Tesla has one factory (Tesla factory in Fremont, California) and four gigafactories: The Nevada Gigafactory, the Shanghai Gigafactory in China, the Gigafactory in Berlin, Germany, and the Gigafactory in Texas.
The Shanghai Gigafactory in China is Tesla's first gigafactory outside the United States. On October 17, 2018, it was decided to establish the Shanghai Gigafactory. On January 7, 2019, the construction of the Shanghai Tesla Gigafactory began, and the new model 3 was delivered in January 2020. The Shanghai Gigafactory is currently responsible for the production of Tesla Tesla Model 3 and Tesla Model Y, of which Model 3 is the main model.
After two years of construction, production will start on Tuesday, March 22, 2022 at the first Tesla European electric vehicle factory in Berlin. This is the second Gigafactory in Berlin, Germany, after the Shanghai Gigafactory, which is Tesla's second gigafactory outside the United States.
The $5.5 billion plant will ramp up the capacity of Tesla SUVs to better meet the market's demand for electric vehicles. It is understood that the factory covers an area of 227,000 square meters and is about the size of 30 football fields.
The Berlin plant is the fourth gigafactory after California, Texas and Shanghai, and Tesla's first manufacturing plant in Europe, and is by far the most advanced and efficient factory because of the latest opening.
Tesla said it takes ten hours to complete a Tesla car, the car moves every 45 seconds on the assembly line, and the workshop has more than 400 robots involved in manufacturing.
Tesla expects the Berlin plant to recruit 12,000 people, which has already employed 3,500 people. At full capacity, the plant will be able to produce 500,000 vehicles per year, surpassing the number of pure electric vehicles (450,000) sold globally by its German rival Volkswagen in 2021. According to the German magazine Auto & Sport, the Tesla plant aims to produce 2,000 cars in the first few weeks of mass production. 01:01
For Tesla, the production of the Berlin factory is of great significance, Musk has also inserted a sharp knife in Europe, the birthplace of the automobile industry, with supply chain advantages and local government financial subsidies, Tesla's sales in Europe may grow again. How to deal with Tesla's challenge will become a difficult problem facing European car brands such as Volkswagen and BBA.
According to foreign media reports, at the opening ceremony of Tesla's Berlin factory in Germany, Elon Musk predicted that Tesla's annual production capacity may be as high as 20 million units in the next decade. In response to questions from Tesla workers, he said: "I think we can produce 20 million cars in 10 years, which is very ambitious, but it is not impossible." There are about 2 billion cars and trucks in use worldwide each year, and the number of 20 million is equivalent to 1% of the total number of cars in the world every year.
Tesla produced cars in record time
Berlin is the most modern car factory in the world, and it is also important to Tesla. 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 the Berlin Gigafactory in 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. Haike Weber, a partner at industrial consultancy Berylls, said: "The usual high-volume production cycles, such as C-Class cars, are 70 seconds to 90 seconds per car. "
Tesla's "Super Die Casting Machine"
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 the Berlin Gigafactory. 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 Italian mechanical engineering company ldra (China's LK Technology completed its acquisition of Idra in 2011).
Tesla saw the advantages of the super die casting machine: 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 the Berlin Gigafactory and operates under 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, it also has drawbacks: if a customer has an accident and deforms the casting, it must be completely replaced, which makes the repair cost 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. By 2030, one in every two electric vehicles will be produced using this process.