Changes to the Tesla lineup have never come at a more rapid pace.
After revealing the new face of the Model S yesterday, and two weeks after unveiling the Model 3, Tesla has kept the news flowing by ditching the 70 kilowatt-hour battery in the base Model X for a 75 kWh juice pack — and bumping up the price to match.
The all-wheel-drive SUV doesn’t get any faster with the upgrade — the 0-60 mph time is still six seconds — but the 75D can now travel 17 miles further on a charge, going from a 220-mile range to 237 miles.
Tesla will give away the 75D for $83,000 cash, before government incentives — a price increase of $1,800 over the old 70D. For whatever reason, the top speed of the 75D has fallen by 10 mph to 130 mph, meaning your trip to the ski slopes could become longer, if you’re a maniac.
Deliveries of the Model X 75D are scheduled to begin in June. Tesla recently ran into some “parts from the past” trouble, forcing the automaker to recall all Model X vehicles for a possible issue with the rear seatback. This was another fly in the ointment for Tesla founder Elon Musk after a parts shortage related to the model’s sexy falcon-wing doors slowed production of the SUV over the winter months.
Besides the battery boost for the entry-level Model X, nothing changes in the rest of the lineup. The 90D and P90D will make do with ranges of 257 and 250 miles, respectively.
[Image: Tesla Motors]
Seeing that the lowest trims have been dropped with a base model price increase on the S and X now, I expect that the 3 will be available for $35k for approximately 3 months before they drop the base model due to lack of demand or something like that. They then get to deliver on their $35k base promise without actually having to build that many of them.
Ultimately there aren’t going to be many 35k Model 3s in the wold because people are going to want AWD, which means it’ll be roughly 40k before options.
It depends.
If Tesla can build the $35k car profitably, they’ll want to keep it available to compete against the handful of other players in the low-end EV market.
But if they kill off the $35k model in favor of high-end $45-$55k pimped Model 3s, I and many other customers are no longer interested. It will also tell me that Tesla has departed from its original goal of building a car for the masses.
They can’t build $90K cars profitably. How the hell are they going to deliver on $35-50K?
At scale.
They might lose money on every sale, but they’ll make it up in volume.
Source?
Good luck finding one!
Tesla is now quoting a 2-month lead time, according to the online configurator.
Unless something miraculous happened since March (about 2500 built from Dec to March), they really can’t build enough of these to satisfy outstanding orders anytime soon.
It’s a bit funny to refer to “ditching the 70D” model when one has never actually been built. This is a change to an upcoming model not yet delivered to anyone, not a discontinuation of an actual existing product. AFAIK every Model X delivered has been the “First Edition” or w/e they call it that’s a loaded P90D for ~$140k.
I think you’re right about the Signature Edition leading the delivery schedule, but the introduction this week of the Model X online configurator means you can actually buy any version now.
I guess the 70D was a theoretical base model when the product was launched, so now it’s been “ditched” from consideration.
Sure, but my point is just that this is a change to the specifications of the base model ahead of actual production/delivery/sales of them. It’s not dropping a model that actually existed.
Tesla built plenty of Model S 70Ds, so the components for them were at least used, even if not in a Model X.
Tesla will remain supply challenged for few years.If they can maximize their prices while maintaining full production capacity they will do just that.
If Musk succeeds in matching BMW 3 series in performance and price with model 3, the car will have delivered on its promise. This really is not a car for the masses but well heeled middle class. The electrics will continue to come down in price as long as Tesla remains in market.
Electric car prices will come down not because of Musk being charitable but with drop in energy storage prices as efficiencies are found and competition is increased.
Once electric charging logistics come close to that of gasoline, range will not be a major factor and prices will come down further as battery storage is reduced.
Since electric cars are inherently simpler with fewer parts and easier to manufacture. I feel reasonably confident in predicting a sub $20k (todays dollars) midsizer hitting market in 15-20yrs.
With 20 years of inflation, it might be free…
Good golly you have no idea how the world actually works.
Moore’s Law. It’s “how the world works” in several industries.
PC’s, for example, have dropped in price by 95% or so, since the original IBM PC came out in 1981. The iPad I’m typing this comment on weighs 1 lb. cost under $300 and has more computing power than all of NASA had when they landed men on the moon 47 years ago. A high end gaming PC has more computing power (and more transistors inside it) than existed in the entire world at that time. Meanwhile, from the end of WWII to the introduction of Tesla, the auto industry was almost entirely stagnant.
Except “cars” ain’t one of them.
If it did, we would be driving for free, with cars that cost a few hundred bucks, that travel a thousand moles on a 20 gallon tank, and go 400 mph. Or something silly like that.
Moore’s law does not apply to cars, save for the tech that goes inside them.
I think you forgot today’s dollars part, which is precisely to account for inflation. Thank you.
1. I took account of inflation by stating in todays dollars.
Tesla predicted that costs for batteries can drops below $100 khwhr by 2020. Assuming these cost will be halved again in another 15 yrs, it is perhaps reasonable to assume a battery cost of $50/kwhr. A Chevy volt has a range of 50 miles on 18 kwhr, so a car of similar weight and performance should have 250 mile range on 90kwhr battery which works out to be about $4500 for battery. Once you take out, engine, transmission, differentials etc and simplify manufacturing, as well as amortize costs of development, battery surcharge should be negligible. This will allow an electric car to be sold at Mazda 3 prices with interior significantly larger due to efficient space utilization.
I might not have an idea on how world actually works, but I do know that one makes a fool of him or herself by judging others too quickly.
Except actually “accounting for inflation” is meaningless. Even if workers’ wages were to follow it. And the last 20 years have shown otherwise.
So it will, at best. cost the same work as it does now.
Seriously, really?
The fact that workers’ wages haven’t kept up with inflation is purely a result of policy choices, and not remotely inevitable. Workers’ wages have kept up with inflation, or even surpassed it, at plenty of other times in U.S. history.
Stop taxing wages twice or three times as much as investment income, stop connecting healthcare with employment, and restart enforcing the country’s antitrust laws, and you would watch worker wages go up.
I always snicker when I read of production delays from Tesla.
A couple of Januarys ago had a steady customer came in and we got into an extended conversation.
At the time he was an independent programmer that was hired by a group that had a contract to create a new program for Tesla’s production line.(Among other things each frame was tagged so barcode readers could tell paint color,options,etc.) Seems there original program had some bugs in it. The story goes Tesla’s own IT team wrote a new program that had over 900 bugs and half the IT folks were fired. So an independent contractor was brought in to write a new one. Then the folks on the floor went to management and said we have work-arounds for all the existing problems,why replace with something that we have no idea what the problems will be and how long until we can figure out work-arounds. Management agreed and cancelled the contract.
Asking him about it,he said Tesla has no problems making cars,just they’re inefficient and can’t make them as fast as they could.
That’s the reality that those who actually know are aware of.
Musk’s minions know sweet FA about building cars en masse, and never will.
Tesla knows about dominating the US luxury car market, bitch-slapping the Panamera in the process.
Yeah right. Go sit in a Model S, then go sit in a Pana TT. You really have no idea what a “luxury” car is, do you?
Just because it’s pricey, does *not* make it actually “luxurious”. As someone who has actually been inside a Model S, they are not luxurious. They’re adequate at most generous.
Comparing them is comparing apples to go-gurt squeeze tubes.
They are the largest selling luxury brand in Europe.
Regarding this 3rd party anecdote: a couple of people recently drove a Tesla cross country, using the auto pilot software, and barely touching the steering wheel. Seems they’re pretty good at software.
Has there been a learning curve? Yes Do they seem to learn fast? Yes.
They are not the largest selling luxury brand. The Model S was the largest selling large luxury sedan. They are not even close to the largest selling brand lol.
You Tesla fanboys should at least read the stories you like to quote if you don’t want to look like morons.
Is that the factory ski rack, or did they borrow one from Jeep?
Most modern skis and boards can fit inside the car. If these Tesla-eers are carpooling and using the back seat, you’d choose a streamlined Yakima or Thule rocket box on the roof. That would probably compliment the car’s styling, but not this, no, not this.
Say you’re in Denver, and I want to ski at Vail. That’s 100 miles each way. This car could get there and back if there was no traffic delays, no detours over Loveland Pass, and no need to use much heating or defrost. You haven’t known the limits of range anxiety until you’re stuck sitting in a blizzard at 11,000 feet, with night falling. But you wouldn’t care- you’d have double the range, because you would have a fast charging outlet in your mountain chalet, of course– don’t we all?
I’m sure you could think of a similar scenario with a gasoline car. What’s your point,, that the car should fail because some people have chalets without electricity? Nobody should buy it because the sky rack isn’t to your liking?
It’s a very weak argument.
Sure you could, Difference being you started the trip with 1/4 of tank in the gasoline car, and were kinda asking for it.