This is the latest article published on april 2 on the website of the German newspaper Zeitung. The author, with Tesla's permission, entered the factory to visit and interview employees. The original text is in German, and this article is translated from the English version of the alex_avoigt forwarded on Push.
Author: Thomas Jahn Translated: Gravel Villager
The world's most modern car plant was launched in Berlin's Greenhead. Cars are pulling off assembly lines at record speeds, and there is plenty to learn from Germany's competitors.
Greenhead. A ghostly voice often wandered the halls of Greenhead's factory. It was the whistle of the die-casting workshop, a huge machine, three stories high, with a white shell and a red frame.
Source: FoundryPlanet@youtube
Even die-casting machines use Tesla's "company color." It was built with German expertise from suppliers such as Wefa, Schuler and Hirschvogel. 50 tons of die casting machine mold, with a pressure of 2500 tons in 20 seconds to press the body parts.
Similar die-casting machines can be found in other car factories, but Tesla produces a part in a different way than other manufacturers. In addition to components such as doors or tailgates, the die-casting workshop will soon be suppressing battery boxes. These are the new, so-called "4680 lithium battery" containers.
The battery modules and containers made from them are glued together to form the bottom of the Model Y. This reduces weight, improves driving characteristics and increases endurance. "I've been working on this since the company was founded," Tesla CEO Elon Musk said a few months ago.
The Berlin plant features a model Y with a structural package and a 4680 battery pack. Source: Gali@twitter
With new production processes, a high degree of automation and future battery production, Tesla is setting the standard in its newly opened Greenhead plant. Peter Nagel, founder of consultancy ANP Management Consulting, said: "This is an interesting benchmark for the German automotive industry. "
Tesla produced cars in record time
Greenhead is the most modern car factory in the world — and it's important to Tesla as well. Analysts expect the company to reach capacity of 2 million electric vehicles a year by the end of the year, a quarter of which will come from Germany.
To achieve this, by the end of the year, a car will roll off the production line every 45 seconds at the Berlin Gigafactory, which will be a peak. Heiko Weber, a partner at industrial consultancy Berylls, said: "The usual high-volume production cycles, such as C-Class cars, are 70 to 90 seconds a car. "
How will Tesla manage it? The manufacturer is keeping a low profile, and even suppliers have been ordered to remain silent. But The Business Daily was allowed to tour the factory halls and talk to employees. Interviews with experts and evaluations of license applications, Internet forums and other sources of information together paint a picture of a factory that sets a new industry benchmark.
Last but not insignificantly, Tesla CEO, Elon Musk himself, is a good source. He likes to tweet or talk in detail about the production process.
The idea for a "super die casting machine" came from Italy
The aluminum ingots on the pallets lined up in the foundry to feed two other Tesla die-casting machines: the huge die-casting machine used exactly 9 aluminum ingots at a time to press the rear body of the Model Y, a single die-cast, weighing 81 kilograms.
So far, Tesla has been casting and pressing the rear body of the Model Y in this way at Greenhead. This process is controversial among expert groups. In the usual factory, such body parts are still welded from a number of individual parts.
It wasn't Tesla who came up with the idea, but the Italian mechanical engineering company Ldra, which completed its acquisition of Ibra in 2011. According to Riccardo Ferrario, manager of LDRA, when italians showed off "super die casting machines" at a trade show in Berlin in 2019, they were met with a lot of skepticism: "A potential customer just smiled and said it would never work out. "
Centered is Riccardo Ferrario
But Tesla saw an advantage: the casting process eliminated 70 production steps. Musk was captivated: the scheme was closest to his idea of "the machine that makes the machine." His engineers, along with Ldra, developed the OL 6100 CS, which now stands at Greenhead and operates at a pressure of 6100 tons.
This is just the beginning. This year, six more "super die casting machines" will be installed in the factory, for a total of eight. The reason why so much is needed is because the Model Y will not only have the rear body, but also the front body will also be made of a single die casting.
As a result, the crossover became a structural kit assembled from very few components. Musk came up with the idea while looking at a Matchbox car model.
In the future, Tesla body will mainly be composed of three parts. The two large components of the front and rear bodies will be connected to the battery box. In total, this method eliminates 370 production steps. Musk said: "The rear body alone saves us 300 robots. "
However, there are drawbacks: if a customer has an accident that deforms the casting, it must be completely replaced – which makes repair costs even higher. Still, different manufacturers, such as Volvo or a number of startups in China, are now using super-die casting machines, and Volkswagen is also considering it. An analyst from investment bank Bernstein pointed out that by 2030, one in every two electric vehicles will be produced using this process.
Tesla: The Fremont plant has reached peak capacity
Tesla aims to produce 500,000 cars a year in Greenhead, or just under 10,000 a week. Currently, according to automotive expert ANP, the plant is still ramping up capacity and currently produces 500 to 1,000 cars a week. "This factory would be an achievement," said ANP's Nagel, "and Tesla's speed, innovation and flexibility in every way is amazing." "
German automakers are worried. For years, Volkswagen CEO Herbert Diess has been warning about Tesla's superior productivity. Volkswagen takes a total of 30 hours to produce a car, while Tesla takes only 10 hours. That's one of the reasons Volkswagen is now building a brand new electric car factory in Wolfsburg. "If we don't do that, we won't have a chance in the competition," Dies said a few days ago.
Diess invited Musk to present Tesla's innovative power at an internal executive meeting, October 2021
The Volkswagen boss maintains a close relationship with Musk, admiring the entrepreneur and the factory he built. Tesla's capabilities were already evident at its first factory in California. In this car production hall, which was converted from the previous General Motors, Tesla currently produces 8550 cars per week. According to a financial information service Bloomberg analysis of 70 U.S. auto plants, that's a top number. Toyota's flagship plant in Kentucky ranked second with 8,427 units produced per week, followed by BMW in South Carolina with 8,343 units.
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