Tesla Truck 'Quite Likely,' Says Elon Musk (bgr.com) 223
An anonymous reader writes with this excerpt from Boy Genius Report: If you think Tesla's plan for world domination begins with the Model S and ends with the Model 3, you're sorely mistaken. While the Model 3 is of course the mass consumer vehicle Elon Musk is betting the company on, the Tesla CEO is certainly open to developing other types of vehicles in the future. During a recent interview in Hong Kong at the StartmeupHK Festival, Musk briefly touched on the potential for Tesla to build an electric truck. "I think it is quite likely we will do a truck in the future," Musk said. "I think it's sort of a logical thing for us to do in the future." While this might appear to be outside of Tesla's wheelhouse at first glance – the Model S is a luxury sedan, after all – the amount of money to be made in trucks is immense. To wit, the three best-selling vehicles in the U.S. in both 2014 and 2015 were all pickup trucks.
What Type of Truck? (Score:2)
Model T (Score:5, Funny)
how could they miss that opportunity. Model T
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Ford already kill the 'Model E' name, which had to be changed to the 'Model 3' :S,3,X,Y!
They definitely wouldn't allow a 'Model T'
The next model will surely be the "Model Y'.
Then the lineup would be
Re:What Type of Truck? (Score:5, Informative)
I'm all for it; I like driving small pickups. What I've wondered all along is why someone hasn't done this already? Seems like a no-brainer to me. You could build the battery packs right under the bed, no problem.
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THAT is something I'd definitely be in the market for....why won't they do this again as the 'flagship' car to use to see their other more boring/pedestrian looking cars....?
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THAT is something I'd definitely be in the market for....why won't they do this again as the 'flagship' car to use to see their other more boring/pedestrian looking cars....?
That would be cool, and IIRC they have talked about bringing back an updated version of the Roadster.
As for why they (probably) won't do that in the near future -- they already have their low-volume "halo" car that proves their credentials, and what they want to do now is sell in high volume so they can benefit more from economies of scale. To do that, they need to sell something that is (relatively) cheap and popular, not another high-priced niche vehicle.
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electric delivery trucks would make a ton of sense
Yes, I agree, they certainly would. Lower overall operating costs, less pollution, etc.
Pickup buyers are not going to go electric, it's not in their DNA
I'm a pickup truck buyer/owner/driver, and as previously stated, I'd go for one. Similar reasons to the above for a commercial truck: lower overall operating costs, less pollution, less maintenance. Of course in my case the killer would be range. There are many times during the year when I may need to drive 300 miles round trip. If it won't make it then it's a non-starter.
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There are many times during the year when I may need to drive 300 miles round trip. If it won't make it then it's a non-starter.
I see this often and I'm not sure I understand the reasoning. If you're saving so much money from not buying gas, why can't you just rent a truck/car for those infrequent long trips and still save money overall on an electric?
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It's because of the up-front costs, the savings are actually fairly minor.
Re:What Type of Truck? (Score:5, Informative)
Because renting is expensive. Because renting is very inconvenient, particularly if you have no rental places nearby (as I do). Because rental places don't always have the car you need when you need it. Because sometimes I need to leave on short notice. Because I like to drive my own vehicle, which I am comfortable with, I know how it handles, I bought it because I want to drive it. Because I already have all my stuff in my vehicle and I don't want to move transfer it twice just to go on a trip. Because my vehicle is sitting in my driveway and i can load it up at my convenience, I can start a day before my trip if necessary and I can leave stuff in it upon my return. Because I'd have to sign a contract and be responsible for a vehicle that is not mine. Because if I scrape a fender I have a complete bureaucratic and expensive mess on my hands rather than being able to handle it all myself.
Now, any, many, or few might apply to any given person. I really don't care if they do or don't.
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There are many times during the year when I may need to drive 300 miles round trip. If it won't make it then it's a non-starter.
Then we make it a hybrid. With a battery pack capable of hauling the truck itself ~150-200 miles, you add a small engine, possibly just a 4 cylinder. Maybe even just put it in the bed. A nice fuel-efficient 4 cylinder(that you are probably better off renting) would be able to keep the vehicle at modest highway speeds, and even if not, the by the time you exhaust the battery you're probably ready for a stop anyways.
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Pickup buyers are not going to go electric, it's not in their DNA.
A pair of questions. Who do you think is responsible for the majority of purchases of pickup trucks? What if I told you that I know a buyer that was buying so many pickup trucks that GM had to tell them that they could only manufacture a portion of the order?
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Pickup buyers are not going to go electric, it's not in their DNA.
Well, right up until someone points out that if you put a generator in the back of the truck then you can legally run that truck on red diesel even after you run out of battery... that'll change some tunes pretty quick.
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Pickup buyers are not going to go electric, it's not in their DNA.
I see the mistake of trying to generalize the entire pickup market as one group. There are many groups. There are those who need pickups for their work. There are those who use primarily for recreation, sporting activities (transporting bikes/kayaks/camping etc). There are those (like me) who have an old pickup but its not the primary driver, to handle a number of things such as hauling, camping, etc (if you don't drive it much, efficiency is less important). There are those who are simply truck enthusiasts
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There are those who need pickups for their work. Yep. And if they're independent contractors, they're traveling to job sites all over the place, sometimes an hour or two away. Which gets scarily close to the range limit of current EVs.
There are those who use primarily for recreation, sporting activities Yep. And often it's a two or three hour drive to the lake or trailhead. Next.
There are those (like me) who have an old pickup but its not the primary driver
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As to whether it make sense or not for Tesla to sell one, I really don't care nor did I say one way or the other.
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It isn't in the DNA for truck drivers who don't need a truck but just want it for the status.
However business who use trucks, if they find that Tesla, can maintain the power they need, for the time they need it, they may switch over to save fuel cost.
The challenge for a pickup truck you will need to expect that it will be operating 10-12 hours a day, doing heavy work. That would be akin to an electric car with 800 mile range on a single charge.
Yes a pickup will run out of gas during the day. However you c
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I know of a company with a large fleet of pickup trucks that had placed an order for GMC trucks, four digit quantity, which GMC said the volume was too high for them to fill, by about 700 trucks. That company then went and bought the other 700 from Ford and that was a single year's order. That's the market and the reason why pickup trucks are the best selling vehicles. It's not individuals that are purchasing, it's companies with significant fleets and that's because there's this huge aftermarket for pickup
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Re:What Type of Truck? (Score:4, Informative)
Do you know what the specs for a typical trash truck(3mpg) are and the battery you would need to run such a platform? How would you charge 15 or 20 of these monsters at night? (if you are lucky enough for battery to last during the day) The up front costs would be astronomical.
No need to imagine hypotheticals, you could just ask the guys who are doing it [fastcoexist.com].
They seem pretty bullish [forbes.com] on the idea and they've put their money where their mouths are, so to speak.
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You could build the battery packs right under the bed, no problem.
And it'd even fix the winter traction issue. I looked under my truck to kind of figure out how I'd electrify it, and there's plenty of room under there for batteries.
Re:What Type of Truck? (Score:5, Insightful)
My answer to that is that offroading is a minority thing for both SUVs and Trucks. Many drive trucks for the towing or cargo capacity, not for off-roading.
On the truck side, if you put a Model-S engine system in, you have plenty of power. One or two of their 'skateboard' power packs. Maybe even make it a hybrid - put a engine-generator in it to help keep the battery topped off.
That could be one hell of a towing truck.
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Many drive trucks for the towing or cargo capacity, not for off-roading.
No some drive trucks for their towing or cargo capacity, just like some drive them for off-roading. Most however seem to drive them because the thing that at some point in time in the future they may need to tow or haul something even though they have never hauled or towed anything ever. The other reason seems to be that they have a small dick, I have a friend who seems to suffer from this problem. When I put a hitch on my car (e46 BMW) my neighbors thought I was nuts. My response was you wouldn't have thou
Re:What Type of Truck? (Score:5, Interesting)
Most however seem to drive them because the thing that at some point in time in the future they may need to tow or haul something even though they have never hauled or towed anything ever.
Going by my family, our aging population might be part of the issue. Modern cars are generally built very low to the ground for various reasons. They may be good for normal people. But my grandfather has spinal damage - he can't get into or out of standard modern cars. He HAS to have a van, truck, or SUV that he climbs into, not moving down into. Mom has developed arthritis like symptoms(the medical explanation went over my head), and she can no longer climb out of a car seat - I even have to help here climb out of a movie theater seat. Without assistance she'd essentially have to fall out of the vehicle and then get up. Or drive a SUV where she sits higher. I'm not sure about dad, it might simply be with him that when he bought the truck it was as a second vehicle where the bed was useful, and our family's tendencies to drive a vehicle until it doesn't work anymore(even if we buy new), so he's not trading out of it anytime soon. Of course, an S-10 isn't exactly a penis-replacement truck either.
Take my family experiences, combine with a US population that's getting older, and the 'SUV/Truck' craze might amount to the regulations making such vehicles a little cheaper for their size, combined with that said vehicles, being built higher, are simply easier to get into and out of than modern low-slung cars.
4 wheel drive can be satisfied with Subaru and such.
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That makes him a good candidate for a personal mobility device such as a Segway. If only we still built neighborhoods like the one he grew up in, where you didn't have to drive to the grocery store just to buy a gallon of milk, then a Segway would make more sense.
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When I put a hitch on my car (e46 BMW) my neighbors thought I was nuts.
It's what they do in Germany. Very few people own trucks. However everyone tows. It's so much easier to hitch up a trailer and get work done than to carry the "trailer" around everywhere.
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That could be one hell of a towing truck.
I foresee problems using this proposed truck for towing. One of the things that makes the Model S successful is it's form. It has very low aerodynamic drag, [caranddriver.com] and a somewhat fixed mass. Towing a trailer completely disrupts that system. Mass will increase dramatically, and most trailers have the aerodynamics of a brick.
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I foresee problems using this proposed truck for towing. One of the things that makes the Model S successful is it's form. It has very low aerodynamic drag, and a somewhat fixed mass. Towing a trailer completely disrupts that system. Mass will increase dramatically, and most trailers have the aerodynamics of a brick.
The Model X seems to do okay at towing [youtube.com]; I don't know why a purpose-built vehicle would be any worse.
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Will it be a truck like the Model X is an SUV (aka, not really one -- can't beat it up offroad like you can a 4Runner, Highlander, etc)? If it's a real truck that can go offroad, then that would be great. But that's a big step versus where they are now with the X...
Actually I assumed he was talking about actual trucks not gigantic cars with very small back seats and huge open-air trunks.
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Will it be a truck like the Model X is an SUV (aka, not really one -- can't beat it up offroad like you can a 4Runner, Highlander, etc)?
Most SUVs, especially more modern ones, are not very offroad-capable, worst of all crossovers which are just tall station wagons (or in some cases, more like tall hatchbacks). Trucks like the 4Runner and Highlander that come with a taste of offroad capability are the exception, not the rule.
Most gigantic American pickups have a hilariously bad breakover angle as well.
Makes sense to me. (Score:4, Insightful)
Just like Tesla's other ideas, a luxury sports car proves that it can be done so other people can copy it. It makes sense that a truck would be the next thing for Tesla to prove feasible. I don't think Tesla really wants to build cars or trucks but rather wants to run a think tank to prove it can be done. I wouldn't be surprised if Tesla open sourced his car plans at some point so other people could manufacture them for him (and he can sell batteries to them, of course)
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Why would it make sense? Because Elon said so? If the truck will actually be used like a truck there won't be any chargers around. If you are talking about rich dorks running around town to show off, than maybe you are right.
If Elon Musk and his gang of eggheads can build a truck that will move cargo at a lower cost per drive kilometre with a full load of cargo than a diesel truck can then just you wait and see, the charging stations will pop up like mushrooms around a rotting tree stump. The there is fierce competition among the haulage companies, to them only the bottom line matters. If the truck that gives them a competitive edge is electric then they will not stick with diesels for the sake of tradition or some asinine righ
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Maybe, maybe not. The bed of the truck would make for excellent battery swap potential. The end user can't swap the cars battery. I can see several potential ways to make battery swap much more feasible in a truck, at least for a commercial outfit to equip one.
Also the electric All Wheel Drive dual motor in the current models is far superior traction control to Internal Combustion Engine AWD. Its even possible they might put 4 motors, 1 for each wheel. This would offer vastly superior traction to any truck
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I worked for a company that was trying to get Walmart to buy our engines for their trucks.
0.1% of a fuel economy savings could save them millions per year. For short haul a lot of fleets are moving to CNG because it's cheap.
If Walmart, UPS or FedEx could do just a single route in an EV truck they'd jump at the opportunity in a second if it meant cutting fuel costs.
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According to market research, the overwheliming majority of truck owners do not use their truck like a truck. That doesn't make them all rich dorks, it just makes them regular consumers.
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And why are pickup trucks basically the top-selling vehicle in North America? Are there seriously that many people who use it to haul around cargo so often that it's justified?
Like SUVs, the vast majority of them will never more "off road" than a gravel paved road. And most will never h
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It does. How quaint that you think the majority of trucks are utilized in urban areas.
Fun fact. One of the larger purchasers of pickup trucks are companies like Union Pacific and Norfolk Southern, who routinely run their pickup trucks in exceedingly rural areas that have no road access.
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How quaint, you think that Tesla can only make a pickup truck if it will satisfy the needs of the customer who buys the most? I can see how you think that, because that is exactly what they have done with their electric car. Oh, wait...
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I believe Tesla can do just fine if they are producing a pickup truck for non-commercial usage or they build a crossover or SUV as they'll have far more flexibility in their design and engineering which is an advantage to them whenever they can sell the vehicle to the customer as is without the customer needing any further alterations which will encompass practically all non-commercial purchasers. I question their ability to crack into the commercial truck market because they're facing brand loyalty and pri
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Apparently Tesla already open sourced their electric car patents
https://www.teslamotors.com/bl... [teslamotors.com]
Re:Makes sense to me. (Score:5, Insightful)
ANY patent is "open source" by definition. That's just how patents work. The extra bit that Tesla added was disclaiming any rights or intentions to demand royalties.
It would be more accurate to say that he "copylefted" them or "liberated" them.
"open source" is a more watered down term by design.
Power Storage (Score:2)
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A lot of people have trucks for hauling things.
Many of the truck owners I know are compensating for something. The only thing they haul is groceries.
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A lot of people have trucks for hauling things.
Many of the truck owners I know are compensating for something. The only thing they haul is groceries.
This.
Nine times out of ten, when I see a truck on the road, the bed is empty.
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What? Going by anecdotal observation? I almost *never* see a pickup that is loaded. It is much much closer to 99.9% are empty all the time.
However, when do I see trucks? I see them in the parking lot at work, or driving to and from work. I'm not particularly surprised that the beds are empty, all things considered (it used to be that I'd see a toolbox in the truck bed, but it seems that would be hard on the pretty liners on the ones I see).
The most often I have seen a truck used to haul things, I was involv
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Most people buy trucks to have a real vehicle. It's impossible to find a "full" size car. If you want room and comfort a pickup truck is where it's at.
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Damn, since when do they make their muffin packs smaller?
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Wouldn't they need to fix the power storage problem before creating a fully electric truck? A lot of people have trucks for hauling things.
Couldn't they make long, thin batteries and use the bed of a pickup as the compartment. You would lose some storage, but how often to people really use a pickup to transport stuff?
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A Model S battery [cartalk360.com] is already proportionally flatter than a cell phone battery.
At that point you stick it UNDER the bed, like how it's on the bottom of a model S, and you don't lose any storage.
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A Model S battery [cartalk360.com] is already proportionally flatter than a cell phone battery.
At that point you stick it UNDER the bed, like how it's on the bottom of a model S, and you don't lose any storage.
That's kind of what I intended, use the batteries (in a protective compartment of course) to act as the actual floor of the bed. However, since I don't know the thickness of the batteries I didn't know how big said compartment would ahve needed to be.
Musk Needs to Focus (Score:5, Funny)
Look, the guy is amazing but he still has to ramp up production on the delayed Model X, get the Model 3 out, get the Falcon 9 landing and taking off again, finish the first giga factory and its extension, probably update the Model S by then, finish the hyper loop test track, get another giga factory started, convert the global energy supply to solar generation and local storage, fly and land the Falcon Heavy, scale Model 3 production up to 10 million cars a year, build a global micro satellite internet system, build another giga factory, send enough supplies to Mars to sustain a human habitat, build a Mars capable spaceship in orbit, and finally get himself to Mars before he becomes to senile to complete the trip.
As my mum always said, finish the project you're doing before you go start another one.
Re:Musk Needs to Focus (Score:4, Funny)
"Get some rest. If you haven't got your health, then you haven't got anything."
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Pretty sure he's not the sole person working on those projects. I seem to recall teams of thousands of engineers also chipping in with a bit of the work.
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And absolutely none of that gets done without a vision of the future. This is just another piece of his vision.
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This isn't about projects - this about Musk keeping Musk in the public eye. On top of being a showman, Musk seems to have a real need to keep people talking about and listening to him.
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I'm going to be honest... I have no problem with someone doing that that is really working to advance and better the human race. Most people like that like to talk about how amazing they are, or to brag about how great something they've done is. I don't really see or hear about Musk acting like that. He's always looking for the next project and trying something new. Some of the new projects he talks about are flat out ridiculous. Some of them seem ridiculous, but are actually far more doable than anyon
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On top of being a showman, Musk seems to have a real need to keep people talking about and listening to him.
Perhaps, but that goes both ways -- the media also have a real desire to keep talking about Musk, for the obvious reasons -- he's doing interesting things, and therefore talking about him sells copy.
Electric trucks make a lot of sense (Score:2)
Electric trucks make a lot of sense... if you can get the price down.
Trucks benefit from having lots of torque for pulling, towing and hauling. If you went with a hub motor design, each wheel independently powered and each on a motorized jack, you could create a phenomenal off-road vehicle, able to adapt to all sorts of terrain.
The challenge is that trucks also need decent range even when pulling a heavy load. My pickup has a 600+-mile range, not because I need to drive that far but so when I'm pulling
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So something like a UPS, FedEx, insert LastMile courier, or something like a Moving/Freight Truck, or are we talking Semi?
Re:Electric trucks make a lot of sense (Score:4, Informative)
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I'm not sure about that. The range for long range hauling semis might not be there, but there's a ton of semis that get used in limited geographic areas. Lots of places have a central depot or two in a city, that services all their stores/outlets/etc. Many of those semis don't really need huge range, they're just bigger moving/freight trucks. Heck, if you designed it right you could include easily swap-able battery packs with quick charge capability. The truck comes back to the depot, as it's getting r
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He isn't talking about pickups. He is talking about real trucks.
From TFA: "Elon Musk hinted that a Tesla branded pickup truck isn’t entirely outside the realm of possibility."
He's talking about pickup trucks.
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Electric trucks make a lot of sense... if you can get the price down.
Trucks benefit from having lots of torque for pulling, towing and hauling. If you went with a hub motor design, each wheel independently powered and each on a motorized jack, you could create a phenomenal off-road vehicle, able to adapt to all sorts of terrain.
The challenge is that trucks also need decent range even when pulling a heavy load. My pickup has a 600+-mile range, not because I need to drive that far but so when I'm pulling something that cuts my fuel efficiency in half I still have a 300-mile range.
The nice thing about an electric truck is that extra battery capacity would be easy to build into a trailer that needed it when being towed. Bonus: You're not hauling around that weight when you don't need it.
Electric delivery trucks have a great future (Score:4, Insightful)
Most school buses, mail trucks, parcel delivery trucks, can go electric. Most of them stay close to their base station and can be charged over night. Further they are suitable for "swap-the-battery and continue" mode of operations. Deliver fleets could build battery swap stations for their trucks to swap batteries when needed.
Currently these options are not being pursued because the price is too high for the cost savings. As gas prices fall they become even more unviable. But these are the first ones that will be peeled off when the battery price break through comes along.
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Maybe we should stop subsidizing... (Score:2)
Not even possible now (Score:5, Informative)
Truck means extended range (Score:2)
Since you have so much room in a truck, you can put a lot more batteries in it. I'm pretty sure Tesla could make an electric truck with at least quadruple the range of their cars.
Wait, what do you mean by "cargo space"?
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Wait, what do you mean by "cargo space"?
You could shove 4-8 model-s batteries under the bed of a full size pickup without sacrificing any cargo space. That would translate, probably, to 2-4 times the range.
Of course, $136k for 8 ~$17k battery packs would make it a little pricey.
I'd prefer a Tesla Wagon. (Score:5, Interesting)
I'd prefer a Tesla Wagon over a truck. For family usage a wagon is a lot more useful than a sedan or a truck.
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That's essentially what the Model X is.
I'm surprised (Score:2)
Yes, I know TFS says, "the three best-selling vehicles in the U.S. in both 2014 and 2015 were all pickup trucks."
But I would think a luxury SUV would be a more likely step.
Musk has made great improvements to battery capacity and life for his automobiles, but I suspect trucks require more power and range than is practical with current battery technology.
Manual gearbox (Score:3)
Duh (Score:2)
If you think Tesla's plan for world domination begins with the Model S and ends with the Model 3, you're sorely mistaken.
Oh, really? And there was me thinking a car company would just stop making cars once they've made one they thought was good enough.
Sheesh...
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Re:What about a REAL truck? (Score:5, Interesting)
Ironically, you're going 50 years back.
The UK had all-electric vehicles doing local milk, bread, etc. delivery since at least the 60's. We call them milk floats.
They were generally lead-acid powered but the newer models use Li-Ion and other technologies, and because they generally did morning rounds, they could charge all day and night to get their runs done early the next morning.
Many a child woke up with the motor-whine and bottle-jingle of the milk float coming down the road. They died out around where I live about 10 years ago, with the advent of local supermarkets and online shopping.
Everything goes in circles.
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The problem with electrical vehicles in the US is the range. With the exception of commuter vehicles they need to have a minimum 300 mile range per charge. We desperately need some kind of practical electrical storage.
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I generally drive at least 32 miles per day minimum. That's work and back. A lot of my co-workers drive 100 or more miles round trip commute per day. That's not the problem though. If I have to take care of business after work it'll mean a lot more miles. At least one day per week I can count on up to 80 to 100 miles extra. That leaves aside weekends. I don't live in an urban area but it's not rural either. My county has about 140 thousand people and the county directly North of mine has a populatio
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And a frequent-stop application, like milk delivery, postal delivery, package delivery, public bus, etc, is the perfect application for electric power because a fuel-based solution wastes energy slowing down at each stop that an electric solution can recover through regenerative braking.
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Not sure where you live, but here we allow in general 64 tons max weight.
But they are talking of putting down power lines along the highways to allow trucks to get electricity for propulsion.