I am dumbfounded by the Tesla Supercharger Team layoffs

I saw this comment on an article, which might explain some things.

The more I think about Tesla axing the entire Supercharger team, I wonder if it may tie into the Tesla NACS connector being officially standardized by SAE, and now is the J3400. Which is now being installed on new and existing non-Tesla chargers.

Elon may have thought that by allowing GM, Ford, Rivian…. etc. access to their network of chargers, that would eventually make them the only-game-in-town that everyone would need to come to. And now since it has been standardized, all the competitors EVs can go elsewhere. Musk may have thought – “Why should we be investing in all of this, when others can do it with their resources.”

 

If impacted, I recommend contacting a lawyer in Newfoundland. I suspect this violates any reasonable interpretation of the vehicle warranty. A lawsuit can have an effect. Be sure to include the Newfoundland and Canadian politicians with the help of the lawyer.

Bob Wilson

 

Given the choice, choose:

• CCS-1 - unreliable, bulky, expensive from marginally credible 3d party companies.
• J3400 - reliable, slim, lower charge cost by Tesla Inc. Musk justified the change to improve reliability and performance of existing stations.

Owner of an EV and PHEV:

• 2019 Model 3 Std Rng Plus - after adding CCS-1 kit, only use to 'fill the gap' or 'take a shorter, direct route.'
• 2017 BMW i3 REx - the range extender engine/generator supports 70 mph, 24x7 which alleviates the necessity for a CCS-1 charge. It has CCS-1 charging at just under 50 kW into ~27 kWh battery which is way too slow relative to 2.3 gal of 89 octane gas that gives 88 mi range. Furthermore, I can carry a 2.5 gallon, spare gas can in the frunk.

ChargePoint is already in the business of selling fast DC chargers. I suspect Enel and Blink have similar products. This means YOU and/or you club can buy one where you want it.

Bob Wilson

 

Clearly, the supercharger network is not key to where he wants to take the company. However, it's going to be one less reason for buying a Tesla.

It seems to me this was a seat-of-the-pants decision by Elon without any consideration in making an orderly transition. I think he is going to find it hard to find any OEM willing to buy his FSD software after his two-year-old melt down. The OEMs can't trust him.

 

Superchargers were critical for Tesla Model S, X, 3, and Y sales. He didn't start with a fast DC charger business in part because the "CCS-1 standard" remains so disappointing.

Bob Wilson

 

Well we see if this supercharger fiasco affects sales going forward. So far investors are still hanging in there with him.

 

Looks like the house cleaning isn't over. Now it is design and engineering.
https://insideevs.com/news/718636/even-more-tesla-layoffs-may/

 

Sandy Munro might say that the Superchargers work, the cars work, and the truck works, so there is nothing left for Tesla's design and engineering staff to do. However, even Sandy might be surprised if Elon fires his FSD programmers--they have a lot to do.

 

Some day, rather like the move to USB type C charging for mobile phones and laptops, CCS type 2 may prevail for EVs, as it does already in many places internationally, even for Teslas.

 

Everything (mostly) works, but much of the model lineup is old and getting stale, and the competition keeps bringing out new models. The auto business is not static.

 

One caution, Tesla is very adept at installing better designs within the cars as soon as they are available. For example, going from sheet-metal bodies to castings replacing expensive sheet-metal parts.

So I have a 2019 Tesla Model 3 Standard Range Plus and want my next one:

• Stronger, lighter, body - replace sheet metal parts with castings
• Better traction battery - replace 50 kWh, NMC with LiFeP (or better)
• Better temperature range - insulate the battery to expand cold and hot weather operations
  
• Better interior seats on battery - allow the passenger side seats to become a narrow bed
• Better wheels and tires - replace the overweight, rims and power-tires with lighter weight, efficiency-tires
• Better glass - replace traditional windshield with gorilla glass resistant to pebble strikes
• Better electronics - replace with 48 V, ring ethernet, latest computer, 48 V battery and improved cameras
• Better maintainability - doing my own work, the cabin air filters and condenser coils are a disaster
• Make rear a hatch back - instead of just a sedan by removing or replacing the 'hat rack'
• Install 2" receiver and wiring - make this an option when ordering

Tesla can do these while maintaining the same, Model 3 shape. They can come in over time as my existing, 131,000 mi, 85% battery, is still very serviceable.

Bob Wilson

 

Here is a reasonable discussion of likely side effects:

https://www.youtube.com/live/sIGtRX7sQwc?si=IP1j6HpaFkupizdT

(Sorry, I don't know how the time skip occurred.)

Bob Wilson

 

CCS type 2? It's worse than CCS. I get AC 3-phase charging for home/sort-of, but that has absolutely nothing to do with the DCFC side. The fact that Europe mandates it is going to turn out to be abjectly stupid. In an effort to create a "standard" across the pond, they are going to typically shoot themselves in the foot. I predict we might see DC Slow Charging turn up at some point. Or more appropriately perhaps DC home charging, as some of the standards improve. There is no technical reason a 5-10KW DC charger could not be built for a reasonable amount of money. In that case if you have 3-phase, you just add 2 diode bridges and combine the DC outputs. Forcing 3-phase capability with the onboard charger was just silly.

Once there is enough of a market, I predict a $1000 home DC charger. I would not be suprised to see a DC only vehicle at some point if the government regulatory bodies don't get too happy. 400vdc@20A (8KW) would not require any super heavy duty components. I've considered building one myself, the protocols are pretty straightforward.

 

All of the very many of us with vehicles with CCS 2 must be abjectly stupid then. I for one have been happily and innocently charging, publicly by DC and at home with single phase AC, for six years using CCS type 2

 

My understanding is:

• Europe has one
• China has another one
• Japan has another one
• North America has another one

When Europeans, Chinese, and Japanese start driving to North America in significant numbers, I'll worry about it then.

Bob Wilson

 

In the US (not sure about Canada) homes do not have 3-phase and only businesses and farms are likely to, if anywhere. So CCS2 does not make any sense, being extreme overkill for the US infrastructure. It would have been nice for AC charging to work at a higher rate, but if the underlying infrastructure doesn't exist CCS2 doesn't offer any advantage over CCS1. J3400 (aka NACS, aka Tesla) will be superior user experience-wise to CCS1, due to more manageable plug size.

 

You have re-phrased my comment to be inflammatory. If you want to give reasons why you think CCS2 is superior to NACS please do, and we can have a discussion on the merits of the different approaches. To wit.

I said that I thought the decisions made in the EU to mandate the CCS2 charging connector would turn out to be abjectly stupid. In my opinion, the CCS(2) standards are a seriously clumsy inelegant kludgy design extension of the prior AC plugs and sockets. The design of CCS2 was the same as CCS: extend the existing 3-phase capability on the AC charging side add some DC pins, by making the connector a large clunky mess. 3-phase charging has the advantage of three smaller conductors providing equivalent power to the onboard charger, at the expense of requiring two additional contacts vs single phase. There is nothing inherently evil about this, and it made sense to have three-phase to speed up AC charging vs J1772 at a time before DCFC was very prominent. Adding a couple of extra DC pins and creating a clumsy connector to create CCS/CCS2 seemed like a good idea at the time, and certainly met the needs of that generation of vehicles. The same can be said of CHADEMO which, from a physical perspective, was better than CCS, but required an extra socket on the vehicle.

To that end the NACS plug was engineered with the idea of scalable AC or DC charging using a smaller, simpler plug and socket. To that end moving AC->DC conversion from the vehicle to an actual charger (Not an EVSE control relay) at your home is a likely outcome from the adoption of the smaller/saner connectors while forcing infrastructure is going to entrench the poorer design.

The fact that people already own CCS/CCS2 vehicles does not make them abjectly stupid, any more than owning a Leaf with CHADEMO makes a leaf owner stupid, you have to make choices from the options that are available. When governments step in and take away options that often turns out to cause more issues than it solves. YMMV.

 

Again, there is nothing that prevents charging at "household" rates via DC, other than lack of any hardware at present to do it. I do believe long term it will become cheaper to have a DC charger at home, which is going to be somewhat agnostic about 1-phase vs 3-phase, since it will be outputting DC to the vehicle.

 

Keith Smith said:
You have re-phrased my comment to be inflammatory. If you want to give reasons why you think CCS2 is superior to NACS please do.

I posted "Some day, rather like the move to USB type C charging for mobile phones and laptops, CCS type 2 may prevail for EVs, as it does already in many places internationally, even for Teslas."

From outside of North America we see the strong arguments being made for NACS vs CCS type1. In many other places Teslas use CCS type 2. The 3 phase argument puzzles me since I operate on single phase happily. It probably helps that domestic power is 230V. My point is not that one is better, (think Beta vs VHS), just that some day there may be a standard that prevails and it may be CCS 2, and we won't be agonising over it.