of their cars.

It's easy to make 100 cars well. It's much harder to make 10,000 cars well.

I'm not a fan of the Tesla brand/vehicles and I have a number of criticisms for the Model S but I wouldn't go so far as to call it 'crappy.' I think more appropriate phrases would be "not fully refined" and "unpolished."

The cars work, and work well. The important systems are handled properly, if they weren't I'd be complaining about them. Quality control is a hard thing to get right at scale, I think the company deserves a little respect for handling the critical systems well.

> I'm not a fan of the Tesla brand/vehicles and I have a number of criticisms for the Model S but I wouldn't go so far as to call it 'crappy.' I think more appropriate phrases would be "not fully refined" and "unpolished."

It's "crappy" for a higher end luxury vehicle, not for a car in general. A $70-90k car should be fully refined and quite polished.

A lot of those 90k goes towards the battery. That leaves a lot less for perfectly stitched leather upholstery.

If the batteries are so expensive they can't have a proper interior it is odd that Tesla ships some models with extra battery capacity for future purchase options:

http://www.theverge.com/2016/5/5/11597508/tesla-model-s-70-b...

I think the interior is shit because it's hard to do at scale and Tesla hasn't been doing it for very long.

> I think more appropriate phrases would be "not fully refined" and "unpolished."

When companies like Toyota, which have been in the car manufacturing game for 80 years, still suffer from recalls ( 11 recalls in 2016 alone! http://toyotanews.pressroom.toyota.com/section_display.cfm?s... ), why do we have a stratospheric bar for Tesla?

>"not fully refined" and "unpolished."

When you are talking about 100k luxury sedans isn't that exactly what you are paying for? I expect those things out of my car that costs ~40k.

I still give Tesla a thumb up at trying. Others have had many generations to fine-tune their cars. This is only their first generation cars.

The cot story was about the Model X, not Model S. The X is (was?) still experiencing a lot of trouble due to the over-ambitious nature of the product and the fact that they're just starting to gain experience with producing it. The S is much more mature, having been out for four years now.

I think the S's quality issues are exaggerated. It's not the most reliable car in the world, but it's probably around average. It just gets a lot more attention, partly because people love to talk about Tesla, and partly because people think (and Tesla certainly encourages thinking) that EVs are inherently more reliable.

From everything I've heard, your final comment is exactly backwards. The early Model Xs, when they were building them by the dozen or hundred, were plagued with problems. These days, now that they're building them by the thousands each month, they're much better. The early Ss likewise had a lot of problems, which smoothed out as volume ramped up.

No. The Model S is pretty bad too. If you compare it to other cars in its price range it simply isn't that competitive. The interior is more comparable to a Hyundai or Mazda than a BMW, Mercedes or Range Rover. And of course the notable quality issues. They do get a lot of things right e.g. exterior design, EV, performance so I wouldn't call it a crap car. But I also would never purchase one.

Some people love the interior. In any case, that's a different sort of "quality" than the mechanical reliability being discussed here.

What do you mean by "And of course the notable quality issues"?

It's hard for me to imagine the Model X, with its automated everything can be made to be reliable. There are just too many motors and hinges and tracks, especially on the rear doors.

Which will be compounded by the misguided belief that "electric cars don't need maintenance" and the growing charging network making EV ownership more attractive to people living in the Northeast, Midwest and other places where they dump corrosive chemicals on the road every week or so for a good chunk of the year.

There have been a number of reports from different owners that the Model X has had some serious quality issues[1], and there was definitely a story posted here a week or so ago about Tesla reaching an NDA'd settlement with at least one buyer.

[1]:http://www.consumerreports.org/tesla/tesla-model-x-quality-i...

Nice little holiday weekend news dump.

Tesla committed to publishing delivery numbers within three days of the end of quarter. They are just keeping with their commitment, not trying to bury this news by releasing it on a holiday weekend.

FWIW, it published Q1 numbers on April 4th...which would be 4 days after the end of Q1. April 4th was a Monday. I don't think too many people would critique them for waiting until the 5th of July, the Tuesday after a huge U.S. holiday, to publish news:

http://ir.tesla.com/releasedetail.cfm?releaseid=963460

You could put this in a positive light: there is so much demand for their product they can't make enough.

That's not a positive light, demand doesn't pay the bills.

Of course it does. Talk to a banker, orders and deposits in hand, and see if the bills can't get paid.

In the car business though, it's a pre-requisite to paying the bills, and a positive step along a complicated path to getting them paid.

That doesn't make any sense. If demand outstrips supply, you'd expect a long waiting list for new orders. You wouldn't expect production to decrease.

>after the driver of a Tesla car using self-driving technology

seee, this is what naming your driver assist system AutoPilot does, even 'journalist' doesnt know any better.

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