Tesla Semi Update
Tesla has finally released the much-awaited update to its Semi truck. In this article, we'll take a look at the new features and improvements that have been made.
We're less than a month away from the first customer deliveries of Tesla's electric semi-truck, a moment that's been a long way since the first unveiling of the semi-concept that was supposed to arrive in 2019 for a very long time.
 |
| The 2023 Tesla Semi Update |
Long Delay and Uncertainty Yet Just a couple of weeks before they start arriving for service at the Frito Lay plant in Modesto, California.
The Tesla semi has a lot to live with some very impressive specs for an electric semi-truck particularly 500 miles of range with a full load and the ability to recharge 70 percent of its battery capacity in just 30 minutes, making this the most capable electric semi-truck on the market, the potential of the Tesla semi is so insane.
There's an opportunity to reshape the trucking landscape in the United States and perhaps even worldwide to replace one of the most polluting vehicles on the road with a sustainable alternative to zero emissions not to mention a long-term fully autonomous driving effect If this truck delivers as expected it will create an opportunity for the companies that use it to save a significant amount of money.
It's a win-win situation for its Tesla customers and the rest of us who enjoy it. A cleaner environment and safer roads.
Here is the Tesla half
Let's talk about how the Tesla semi-truck will achieve that goal. So what we know for sure is that a limited amount of Tesla semi-trucks were produced at a private plant near Tesla's massive Nevada plant, and it's not clear if it will take a long time. something, or just a temporary measure.
Most people expected to see a semi-manufactured Tesla at the massive new Texas plant, which would make sense as the company's largest production facility with a more central location, and this is likely to be the case in the long run, but given that they're going through a ramp-up of models and tooling for electronic truck production next year while trying to figure out mass production for the 4680 battery cell all at the same time.
It's entirely possible that Giga Texas is just a little too busy right now to really deal with semi-batteries and speaking of batteries, we know that Tesla has chosen to forego the addition of the new 4680 battery cell to the semi-design and stick with it.
The real Panasonic has produced a 21cm block of 70 cells produced in Giga Nevada, which is something Elon talked about on Tesla's latest earnings call. While it was fully loaded at 82,000 pounds of total combined weight which seemed to come as a huge surprise to many people who were watching this story, we assumed that the new half would make use of Tesla's latest and greatest 4,680-cell battery technology.
But on the manufacturing side of things for a cell The new battery, it wasn't really moving the way Tesla expected it doesn't fly off the line with ultra-high production We know that the Giga Texas 24680 production move plan has been largely scrapped and it is generally believed that the majority of cells being produced now It will be stacked for a Cybertruck launch in 2023.
But what a lot of people seem to misunderstand is that half don't need to perform 4,684 and 4,680 cells and that both 2170 are high-density nickel-based chemical chemists from early reports we've seen from Sources like the limiting factor who did a complete demolition on an early production 4680 The two cells seem to have more or less the same volumetric energy density, so the 4680 is about five times the size of a 2170 cell and it contains Wei have five times the energy which is more or less equal.
For Tesla to increase the power density of the 4,680 with upgrades in chemistry and improved build, they're not there yet regardless of what battery they're packing the Tesla semi is on the road as we speak so several production versions have been spotted testing around the Sparks Nevada area recently.
 |
| Tesla semi |
- We've seen Tesla semis with trailers attached performing some acceleration Maneuvers that would be impossible from a conventional transport truck the Tesla semi is still being advertised with its 22nd 0-60 time while fully loaded at 82 000 pounds of gross combined weight and from what.
- We understand that's about triple the speed of a diesel-powered transport truck. we can also see how smoothly the Tesla gets up to speed that's because the driver doesn't have to rapidly shift through 18 different gear ratios when accelerating like a conventional truck driver as far as we know the Tesla semi like all other Tesla vehicles doesn't have gears at all the motors go through a fixed gearbox and then straight to the wheels.
- The updated semi-design has three electric motors originally Tesla advertised the truck with four independent Motors but it's likely that at some point they realized that they were over-engineering the powertrain Tesla lists this spec as three independent Motors on rear axles which would exclude the front axle so it's not an all-wheel drive vehicle.
- So likely very similar to the Tesla plaid design we are expecting to see two Motors on the back axle driving each side independently and then one motor on the middle axle driving both sides Tesla says that gives them less than two-kilowatt hours per mile of energy consumption so at 500 miles of range that would put the battery pack size at around one-megawatt hour or less of capacity about 10 times the energy of a Model S plaid and about 13 times the energy of a model y Tesla maintains that up to 70 percent of that battery.
- Capacity can be recharged in just 30 minutes in order to do this the semi needs a very special charging station and a mega charger so far we've only seen these at the Tesla Nevada facility and installed at the Frito-Lay plant in Modesto where the semi will begin service.
- The Lays Factory is expected to get 15 Tesla semis for initial delivery, parent company PepsiCo has ordered 100 in total so far and Tesla has installed four of its new mega charger plugs to service those vehicles that Pepsi wants to move that plant to its first plant. Zero Emissions Facility What we don't really know is at least the actual peak charging output of the mega charger.
- Obviously much more at peak delivery because lithium-ion batteries need to be charged on a curve that starts at high wattage and then tapers to lower power as the cells approach full Capacity experts at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory and the Charging Front Initiative met during the summer of 2022 to discuss the adoption of a new industry standard for heavy electric vehicles such as electric transport trucks but also aircraft and electric ships.
- The goal is to develop a new high-power charging standard for medium and heavy vehicles called the Megawatt Charging System or MCS, they envision the target's maximum output being 3.75 megawatts now and that doesn't mean Tesla will adopt this standard or never have. He was very good at this kind of thing.
- But if the industry standard were to be 3.75 megawatts, it's hard to imagine that Tesla would be so far away that Mark Tesla calculated that charging half the electricity would be about 2.5 times cheaper than filling it up with electricity Diesel fuel that should be up to $200,000 in cost.
- The savings in just three years of operation add up to the fact that there are far fewer moving parts in an electric vehicle and require significantly less routine maintenance and no oil changes. Or any of that, so the trucks will spend less time in service and more of their life on the road.
- We know Elon has set a goal of reaching 50,000 trucks per year production run rate by 2024 which is ambitious and shows that he expects this semi-electric to become a popular commodity if you are looking for an EV and not quite ready to move to a Tesla.
- It's not entirely clear how many Tesla semis have been booked, but there are a few major orders that we clearly know, PepsiCo with its 100th truck is clearly one of the biggest but not the biggest customers to go to Pride Group Enterprises. Huge Canada, a logistics and service company, has at least 150 Tesla semis on the books Walmart Canada has 130 UPS in 125 trucks and then a smaller batch.
- Orders I think we can now track about 800 Tesla orders but there will likely be a lot more in terms of whether we see a semi-delivery Tesla that I've seen pop up a few times like If your Tesla half is so cool why not use it and yes that's a point I guess but the whole point of building a Tesla is to sell it to customers if it takes a few years to make hundreds of thousands of dollars in savings over the traditional If Tesla could sell that truck for two hundred thousand dollars and get the money now.
It would be much better for its balance sheet, it's still taking the conventional truck out of the way, so the net benefit is still there no matter who uses the product But if we're talking about the next step for the Tesla half, it really does make sense that we'll see production shift to Giga Texas sometime in the future and at that point.
There will probably be a switch in the battery cell to the 4680 just for logistics, half of it is now built-in Sparks Nevada where the 2170 cell is also produced and that's the battery you're using right now, the cells don't have to go which makes a lot of sense if they move to Giga Texas where they will be manufacture 4680, then they will switch to that cell again because they it won't have to go very far.
They would definitely need a proper factory to reach this kind of production number Which Elon is talking about on the day Elon speculated that half of Tesla would reach 100,000 units per year of production volume by 2022 and that was assuming vehicles launched in 2019, so if we set the timeline forward by three years, Tesla can go from 50,000 trucks per year in 2024 to 100,000 trucks per year in 2025.
Do you think this is possible, tell us in the comments section below that half of Tesla could be a huge failure or it could be the company's greatest achievement to date in which direction we will have to wait and find.
How many years does a Tesla battery last?
- I said tesla batteries to be designed to last 300,000-500,000 miles (as purported by Tesla CEO Elon Musk), or about 21-35 years, based on the average person driving 273 miles a week.
- However, other parts of the car are designed to last much longer.
- 8 years or 120,000-mile warranty covers the car's body and drive unit,. Data collected by Tesla shows that their batteries retain more than 70% of their original capacity after 8 years or 120,000 miles.
- Based on this data, it is reasonable to expect that Tesla batteries will last for many years to come.
How much does a Tesla battery cost to replace?
- Based on what we know, it would be safe to say that replacing a Tesla battery would cost somewhere between $10,000 to $20,000.
- This cost includes the battery itself, as well as parts and labor.
- Keep in mind that this cost could vary depending on the type of battery and the difficulty of the replacement.
- However, on average, it would be reasonable to expect a cost of around $13,000 for a basic model and replacement, and up to $20,000 for a more difficult replacement.
That’s all for now on the 2023 Tesla Semi Update. We’ll be sure to keep you updated as we learn more about this exciting new electric vehicle. In the meantime, let us know your thoughts in the comments below!