The Rogue Tesla Mechanic Resurrecting Salvaged Cars (vice.com) 169
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Motherboard: In a scrapyard in Massachusetts, the YouTuber known as Rich Rebuilds runs a pair of jumper cables from a broken down Tesla Model S to a deep cycle battery. "We may hear some clicks," he says, as he prepares to connect the second lead. "We may hear some buzzing. The car may explode. I don't know what's gonna happen." As a self-described "Doctor Frankenstein of Teslas," this is Rich Benoit's modus operandi. On YouTube, he's chronicled his journey to learn how the cars' internal systems work -- and how to repair them after floods, fires and wrecks. In a new Motherboard documentary, Benoit shows us the scrapyards where he scavenges Tesla parts, the basement where he categorizes them, and an auto body shop that lets him use its equipment. He shows us deep under the hood, where he wrestles with the motors, high-powered batteries and tangles of electronics and cables that make Teslas tick. Since his first Tesla restoration -- he's now working on a second -- Rich has become a point-person in the Tesla repair community. He runs a Facebook group for people who want to sell and trade parts and has helped other enthusiasts across the country and as far away as Norway, Germany and South Africa. Tesla told Motherboard that it will inspect salvaged vehicles to assess which repairs are needed, but there would be a fee. The company says customers are free to do whatever they want with their cars, including repair them. However, Massachusetts, because of their "Right to Repair" initiative, is the only state where Tesla owners can register to access repair manuals, service documents, wiring diagrams, and part information. According to Electrek, President Jon McNeil says the automaker is working on opening the program.
Business opportunity... (Score:5, Insightful)
Software (Score:2)
Watch Rich's videos. You can get some manuals and TSBs from Tesla, but you can't get the software that diagnoses error codes, which is pretty much critical if there are *any* problems with the motors, or steering system, or breaks, or batteries, or anything controlled by the cars computer which is, pretty much, everything.
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I interviewed with Snap-On who make car diagnostic equipment once. They have to reverse engineer everything, they don't get any help from the manufacturers.
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January 30, 2017 article about manuals. (Score:1)
The last link about opening up the manuals is dated 1/13/2017.
What's the deal?
I don't buy new cars. I get used ones and fix them myself. And there are a few Tesla's (X, a couple S's but no 3s yet.) around me and I was hoping to one day pick up one used and repair it myself. I can't afford a new one anyway.
But if I can't access the manuals, I'm SOL.
I guess it's the Chevy Bolt for me.
Tesla is SaaS (Score:1)
I am a Tesla fan but... (Score:2)
...I'm not entirely happy with the attempt to force all parts & repairs through a system that requires a current supported Tesla serial number. I do understand it for when you are welding the front half of one car to the rear half of another... but just requesting a nut?
Maybe they do have a point in that if the car fails catastrophically the Tesla brand will be tarnished; in this current environment it will (thanks "shorts", Auto-manufacturers, Big-oil & Unions). Possibly a solution is to debrand
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Manufacturers have significant liability.
A lot of people don't understand that when they go to the parts counter at most auto dealers, the company that sold the car isn't who made those parts. And since they're not the manufacturer, they don't have the same sort of liability. Of course they're happy to sell you those parts. And many of the parts are not the stock part, but a qualified replacement part that was totally designed and built by a 3rd party with no involvement by the auto brand other than testing
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That is BS. Do you think Ford makes all the parts for their cars?
Replying drunk, I presume? LOL
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Tesla has the highest consumer satisfaction rating in the industry [consumerreports.org]. 90% satisfaction rate. By contrast, Chevy and GMC are ranked 72%, Buick is 66%, and Cadillac is 64%. The only brand close to Tesla is Porsche, at 85% satisfaction.
But, glad to know that you have short positions :) Are you really sure you don't want to buy more? You only have a couple more days before the Q2 report, don't get in too late! Come on, how much interest is the money in your bank account earning? How much interest would a ho
Re:I am a Tesla fan but... (Score:4, Insightful)
Impressive mislabeling job. That article wasn't about a customer satisfaction survey. Pied Piper's surveys are how skilled a company's salesmen are at selling cars. Tesla has (for many years running) the least "salesy" salemen in the industry. By design. Tesla publicly celebrates every year scoring last in the Pied Piper studies.
The Consumer Report study I linked is an actual customer satisfaction survey.
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The headline says: "Tesla was ranked last on a survey of 34 auto brands based on how helpful its salespeople are" I've been to a Tesla sales store... well they can't sell directly in my state, so they are very laid back. None of that running off to talk to the manager crap. The service manager was VERY nice as well, even making suggestions for us buying a used one.
Dissected entrails of a still living Tesla M3... (Score:3)
For the hard-core geeks both electrical and mechanical:
Tesla Model 3 - Exploded [youtu.be]
This guy has a brilliant series of videos detailing all aspects os Tesla anatomy.
Re:Dissected entrails of a still living Tesla M3.. (Score:5, Funny)
both electrical and mechanical:
Can't.... resist...
I'm the very model of a modern Tesla technician,
I've information technical, electrical, mechanical,
I know the latest models, and I quote designs historical,
From Model X to Model 3, in order categorical;
I'm very well acquainted, too, with matters mathematical,
I understand transmissions, both continuous and manual,
I'm bullish on the stock reports and teeming with a lot o' news,
With many cheerful facts about executive option issues.
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Mod this up. Great stuff.
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I will agree that the first line doesn't work. The rhyme is wrong too. But the rest seems to fit to me. Having listened to a few versions online while composing this, there are plenty of such mispronunciations in the song itself. I kinda find it painful actually, and I may have cut some syllables out of the last few lines because I hate that method of forcing words to fit.
I'd love to see a competing version in a reply...
No supercharger for you! (Score:5, Informative)
One thing to note about restored Telsa EVs is that they cannot use the supercharger stations. Apparently there is some sort of key held in RAM that indicates it's been tested and meets certification criteria. You can get it re-certified but I've heard it's a costly process because they have to inspect the cabling.
You may think this is somehow unfair but remember how much power is flowing through the cables to recharge all those batteries. It's not a stretch to think that minor damage to a cable could go unnoticed and then set your car and the whole supercharger station on fire.
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Tesla turns off Supercharging on any Tesla that is totaled, if they know about it. I assume this means they invalidate the key. In some cases, salvaged cars never had the key disabled and will Supercharge just fine. That is a serious issue, though. Without Supercharging, a Tesla is just a local car.
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It's quite understandable though. Supercharging with components which might be damaged, even if the damage is small enough to escape detection until you stress it with a supercharge, isn't something normal people would like to be near. At least not if they have any clue about what's actually happening.
You might think it's serious to not be able to supercharge, but let me assure you that it's nothing compared to if things go wrong because of damaged battery cells or cabling.
Re:No supercharger for you! (Score:5, Informative)
It's worse than that. Tesla's official policy is that uncertified cars can't use service centres and don't get over-the-air updates, as well as no supercharging. Re-certification is north of $10,000.
In fact they recently got told by the NTSB that they have to do recalls for salvaged vehicles. Previously they didn't even give salvaged cars safety recalls.
Re: No supercharger for you! (Score:2)
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and laws will force there hand that software (Score:2)
and laws will force there hand that software must be put to 3rd party repair shops and that can't black list people for useing non dealer parts / non dealer shops.
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I definitely understand the reasoning, but I don't think this is an ethical way to do it.
What would be the ethical way of doing it?
If the recert fails their passing grade, you have signed a contract that allows them to "disable" your car, and you don't get any of the $ back.
Disabling the car seems like a legal liability thing. It may seem cruel but when some idiot fails and his car goes up in flames later then that idiot could sue the inspector which is costly to defend against with the spectre of possibly being held liable. Anyway, I think the restrictions will be relaxed when they start making batteries that don't have a thermal runaway problem.
Honestly though, if you want to take control of your car then you are going to need to w
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Neat! Got a repo for the software?
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Then you do not have control your car because you merely wrote software to manipulate their software. If want real control, you must write your own software to replace theirs.
Prepare to be sued Mr. Rich (Score:2)
You are breaking the EULA.
This is good stuff, but let's be reasonable .... (Score:5, Informative)
The people who are screaming about Tesla not opening up the repair info to the masses should also realize that almost none of their vehicles sold, to date, are old enough to be completely out of warranty. The Model S wasn't a thing you could buy until 2012, and they all got an 8 year, unlimited mileage warranty on their powertrains.
When you couple that with the fact that Teslas were never mass produced in the quantities the big-name auto makers produce? You start to realize that the number of Teslas out there in scrap yards from getting totaled in accidents or written off from flood damage are FAR too few to support the business of local garages or other repair shops who might want to specialize in working on them.
As a used Model S owner myself, I've done a lot of reading and research on the cars, because I wanted to know what I might be up against in coming years. The biggest issue facing Tesla owners today is an overall shortage of parts. Even if you have an authorized Tesla body shop repairing your car from a fender-bender, it's quite common they can't obtain a body panel or other trim part you need for 2-3 months. That's one of the challenges the company is still trying to overcome. (Again, they're nowhere near the size of GM or Ford or Toyota ... and they didn't really have the money to stock large quantities of spare parts in warehouses. I'm sure they started out just making spare parts to order, as they had the need. And now they have enough cars on the roads so that's not workable, but their factories were doing all they could just to meet demand for the new Model 3 vehicle orders.)
Personally? I think there's a great money-making opportunity for independent shops who can stock specific parts that are known to fail somewhat regularly, and can do those specific repairs. Great example? Model S auto-retracting/presenting door handles. These are pretty complex components and had a couple of design flaws. (Tesla used a cast metal gear part that tends to develop a stress fracture over time and break into pieces. They also used regular copper wire where flexible silicone wire should have been substituted, so over hundreds of door handle cycles, the wire flexing back and forth snaps it.) Both of these issues have been addressed, at least to a large extent, with a newer handle revision. But my understanding is, Tesla didn't do that until 2017 and there's kind of a run on these -- since service centers will only replace an older revision broken handle with the latest revision. Clearly, this is a place where independent shops could re-work a broken, old revision handle and make it "better than new", for cheaper than Tesla's repair cost. (Tesla wants around $700+ per door handle for an out of warranty repair.)
Another example is the small 12 volt battery in a Model S. This is known to fail on a lot of people, and will leave you stranded if it does. (Luckily, you *usually* get some kind of warning on the dash that it's having issues for at least a little while before it conks out.) This one, again, was usually just a free warranty swap so far. But as these cars age out of factory coverage, it'll become a problem. There's a company on the net called BattMobile who sells an improved replacement battery with the necessary, proprietary battery connector points already on it. But it would be great if more shops knew how to swap one of these and could do it for people inexpensively. On a dual motor Model S, it's not THAT tough as job, but it's kind of a bear to get to it on the regular, single motor vehicles.
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No, the battery is covered by a standard 8 year warranty but the rest of the car only has 4. A lot of people have been buying extended warranties because the cost of repairs is astronomical.
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That only works if two preconditions have been met: 1) a sufficient density of vehicles to keep the shop occupied. And 2), a sufficient supply of spare parts (depth, breadth, and speed of replenishment). The latter in particular is a problem as Tesla is struggling to meet the existing market.
Open Software (Score:2)
Sometimes I suspect the main reason more software isn't open to the public is the authors are too embarrassed to show it.
Compromise at design stage (Score:1)
I think this situation could be handled by a compromise designed in from the start.
For example, the charging, battery and software is offlimits...
but the rest of the car is open and documented.
The analogy being Open API's
I watch him - Good Channel (Score:2)
I stumbled across his channel earlier this year. He raises a lot of good points - although he may not verbalize them in the videos, he stumbles across lots of issues that are bigger, he'll have a problem "man Tesla makes this difficult" that really needs to be thought through. It seems bigger than right-to-repair. Watching his experiences is terrific though, as it provides insights into how complicated this can be.
Somebody wrote to him with a problem which raised an issue - the guy had purchased a used T
Tesla dropped the ball.... (Score:1)
What is the problem? Tesla actively blocks the sale of any parts whatsoever to any salvage or grey market (unsupported) cars, and will not provide an
Re:No parts for you (Score:4, Funny)
If this was a computer company that refused to resale parts or provide repair information everyone here would be having a coronary.
No.
Someone how only Tesla gets a pass on this...
No.
Care to explain your position?
No.
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People are on Elon Musk's dick like a cult leader. Meanwhile he tries to control your property *after* you purchase it. The car always phones home and they can turn it into a literal brick with a mouse click. Imagine if Ford wouldn't allow anyone to make third party parts and meddled with software without your consent?
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No.
No.
No,
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+1. Insightful.
Re:No parts for you (Score:5, Insightful)
When your computer crashes, it doesn't involve a school bus full of children.
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You mean that bus full of children leeching my WiFi? Those kids get quite irate when the WiFi goes down.
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When your computer crashes, it doesn't involve a school bus full of children.
Mine does... I like to live dangerously.
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I've been watching RichRebuilds for a while.
It's amazing that Tesla can remotely "brick" one of their cars against the owner's wishes and render it inoperable until they give the owner a code to get it running (if they choose to do so).
It's also criminal that they will not allow owners to buy repair parts for their cars.
Last, if Tesla goes bankrupt (which, at their current cash burn rate and unprofitably is a good possibility) owners will be left holding the bag with cars that cannot be maintained or repair
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If you had actually been following the issue, you'd know that third parties would be providing parts and repairs in your doomsday scenario; not exactly a doomsday.
Your tale of woe doesn't line up at all with the part where you point to an authority for information. The information contradicts your story.
Re:No parts for you (Score:5, Informative)
What are you even talking about? Tesla does not "remotely brick" cars. The concept of a "code" makes no sense in the concept of a Tesla. Where would you even enter a code?
I've been wracking my brain to try to figure out what you might be talking about. The closest I can think is that Tesla considers salvaged cars that haven't gone through recertification "unsupported", and they can't get updates or use the supercharging network.
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When I bought my used Tesla, I called them with the VIN and they told me it wasn't salvaged. I was very concerned about getting locked out of the supercharger network. They would /not/ tell me anything else about the car until I'd sent them a copy of the title or registration to prove I was the owner. Aggravating, but not earth shattering. There were two recalls and upon my first visit to a service center they told me and fixed them on the spot.
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The worst I've seen from Tesla is that they will disable supercharging access for salvage cars. Solution is unappealing... pay them $10,000 to go thru the car with a fine toothed comb and make sure it won't catch fire while supercharging. Can you image the bad press from a car catching fire? I have never heard of a tesla being out and out bricked.... and I own one.
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Take a look at the "Rich Rebuilds" youtube channel for further information.
The guy tries to get salvaged Teslas running. His difficulties are clearly documented on the site.
No parts from Tesla for repair and if Tesla remotely disables the car, it can't be run without a code from Tesla after they determine the car is acceptable to their standards (or maybe never if they don't like the car).
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No hits if I put it in quotes, nothing obvious when it's not. Care to try again? The closest I see is a random unsubstantiated post on the net that says that they could do it (but haven't), and has no mention of a "code". Is that what you're talking about?
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That's not even remotely what you described. It's what I described before when I wrote:
That is in no way "bricking the battery" and "requiring a code"
Re:No parts for you (Score:4, Insightful)
That's not what the word "bricks" means. And no, there is no "factory code". The whole concept of "codes" has no meaning in the context of Teslas. What it requires is recertification if you want to use supercharging. To make sure that your someone-else-pieced-it-together-car doesn't fry their superchargers and potentially start a fire. For really bloody obvious reasons.
You can still charge just fine on non-Tesla chargers, because hey, no risk to their hardware.
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"The whole concept of "codes" has no meaning in the context of Teslas."
Nonsense. Just logging into the system to make changes surely involves a security code. And the common parlance for changing settings in a control module is "coding" or "recoding".
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I don't buy it. If the Tesla chargers are at risk then the 50/100/175kW third party changers are going to be too.
The charging system already has plenty of safety tech built in to it. Tesla are just being dicks.
Charger owner (Score:2)
If the Tesla chargers are at risk then the 50/100/175kW third party changers are going to be too.
Yes indeed for the 50 kW AC chargers.
(no for the higher charger, those are DC, and Tesla uses a different connection. Normal DC uses Mennekes connector (for ground and data) plus 2 exra pins for DC. Tesla's proprietary connection re-use pins of the Mennekes to carry DC. You can't fry a 175kW by connecting it to a Frankentesla, because you can't even connect it to begin with. Look up "Type 2" in Wikipedia for the details).
(Though maybe the situation is different in the US. Are there converter plugs between
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CHAdeMO to Tesla adapter provides 50kW DC. Do they get disabled too on non-certified cars?
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I don't buy it. If the Tesla chargers are at risk then the 50/100/175kW third party changers are going to be too.
LOL
First, show me a 100/175kW third-party charging network in the wild. No, I don't care about somebody's 1- or 2-location little proof-of-concept charging station.
Second, Tesla doesn't own those third party chargers. So Tesla's not interested is protecting them.
The charging system already has plenty of safety tech built in to it. Tesla are just being dicks.
The superchargers include a direct low-resistance connection between the charger and the car's battery. If the battery has a short of some sort, the "safety tech" that communicates between the car and the charging station won't know about it.
Uh, ok kids (Score:2)
It's too bad moderators don't have to know anything to get mod points.
Shouldn't block chademo (Score:2)
From what I gather info online, and from what limited experience I have (on *other* cars) :
Nope.
It's not the *car* that gets remotely disabled. (That would actually be illegal. See Renault's answer on complains about risk of remote shut down of rented Zoe batteries).
It's Tesla banning some models *from their own charger*.
Super Chargers : it's their chargers, it's their call to decide what goes on there.
Chademo : They don't own these chargers, it's the charger's owner decision if they accept you on them or n
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Oh please.. technically ANY car with mBrace, OnStar, LexusEnform, etc... can remotely brick their cars. These days any vehicle with any sort of remote assistance/remote start CAN be bricked against the owner's wishes.
So why are you beating up on Tesla. They baked into their vehicles the SAME things that all the manufacturers have. And if anything, they have one main advantage over others. Vehicles with third party "remote" functions can be attacked via the third party so any issues with that can be laid at
Re: No parts for you (Score:2)
Re:Right to repair (Score:4, Interesting)
Who here is saying that Tesla should get a free pass on this?
BTW; there's lots of people who tear down and build up Teslas. There's a great series [youtube.com] over on Youtube from Ingineerix (who salvages wrecked / flooded Teslas), who's been going into how every system on the Model 3 works, down to the nitty-gritty details. One of my favourite things recently was the design of the rear wheel/motor assembly [youtube.com]. To take it off involves only disconnecting 2 dampers, 2 brake lines, 3 electrical cables and 4 bolts. And you've entirely removed the rear wheels and motor. Unlike S and X, this car was clearly designed with keeping maintenance labour costs down as a high priority.
Another really interesting thing is in his most recent video, where he shows how much thicker the charge port-to-battery wiring is on Model 3 than Model S and Model X. Now, there's always the possibility they switched from copper to alumium or similar, but as it stands, it looks like they've designed it for much higher max charge powers. Which matches well their plans to introduce a new supercharger (V3) later this year. If it's 180kW per-vehicle, as the speculation has been, a five minute charge at low SoCs would allow for an hour of driving at moderately fast highway speeds (about an hour and a half at the sort of speed limits we have here!)
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Why can't I go into a Tesla parts counter in the same fashion as a Mazda parts dealer can get whatever the fuck I want if I'm willing to pay for it?
Warranty (Score:2)
Why can't I go into a Tesla parts counter in the same fashion as a Mazda parts dealer can get whatever the fuck I want if I'm willing to pay for it?
Because virtually all the Model 3 currently on the road are more recent that their warranty period.
Thus to an end users, thinking about repairs seems free-as-in-beer.
It would be hard for any business to compete with a percieved price of "zero".
Wait a few years, for the market to start having lots of old second-hand Teslas that aren't warranty covered and needs repairs/maintenance/upgrades here and there.
Then being a "Tesla parts" reseller would be much more interesting business.
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Because any other company would have tons of outrage and bad press. Tesla does it and its literal crickets chirping.
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Unlike S and X, this car was clearly designed with keeping maintenance labour costs down as a high priority.
Considering how many S and X motor units they have replaced, the fact that they made the 3 one easy to replace doesn't inspire confidence. How old are the oldest 3s out there now? Maybe they are just being careful, if they had to do mass warranty replacements it would destroy them if it was as much work as the S/X.
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Welcome to Slashdot, where a company designing a vehicle to be easy to repair is spun as a bad thing.
Amazing.
Re: Right to repair (Score:2)
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What's really going to blow your mind is that it's usually that easy to remove the rear subframe from any car. They don't normally have an electric motor there, and if they are in a FR configuration you will have to disconnect the driveshaft, but that typically requires just four to six bolts. If that wasn't the case on their earlier models, it's a sign that they didn't engineer them very intelligently.
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If you think $60k is expensive for a new car then you haven't been car shopping lately. Ford managed to dupe people into thinking that is a normal base price for a *small* F-150 truck or SUV. Order a King Ranch and it's over $100,000.
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What packages are you adding on to reach $60k? I'm trying to figure out what you're thinking of.
So, you're starting out by optioning out to the long range battery and the premium interior, since that's first production. But that only adds $9k and $5k, respectively, so $49k. What else are you adding?
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Autopilot is another $5K, right? I suppose you think you can run into a fire truck without it, but it will handle all the messy details for you. and it demonstrably works.
That gets you to $54K.
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Okay, so keep on going to get up to $60k. We're already comparing (what kind of car, exactly?), to a 5,1s 310-mile 0-60 electric sports sedan with luxury package (all-glass roof, auto-folding heated side mirrors, about 20 other things) that can steer and park itself. But you still need to add $6k more. What else are you adding, and what exactly are we comparing this to?
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Care to actually respond to the post you hit the reply button on?
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That's exactly the point the GP is making A base Ford F-150 costs $28k. But you can option it out to over $100k.
And really, stop the presses: car maker starts out a new model line with only more expensive options availables. Details at 11!
(FYI, both I-Pace and Kona are doing the exact same thing)
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Had no clue that a Ford F-150 is a "new model". Thanks for letting me know.
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The current F150 came out in 2015 - say year the Model 3 was announced. So about as new as the Model 3. Too bad Tesla can't design nor build a car in decent volume or decent speed...
And can you buy a $35,000 (let alone a $28,000) Tesla today? Can you? If not - STFU, shill....
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Model 3 went into production in mid 2017, not 2015. That's two years difference. And the 13th generation Ford F-150 was mostly the same vehicle platform as the 12th generation. They replaced the body panels with alumium (the new production systems took years to develop) and they switched out a couple engine options (but they weren't newly developed engines). Most of the rest of the vehicle, including the chassis, was carried over from the 12th generation.
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How exactly can you call a company that has been on the market for 15 years "a startup" with a straight face?
Re: Right to repair (Score:2)
They have accepted preorders way before that so they have been on the market for more than a decade. Besides, even a decade is more than long enough to stop being a startup.
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By which you mean your estranged mother's crushing hugs, we assume, you betch.
Re: Teslas aren't supposed to tick (Score:2)
Relays and solenoids are likely to activate and respond when an electrical device is powered up from an unknown state. This is slashdot. Maybe your comments belong more on yahoo news.
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Yes, please do check out my posts on the subject [slashdot.org].
Rei's shares (Score:2)
Rei bought in to TSLA at about $260. They spiked to $371 but he didn't sell then. Today they closed at $297. JP Morgan say $180 by the end of the year.
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Jurisdiction and Frankencars (Score:2)
Can you assembly these disassembled pieces?
In some jurisdiction : No, you can't.
If you want to put your re-assembled franken on a street, it has to pass safety inspection.
Only then yes, if if passes inspection, you can drive your Frankencar on streets.
That includes electric cars too.
Can you mod or improve this car for competition?
In these jurisdiction, competition tracks aren't considered public roads, they are considered private grounds.
You aren't required to pass safety inspection by law.
(But the track owner might have other requirements).
But as long as carry your Frankencar on a trailer, you'r