Tesla traditional workshop design

On April 8 th, Beijing time, Tesla Texas Super Factory officially started construction and held a conference called "Gigafactory? Cyber Rodeo, a queue with great geographical and product characteristics, can imagine that this is another one of Musk's personal shows even without watching the crazy output of female powder under the stage.

However, the old horse, who used to jump at every happy event, actually restrained his hands and feet in his hometown in the United States and dressed up in a cowboy suit with Texas characteristics. The Texas factory started construction, and as usual, it was Tesla's muscle show moment: the new factory is also a new product, made in Texas? The delivery of the new version of Y, the largest factory of 4680 batteries, the emergence of Cybertruck production cars, the coverage of FSD Beta in North America this year, or the upcoming Robotaxi. ...

In addition to the display of existing achievements, it is the pit filling of the old horse and the continued painting of cakes. This time in Austin, Texas, covering an area of 12 140 mu, cowboys are really busy, Tesla is still crazy, and the development of electric vehicles may have a new direction.

45 seconds to produce a white body: it is not just another new factory of Tesla.

Tesla regards the factory itself as a product. This super factory covers an area of 12 140 mu, with a volume of about 9.57 million cubic meters and a workshop length of about 1 166 meters, making it the largest super factory in Tesla. Musk is afraid that you don't know how awesome it is, and even came up with a brain hole higher than the Burj Khalifa, the tallest building in the world. But "big" or "new" is not its biggest feature, and its landing may be another industrial revolution in the automobile industry.

From the factory layout, the chip-intensive factory layout has been separated from the series form of stamping → welding → painting → final assembly in the traditional automobile factory. The combination of integrated die casting of the front and rear floor of the car body +CTC (that is, the battery is directly installed on the chassis) +4680 battery directly runs through the parallel+modular route of automobile production, which truly realizes the raw materials from the beginning and the automobile from the end.

From the obvious effect, this is a successful cost reduction and efficiency increase, and the assembly path is greatly shortened. At one time, many welded parts were directly reduced to a whole piece. The productivity of 4x2 (series) x300 industrial robot was liberated by four large die casting machines from IDRA, Italy, which can form a maximum pressure of 6,000 tons. The production time of a body-in-white is only 45s. Improve the efficiency, the structural performance of the car body and the consistency of parts, and reduce the manufacturing cost and equipment occupation, killing two birds with one stone.

What if it's just a model? Y As far as a model is concerned, the annual production capacity of the Texas factory can reach 500,000 vehicles. If Cybertruck, Roadster 2 and Semi are mass-produced in the future, the overall annual production capacity of Dezhou plant is expected to climb to 6.5438+0 million, and the production capacity is insufficient. Tesla's neck can't get stuck any more.

The deeper significance is that the landing of the Texas factory has made us see that the new energy vehicle architecture such as modular iteration and integration of different platforms may be more suitable for the rapid iteration in the future, which has brought revolutionary changes to the life of traditional automobile production. Tesla's most powerful place is not the battery, not the body, but the powerful engineering ability.

A model of the whole body? Y: The combination of three building blocks makes subtraction the ultimate.

In just 16 days, two Tesla super factories started construction. Where's the model? Y, the result is: a model of a complete body? The new version of y was officially put into production and delivered. Before these two factories were put into production, the earliest? The rear body of Model Y is made of dozens of parts through complicated welding and riveting, which is time-consuming and cumbersome. And what about the models produced by the Shanghai factory? Y new products can only realize the overall die casting of the rear floor of the car body at most; 16 days ago, the Berlin factory realized the integrated die casting of the front and rear underbody. The new version made in Texas this time, that is, the standard endurance four-wheel drive version, is a complete body with front and rear underbody +CTC+4680 battery integrated die casting.

CTC landed in Texas this time. Models? The focus of Y, structural battery pack, is the product of CTC technology. The whole assembly process was demonstrated at the scene for the first time, and the practice of directly integrating the battery into the body chassis once again showed another secret to improve production efficiency.

CTC, that is, the battery unit is directly installed on the chassis. Different from the traditional CTP(Cell to Pack) mode, CTC omits the steps of assembling the battery pack and directly installs the battery on the chassis. It is equivalent to that the case itself is the PACK of the battery, without a layer of packaging, which makes the structure of the whole battery pack+case more compact, and the stainless steel battery cell itself has become a structural stress piece, which not only relies on the shell, but also improves the overall power density and energy density of the battery.

With the landing of CTC technology, the front body floor +CTC integrated battery floor+rear body floor are assembled into a complete lower chassis. From Volkswagen PQ platform to MQB platform, the integration advantages brought by Toyota's TNGA architecture ... platform modularity are brought to the extreme here.

Mass production of 4680 batteries: officially moving to the center of the stage

Compared with several other Tesla super factories, the factory in Texas is currently undertaking the irreplaceable and important work of mass production and assembly of 4680 batteries. This vehicle manufacturing plant, which integrates battery production and assembly, will become the largest single battery factory in the world in the next few years, making the long-awaited mass production of 4680 batteries a reality.

The mass production of 4680 is an important symbol of the revival of cylindrical batteries. In recent years, the most dazzling term we have seen in electric passenger cars is the innovation of CTP square battery pack led by the technical route of blade battery, while cylindrical battery and soft bag battery are more like backward products. This time Tesla once again brought the cylindrical battery to the forefront of battery technology by its own efforts.

From 18650 to 2 170 to today's 4680, Tesla and Panasonic have been unswervingly developing cylindrical batteries, and the energy density and endurance of the batteries have improved, but by 4680, the advantages have improved nonlinearly. There are five innovations in battery design, battery factory, positive electrode material, negative electrode material and vehicle battery integration, showing the effect of1+1+65438+1+1> 5.

First of all, the all-pole lug design, based on the golden number with a diameter of 46mm, meets the best balance point of improving battery life and reducing costs. All-pole ear (Tesla calls itself "pole ear", but it is actually a side pole ear) effectively reduces the lateral path of current and greatly reduces the internal loss and internal resistance heating of the battery. The internal resistance of 4680 battery is only one fifth of that of 2 170 battery.

As a result, the battery life of 4680 is improved by 16%, and the cost is reduced by 14%. The capacity of a single battery is five times that of 2 170 battery. In addition, the 4680 battery meets the conditions of double improvement of power density and energy density, and the high-power discharge and fast charge ability have been further improved. According to the research report of Insideevs, it takes 70% charge time 15 minutes for 400 V 4680 battery system. After introducing 800V high-voltage fast charge in the future, the charging efficiency will be more predictable.

Second, the cathode material is rich in nickel and does not contain cobalt. At present, the cathode material of 4680 is still familiar with NCM8 1 1, but it will gradually develop into NCM9/0.5/0.5 or even cobalt-free quaternary batteries in the future. Nickel has the highest energy density, but the lowest cost. The premise of gradually becoming cobalt-free is to improve the stability of the battery. At that time, the cost of the battery will be further reduced, and the factors stuck by raw materials will also be reduced.

Thirdly, the anode material is doped with silicon. This is one of the effective ways to improve the energy density of battery based on the existing battery technology. At present, most batteries are graphite negative electrodes, and the actual specific capacity is about 330-370 mAh/g, so there is little room for improvement. The theoretical specific capacity of silicon-based battery is 4200 mAh/g, which has obvious advantages over graphite, which is why the new battery technologies of Ai 'an, Weilai and other manufacturers have adopted silicon-doped technology in recent years.

Combining the above three points with the above-mentioned CTC battery integrated chassis and the efficient operation of the battery factory, the energy density of 300Wh/kg becomes a reality. In terms of battery life, EPA's four-wheel drive standard battery life version has a battery life of 279 miles (449km). Compared with EPA, which was sold in the North American market in the early days, the standard battery life of a single motor was 244 miles (393km), and the battery life was greatly improved by adding one more motor. The future performance on other models can be foreseen.

From the perspective of production capacity, models? Y The whole car is equipped with 960 4680 batteries, which is one fifth of 2 170. Bicycles rely on fewer batteries, which are only available in Texas factories. Y the basis for a car to achieve an annual production capacity of 500 thousand. Factory production system, 4680 battery system, CTC system and other technologies complement each other, which is also the best practice of Musk's "first principle".

Cybertruck, Roadster 2, Semi, V 1 Optimus, FSD Beta, Robotaxi: Fill the old pit and draw new cakes.

The result that people see in the Texas factory must be a production model? Y, most of the content is also around it. After all, it is the mainstay of Tesla sales at present. But to be handsome and show your muscles, those are the brothers who appeared a few years ago: Cybertruck, Roadster 2, and Semi.

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