Elon Musk Testing The Model 3's Main Competitor: His First Impressions
Posted on 09/09/2020 7:17:27 AM PDT by SunkenCiv
Elon Musk test-drove the ID.3 when he made a final stopover to meet with one of his biggest competitors, Volkswagen CEO Herbert Diess.
Musk also inspected the ID.4 electric SUV that Volkswagen will launch later this month.
Before Tesla Inc Chief Executive Officer Elon Musk returned to the US after a three-day visit to Germany, he made a final stopover to meet with one of his biggest competitors - Volkswagen AG CEO Herbert Diess.
The two auto executives met at a small airport in Braunschweig for about two hours on Thursday evening and Musk test-drove VW’s ID.3 electric-car, according to people familiar with the matter. Musk also inspected the ID.4 electric SUV that VW will launch toward the end of the year, said the people, who asked not to be identified as the meeting wasn’t public.
A spokesman for VW confirmed that Diess met with Musk, but declined to comment on details.
Musk had toured Europe’s largest economy since Tuesday, visiting pharmaceutical company Curevac GmbH, before moving on to Berlin for meetings with politicians and a visit of the factory Tesla is building outside the German capital in Gruenheide. The site would be Tesla’s first car-factory in Europe and could assemble as many as 500,000 vehicles a year, underpinning Musk’s attack on the German auto establishment.
Diess has praised Musk’s achievements several times in the past, both publicly and during internal events.
The VW CEO on Friday lauded his rival yet again, saying in a LinkedIn post that Tesla’s new factory brings “trend-setting future automotive technology" to Germany.
“Tesla will live up the competition in Germany and accelerates the transformation of our established industry significantly," he said.
(Excerpt) Read more at auto.hindustantimes.com ...
In one factory in Germany, VW produced over 25 million VW (original) Beetles over a period of about 40 years. In that same factory, VW has produced the Golf for a slightly longer period of time (started in March 1974), and has built at least 35 million of them. VW's the largest European automaker by units (second place is Fiat, if memory serves) and
Sez here, Volkswagen's Electrify America is buying and installing Tesla Powerpacks at " more than 100" of its charging stations...
VW and Tesla are likely to be friendly rivals, perhaps allies, as the EU rids Europe of gasoline powered vehicles over a rather short window of time. Used German luxury cars will probably be all over the markets of the world over the coming years.
E-car = goofy wheels.
Volkswagen ID.3: First-Drive Review By Jonny Smith
Inside EVs | August 23, 2020 | Steven Loveday
Posted on 08/28/2020 8:59:03 AM PDT by SunkenCiv
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/chat/3878547/posts
VW’s had weird wheel designs on their gas and diesel cars for a number of years now.
All e-cars have goofy looking wheels to look different so virtual signalers can show off.
Musk has gambled heavily on China. He has situated Tesla plants in China and hopes to show a profit and reward his investors by selling huge numbers of EVs in China. sorry but ultimately he will go bankrupt. any manufacturing, software or battery developments or patents held by Tesla will be pirated and put in the hands of Chinese EV manufacturers. They will underprice him. Also any profit he manages to make from Chinese sales will never reach his mostly American shareholders. The fact is unless forced by Democrat laws and regulations, most buyers shun EVs and prefer cars with internal combustion engine. The truth be told there can never be enough “green electricity” to power a car fleet the size of America’s. The whole concept is flawed and bogus.However be ready to give up your personal vehicle if the Democrats take power. They hate the personal freedom you have to travelwith your car.
BTW Musk himself is a very flawed drug using character. IMHO he has a death wish and will crash his companies.
Tesla 3 wheel covers protrude enough to scrape against curbs. Seems like a design flaw.
Tesla wheels are pretty conventional for modern cars.
That’s a problem for a lot of modern cars due to low profile tires. It’s the price paid for handling and a ride that isn’t land-yacht levels of seasickness inducing.
Seems like a design flaw.”
And a bad one. Wheels are expensive.
Frankly, I think that once the big auto producers start making electrics, tesla will be history.
I saw a show that compared electric cars by cutting them up and looking at the parts. They said tesla bodies were extremely inefficient in construction methodology and cost of construction. However, they did LOVE their motor tech. If the other manufacturers can match Tesla’s motor tech, I think Tesla is done.
Of course, big companies have other “big overhead”.
I see Tesla as a slightly more successful 21st century version of Tucker.
Nice propaganda video for Tesla. :)
Drug using? Puffed on a marijuana/tobacco mix once. He doesnt smoke pot. What other drugs?
Let me guess, you think this was better????
Ewwwwwwww.......
The current Toyota Prius, the original king of visual virtue signaling, comes with these wheels as one of the standard offerings.
Perfectly normal modern wheels, not weird ones.
I guarantee you that a large proportion of those will wind up in China. German cars are already a status symbol there, their economy continues to grow and develop the middle class, and with the price dropping from that huge pool suddenly available in that short time span... easy prediction.
Again, pretty standard for modern wheels.
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