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Tesla Model 3 will be revealed on March 31st

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LordOfChaos

Member
I wonder how a car like this would handle in the snow and ice of the north east. Would the torque on acceleration help with the snow or cause it to spin more? Is this fwd/rwd/awd?

By most accounts the Model S handles brilliantly in the snow because of the skateboard battery platform, which the Model 3 also has. That means most of the mass is in the bottom, low centre of gravity, great for snow. Some say better than any all wheel drive gas car.

Model 3 will come in both rear-wheel drive and all-wheel drive .

Only thing is we northern climate-ers lose some range in the cold, iirc 20% or something. Longevity hasn't proven an issue with Teslas (or Volts, but it did with Leafs which don't have advanced battery cooling/heating, just air cooling).
 

ColdPizza

Banned
By most accounts the Model S handles brilliantly in the snow because of the skateboard battery platform, which the Model 3 also has. That means most of the mass is in the bottom, low centre of gravity, great for snow.

Model 3 will come in both rear-wheel drive and all-wheel drive .

Only thing is we northern climate-ers lose some range in the cold, iirc 20% or something. Longevity hasn't proven an issue with Teslas (or Volts, but it did with Leafs which don't have advanced battery cooling/heating, just air cooling).

Good info. Thanks.
 

SteveMeister

Hang out with Steve.
Placed my pre-order yesterday at about 4:50am EDT, got my confirmation email at 11:50pm, so 19 hours.

The car is gorgeous-- loving the cab-forward design, the short overhangs. Really sporty, very aerodynamic. Can't wait to find out what the cd is.
 
Stop taking preorders? Seriously? As long as Tesla inform people there's a queue, pretty sure people have no problem waiting a year or two. If someone is willing to hand you $35k, pretty sure you'll find a way of building them.

Honestly this makes Tesla heavily heavily undervalued imo... They literally just generated 6b revenue in 2 days and they haven't started making the cars yet.

A Company's valuation is based on profitability and cash flow, not revenue.

If Tesla loses money on each vehicle, which is the case at the moment, IIRC, then obviously this will have an adverse impact on valuation.
 

LordOfChaos

Member
If Tesla loses money on each vehicle, which is the case at the moment, IIRC, then obviously this will have an adverse impact on valuation.

This is widely misstated. Just to clear it up, they weren't giving away the Model S at a loss. When people said they were losing money on each Model S, it was about operating costs with R&D and manufacture vs income. Each car individually was still sold at a profit.

In fact it's some OTHER car companies that had the model of selling at a loss and making it up on repairs, but that's not the model of Tesla (or most Japanese brands I believe)
 

ColdPizza

Banned
A Company's valuation is based on profitability and cash flow, not revenue.

If Tesla loses money on each vehicle, which is the case at the moment, IIRC, then obviously this will have an adverse impact on valuation.

It's also based on projected profitability. Speculators may drive the share prices up in the mean time.
 

GatorBait

Member
A Company's valuation is based on profitability and cash flow, not revenue.

If Tesla loses money on each vehicle, which is the case at the moment, IIRC, then obviously this will have an adverse impact on valuation.
Not quite. A company's valuation is based on future cash flows discounted to net present value. Your logic is flawed because your premise is incorrect.
 

mcfrank

Member
A Company's valuation is based on profitability and cash flow, not revenue.

If Tesla loses money on each vehicle, which is the case at the moment, IIRC, then obviously this will have an adverse impact on valuation.

Tesla does not lose money on each vehicle sold. That implies they are selling the vehicles for under what they cost to make. Tesla makes money off each vehicle and then re-invests that money into making the company bigger (building the giga factory, building super chargers, opening stores). They lose money as a company, they don't lose money on each car.

Edit - already answered.
 

mcfrank

Member
Someone on reddit photoshopped different colors

zwdcZ2e.jpg


g8Z4JlK.jpg


More at the link
 

Luigiv

Member
it def reminds me of a panamera, but shorter and a flat butt.

There are definitely similarities, but they're mostly superficial. When it comes to the details, the two are quite different (and most of those differences seem to be working exclusively in the Model 3's favour).

I'm still not a fan of the front fascia but the profile and rear view are sexy as fuck. Quite impressive, given the aggressively cab forward design on such a short wheel base.
 

mf.luder

Member
Fuck that red and blue are sexy. Although I think I want silver/grey metallic colour.

Odd that I've been applying for a higher paying job?
 

rinse82

Member
Any news on Canadian availability with Canadian pricing? Will it be a straight USD to CAD conversion with regards to pricing?

I was maybe the 50-60th person to reserve at the Toronto store when it opened - I'm anticipating I'll get my car by Q3-2018, which would be perfect as that's when my 320i lease runs out
 

Ty4on

Member
I wonder how a car like this would handle in the snow and ice of the north east. Would the torque on acceleration help with the snow or cause it to spin more? Is this fwd/rwd/awd?
There is a dual motor version with AWD, but I think traction control systems in general have an easier time tackling wheel spin in EVs because the engine has much less inertia. They bragged about that with the Model S and snowy Norway is Tesla's second biggest market.
Without a grill, how will it intake air for ventilation, air conditioning, etc?
There is a grill, it's just much smaller and lower down. It still has radiators for battery cooling and the AC.

The intake for cabin air is in most cars under the windshield wipers and not in the grill.
 
Why not use a credit card and then pay it off as soon as the charge goes through?
I was advised by my agent to avoid large transactions on my checking/savings and my credit cards until close of escrow. Mainly because I have to submit one more month of statements to the lender.
 
Has Tesla announced plans to build more supercharging stations due to the large influx of new owners? I'm not sure how the situation is now, but I would think that these stations would start becoming super busy after the Model 3 is released.
 
Man, so close. In a few years when the battery life catches up to my particular needs (215 mpc is about 100-150 short of what I need) I'll be all over this. It's really tempting as is. Like, really, really tempting.

Yeah I can't blow $35k on a car right now... two kids in college over the next six years... but I'm very interested in this tech and believe my next vehicle will be EV (whether it's Tesla or some other by the time I'm ready for the next vehicle will depend heavily on the landscape by then).

Very impressed with the reception Tesla is getting here. Like a few others, I'm somewhat stunned that someone would plunk down money now for a car they won't see for a couple years, but hey, we all invest money in KS campaigns as well. In some sense, that's what this is. A massive KS campaign where if you pledge $1K you get a car, and not just any car, but an electric vehicle that has "future" written all over it.
 
Has Tesla announced plans to build more supercharging stations due to the large influx of new owners? I'm not sure how the situation is now, but I would think that these stations would start becoming super busy after the Model 3 is released.

I'm pretty sure they said they are doubling the number of supercharger stations in 2 (?) years.
 

Jimrpg

Member
A Company's valuation is based on profitability and cash flow, not revenue.

If Tesla loses money on each vehicle, which is the case at the moment, IIRC, then obviously this will have an adverse impact on valuation.

They are losing money on the model S and model X because of the huge upfront development cost. As the model 3 is the last step of their master plan, the high volume should return them to profitability. They've got huge brand appeal, as good as Apple at the moment. From Elons tweets, the preorders have exceeded their expectations. Their revenues are billions per day... the overheads come down with each car they sell.
 

Pocks

Member
One year.
End of 2017

I was advised by my agent to avoid large transactions on my checking/savings and my credit cards until close of escrow. Mainly because I have to submit one more month of statements to the lender.
American Express has a prepaid card that will cost you about $5. Available at Walmart, CVS, and other retailers. A 0.5 percent fee ain't bad.

https://www.americanexpress.com/us/...av=menu_cards_reloadablecards#serve-fee-chart
 
232,000 preorders
https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/716089404985487361

Elon better get to work because 232,000 cars won't be building themselves. That's more than twice as many cars as Tesla has sold in the company's entire lifetime, and four times the number of cars Tesla sold in 2015 (about 55k Model S + X). At some point he really needs to stop taking preorders, because the people who just preordered are realistically looking at taking delivery in 2019 already. I mean there's no point in taking 1 million preorders if they won't be able to deliver the 1 millionth car until 2025.

Well, time to build another Gigafactory and hire more people! I think he will do this sometime late this year.
 
Ordered mine this morning. Got confirmation email within minutes. I guess the preorder rush is over. I know I am in the busiest region (CA) so I wonder how long I will have to wait for my car after production starts.
 
This is widely misstated. Just to clear it up, they weren't giving away the Model S at a loss. When people said they were losing money on each Model S, it was about operating costs with R&D and manufacture vs income. Each car individually was still sold at a profit.

In fact it's some OTHER car companies that had the model of selling at a loss and making it up on repairs, but that's not the model of Tesla (or most Japanese brands I believe)

You are talking about marginal cost of production. It's like saying Airbus makes money on every A380, but they are still deep in the hole because the production and engineering costs were so prohibitive, Airbus will never breakeven on the project. That's what I was referring too.

It's also based on projected profitability. Speculators may drive the share prices up in the mean time.

I know. I agree. Tesla is a trendy stock, as there is an obvious growth story.

Not quite. A company's valuation is based on future cash flows discounted to net present value. Your logic is flawed because your premise is incorrect.

That's what I implied by saying "cash flow". Where is my logic flawed?

They are losing money on the model S and model X because of the huge upfront development cost. As the model 3 is the last step of their master plan, the high volume should return them to profitability. They've got huge brand appeal, as good as Apple at the moment. From Elons tweets, the preorders have exceeded their expectations. Their revenues are billions per day... the overheads come down with each car they sell.

I agree. But there are huge challenges ahead. They will need to meet their production targets otherwise Tesla could be in serious trouble. Car manufacturers have very high operating leverage, after all.

This reminds me of the Boeing 787. Record pre-orders, great tech, but they failed to deliver on production and suffered as a result. But Boeing is magnitudes bigger than Tesla so it didn't matter as much.
 

mcfrank

Member
You are talking about marginal cost of production. It's like saying Airbus makes money on every A380, but they are still deep in the hole because the production and engineering costs were so prohibitive, Airbus will never breakeven on the project. That's what I was referring too.



I know. I agree. Tesla is a trendy stock, as there is an obvious growth story.



That's what I implied by saying "cash flow". Where is my logic flawed?

But you are wrong. They aren't losing money because of engineering costs of the current cars. They are losing money because of capex to grow the company for future products.
 
But you are wrong. They aren't losing money because of engineering costs of the current cars. They are losing money because of capex to grow the company for future products.

YOU are wrong, because I never said anything about them losing money because of anything specific. If you allocate capex/engineering costs on every car sold, they are losing money. That's a fact.
 

mcfrank

Member
YOU are wrong, because I never said anything about them losing money because of anything specific. If you allocate capex/engineering costs on every car sold, they are losing money. That's a fact.

You said tesla loses money on each car sold which is not true. They make money on each car sold and lose money on building factories. Those are very different things.
 

GTI Guy

Member
YOU are wrong, because I never said anything about them losing money because of anything specific. If you allocate capex/engineering costs on every car sold, they are losing money. That's a fact.

Didn't you say they were losing money on each car sold? that statement implies they are not making a profit on each car sold. There is a difference between profit on a car sale and overall profitability of a company.

Edit: Beaten
 

GatorBait

Member
That's what I implied by saying "cash flow". Where is my logic flawed?

You can correct me if I'm misinterpreting what you wrote, but based on your below quote, you seem to imply that the company's valuation is going to be adversely affected by selling more cars? That is entirely backwards. As economies of scale are realized from the gigafactory and production ramp-up, per-unit marginal profit will increase, as will future cash flows with each car sold.

Tesla has been operating at a net loss based on the massive up-front costs related to R&D, initial manufacturing ramp-up, and, of course, the costs of building the gigafactory. I believe Musk has mentioned the company could already be operating at a net profit, if not for building the gigafactory. It is also important to note Tesla projects to turn cash-flow positive in 2016 and realize a net profit in Q4 2016.

A Company's valuation is based on profitability and cash flow, not revenue.

If Tesla loses money on each vehicle, which is the case at the moment, IIRC, then obviously this will have an adverse impact on valuation.
 
Wish I could pull the trigger on one of these. My wife graduates on the last month of 2017. Our income will immediately quadruple and my current car will be 12 years old. Seriously considering getting one in 2018. If I don't pre-order will it still be possible for me to get one mid-2018?
 

GatorBait

Member
Wish I could pull the trigger on one of these. My wife graduates on the last month of 2017. Our income will immediately quadruple and my current car will be 12 years old. Seriously considering getting one in 2018. If I don't pre-order will it still be possible for me to get one mid-2018?

You may not be able to get one mid-2018 even if you do pre-order. Only time will tell.
 
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