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palmermd said:
The tax credit has nothing to do with corporate profits. The manufacturer sells the car at a price that hopefully includes some profit, and if the government wants to give some of that money back to the consumer in the form of a tax credit, it should have no bearing on corporate profits.

Sure it does, and you said so in your statement below. At its core, the purpose of the tax credit is to take a beneficial, emerging technology (such as automotive batteries) and provide financial support to companies producing said technology to bring the technology to a point where it can be economically built/produced/installed, at which point the benefits of the new technology take over. While as implemented, the tax credit didn't do that directly, providing the benefit to consumers and not manufacturers, and even then only SOME consumers, in reality it did have the intended effect and allowed car makers to price their vehicles at a point where they could compete with otherwise equivalent gas vehicles at a "normal" profit margin ramp. And, once that ramp starts resulting in positive profit margins, it is designed to phase out since it is no longer required.

palmermd said:
A company could conceivably price a car $7500 more than they would otherwise knowing that the consumer would get that back, but that is another subject.

Yes, and you better believe the heel-draggers of the industry are planning on doing exactly that, as you lament in your paragraph below.

palmermd said:
Either way, Tesla's ability to get into the black on Model 3 is in their own hands. They need to solve their manufacturing and logistics issues and get sales numbers up and costs down.

Well yes, but ultimately you can say that about ANY company making EVs, and it's not like you can just wave your hands and make that happen. It's a chicken and egg thing. It takes sales to create volume to bring prices down, and it takes low prices to build sales. And Tesla has probably gotten 75-80% of the way there to being able to be competitive on an unsubsidized basis. Going through their 500K deposit backlog would get them there. Going through 300K of those would probably do the trick. The question is whether or not losing the tax credit would cause too many of those 500K to drop their reservations and buy an ICE instead.

palmermd said:
Tax credit going away completely will be a non issue for Tesla. Having it go away only for Tesla due to their sales numbers is a bigger problem. I've always felt the setup was unfair to GM, Nissan and Tesla for being the first movers. They will have theirs eliminated and then newcomers/latecomers will have an advantage. It should have been a total vehicle production across all MFG's to sunset the program, not individual numbers.

I wholeheartedly agree and have been saying that myself as well. But this is where you contradict your earlier statements. They will have an advantage because they can either price their vehicles $7500 less than Tesla/GM and steal their market, or more likely, they will price their cars $2500 below Tesla/GM, steal market share and pocket the $5000 in pure profit, something Tesla/GM did not have the luxury of doing.
 
lpickup said:
EVDRIVER said:
Loss of the credit would likely benefit Tesla, since they are almost done with the credit pulling it makes new entires to the market less competitive in price as they are just starting. To Tesla it's actually more of a win to have it pulled at this point unless they extended the production caps which will never happen.

Well yes, and no. All else being equal, what you say is true. It avoids the headwind that Tesla would face as its competitors had yet to reach the phase out. This would likely mean one quarter for GM, 3-4 quarters for Nissan & BMW, and more than a year for everyone else.

But unfortunately all is not equal.

The effect of losing the tax credit will not permanently harm the industry--the momentum towards electrification and the direction the rest of the world is going in is enough so that it's only a question of when, not if, the industry becomes electric. But the loss of the tax credit will delay the timing of what I call the tipping point, where EVs become cheaper to purchase than ICE and it's game over for ICE.

Now other automakers can afford to wait that out. Tesla cannot. They have spent a ton of money on the Gigafactory and equipment for Model 3. They cannot afford to sell Model 3's at a loss for a year until economies of scale put them in the black.

So the big winner would be GM. Then Nissan and then Tesla.

Now if in fact removal of the credit doesn't happen in 2018 but 2019, then yes, I think Tesla will certainly be the big winner.


They already reaped the benefits on the S. The few orders they will lose on the 3 are noting in comparison to the pre-order ratio and the credit losses that would push more new orders to them from competitive price sensitivity in similar price ranges. It's only a win for the credit to go away by the govt vs production quota, they could care less. Besides, they more price sensitive buyers already will miss out on the credit as the fully loaded cars deliver first.
 
EVDRIVER said:
Besides, they more price sensitive buyers already will miss out on the credit as the fully loaded cars deliver first.

My delivery estimator says "Early 2018" for the $35K model. Granted, I take that with a grain of salt, but I do expect the $35K trim level to be available by June, which would still give at least one quarter for the full credit.
 
lpickup said:
EVDRIVER said:
Besides, they more price sensitive buyers already will miss out on the credit as the fully loaded cars deliver first.

My delivery estimator says "Early 2018" for the $35K model. Granted, I take that with a grain of salt, but I do expect the $35K trim level to be available by June, which would still give at least one quarter for the full credit.

Which is nothing compared to how many cars need to be delivered.
 
palmermd said:
The tax credit has nothing to do with corporate profits. The manufacturer sells the car at a price that hopefully includes some profit, and if the government wants to give some of that money back to the consumer in the form of a tax credit, it should have no bearing on corporate profits.

A company could conceivably price a car $7500 more than they would otherwise knowing that the consumer would get that back, but that is another subject.

Just saying "Chevy" is easier and has less letters.. :)
 
cwerdna said:
^^^
I'm not saying these are the best posts on this, but here are a few I quickly found by Googling:
https://teslamotorsclub.com/tmc/threads/ap2-8-1-test-drive-perspective-from-ap1-owner.88597/
https://teslamotorsclub.com/tmc/threads/ap1-vs-ap2-from-someone-who-owns-both.98582/
https://teslamotorsclub.com/tmc/threads/model-x-ap1-is-more-stable-than-ap2.97157/

I'm sure you can find more by Googling for stuff like site:teslamotorsclub.com ap1 ap2 parity and limiting results to some recent period of time like the past 6 months or year.
Any posting more than a few months old isn't talking about AP2 today. Each new firmware release has improved and refined performance - and they've been coming out at about once a month (http://firmware.teslafi.com/). The AP2 I have today is a order of magnitude better than the "beta" AP2 I had back when I got the car in March.

I've only had one experience with AP1 (on a loaner X) and noticed some things that AP2 still doesn't do, such as the dash display showing vehicles in adjacent lanes, and showing trucks as trucks (rather than cars).
 
This thread showed up last week and is about 17.44, the latest firmware (which I also got last week when they uncorked my 75D).
 
jlv said:
cwerdna said:
^^^
I'm not saying these are the best posts on this, but here are a few I quickly found by Googling:
https://teslamotorsclub.com/tmc/threads/ap2-8-1-test-drive-perspective-from-ap1-owner.88597/
https://teslamotorsclub.com/tmc/threads/ap1-vs-ap2-from-someone-who-owns-both.98582/
https://teslamotorsclub.com/tmc/threads/model-x-ap1-is-more-stable-than-ap2.97157/

I'm sure you can find more by Googling for stuff like site:teslamotorsclub.com ap1 ap2 parity and limiting results to some recent period of time like the past 6 months or year.
Any posting more than a few months old isn't talking about AP2 today. Each new firmware release has improved and refined performance - and they've been coming out at about once a month (http://firmware.teslafi.com/). The AP2 I have today is a order of magnitude better than the "beta" AP2 I had back when I got the car in March.

I've only had one experience with AP1 (on a loaner X) and noticed some things that AP2 still doesn't do, such as the dash display showing vehicles in adjacent lanes, and showing trucks as trucks (rather than cars).
Well, https://teslamotorsclub.com/tmc/threads/ap1-vs-ap2-from-someone-who-owns-both.98582/#post-2393579 is an update from Nov 3, 2017.

https://teslamotorsclub.com/tmc/threads/2017-44-ap-worse-than-42.101926/ from a few days ago has some reports of regressions.
 
jlv said:
This thread showed up last week and is about 17.44, the latest firmware (which I also got last week when they uncorked my 75D).
The link I intended to post got lost:
https://teslamotorsclub.com/tmc/threads/ap2-eap-starting-to-show-signs-of-super-human-abilities.101795/
 
DaveinOlyWA said:
on a completely different note....

Sightings have exploded this week!

Where? But then again, this thread does need someone to be facetious from time to time, right?
 
lorenfb said:
DaveinOlyWA said:
on a completely different note....

Sightings have exploded this week!

Where? But then again, this thread does need someone to be facetious from time to time, right?

20 or so sighted in an LA parking deck staging area
29 or so sighted in Fremont parking lot staging area
Sightings in Wisconsin, Cleveland, Austin, La Brea and Rocklin, CA to name a few
 
lpickup said:
lorenfb said:
DaveinOlyWA said:
on a completely different note....

Sightings have exploded this week!

Where? But then again, this thread does need someone to be facetious from time to time, right?

20 or so sighted in an LA parking deck staging area
29 or so sighted in Fremont parking lot staging area
Sightings in Wisconsin, Cleveland, Austin, La Brea and Rocklin, CA to name a few

Images?
 
lorenfb said:
lpickup said:
lorenfb said:
Where? But then again, this thread does need someone to be facetious from time to time, right?

20 or so sighted in an LA parking deck staging area
29 or so sighted in Fremont parking lot staging area
Sightings in Wisconsin, Cleveland, Austin, La Brea and Rocklin, CA to name a few

Images?

How about videos too?

LA (Playa Vista): https://youtu.be/4pljaMTVBOw https://youtu.be/5QxTluLJu3Q https://imgur.com/a/XA7pu
Freemont: https://teslamotorsclub.com/tmc/attachments/408d52b9-f78c-4383-a068-aecdefc60955-jpeg.260614/
https://teslamotorsclub.com/tmc/attachments/ecb64489-0da0-4581-8d03-4658175dfc53-jpeg.260615/
https://teslamotorsclub.com/tmc/attachments/92d167e6-3b4b-4cef-aa71-a80b41c7e3da-jpeg.260616/
Wisconsin (Illinois): https://youtu.be/0xzuOasOEoY
Brea Mall: https://youtu.be/7mWW5htUfRI
Rocklin: https://teslamotorsclub.com/tmc/attachments/1d9ca564-fec7-4b71-97a5-227868abd727-jpeg.260791/
Austin: https://teslamotorsclub.com/tmc/attachments/model3-jpg.260796/

Oh here's another new one (VIN #992) at a high school in California: https://i.redd.it/z63hs5s4r6yz.jpg
 
lpickup said:
lorenfb said:
lpickup said:
20 or so sighted in an LA parking deck staging area
29 or so sighted in Fremont parking lot staging area
Sightings in Wisconsin, Cleveland, Austin, La Brea and Rocklin, CA to name a few

Images?

How about videos too?

Some appear to be at a Tesla storage location (various Tesla models) and not at typical owners' parking locations, e.g. shopping mall.
Maybe some images having been 'staged', "Model 3 Stash"? Only one where an actual VIN was noted. None like I posted while driving
on the SoCal 405 back months ago http://mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?f=10&t=18016&start=720.
 
lorenfb said:
Some appear to be at a Tesla storage location (various Tesla models) and not at typical owners' parking locations, e.g. shopping mall.
Maybe some images having been 'staged', "Model 3 Stash"? Only one where an actual VIN was noted. None like I posted while driving
on the SoCal 405 back months ago http://mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?f=10&t=18016&start=720.

Yes, these are mostly pictures of staging areas (LA & Fremont) and delivery/service centers getting ready for customer deliveries. The cars in LA in particular were seen to be coming and going. I think a few days later most were gone. Some thought they might be part of the semi reveal, but apparently wasn't, so I suspect it was a batch of cars headed to SpaceX employees. There do continue to be on the road/parking lot sightings as well, but the focus of the groups I am following are focused on identifying NEW vehicles (and hence focusing on delivery centers) rather than just simple "in the wild" sightings which may or may not even be a previously unseen vehicle. It is disappointing that VINs were not noted (particularly in the Fremont case), but it is pretty clear that most of these are new vehicles, and the VINs that have been noted have shown a progression from highs in 400's and low 500's a couple weeks ago to cars in the 600's, 700's, 800's, 900's and 1000's now (1099 is the highest, so haven't quite caught an 1100's yet).

As for more serendipitous sightings (if you think there is value in that), I can relate that here in North Carolina a new charging station appeared with a picture (must have been posted by the person adding the charging station--no comment or anything was left!) showing a Model 3 charging. And someone just posted on our local Tesla group that they saw a Model 3 at "the service center" (although this literally happened only about a half hour ago so I don't have any more details yet such as whether he got a VIN and whether he was talking about the Raleigh Service Center).

https://api.plugshare.com/view/location/117072
 
Here's a picture of 1096, posted by Reddit user "theangryburrito," from a link posted by lpickup above:

penmgCd.jpg


(We don't really need to see the rest of the car, do we? They all look pretty much alike, except for color and wheels...)
 
Seattle group video of "5xx" in a parking lot, NOT a Tesla delivery area


https://www.facebook.com/groups/SeattleTeslaModel3Owners/permalink/2008492232741823/
 
DaveinOlyWA said:
Seattle group video of "5xx" in a parking lot, NOT a Tesla delivery area


https://www.facebook.com/groups/SeattleTeslaModel3Owners/permalink/2008492232741823/
Unfortunately, that's a closed group and folks have to join that group to see the pic(s).
 
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