Wasn’t aware of that detail thanks, it’s such a bizarre idea.
I disagree that it couldn’t come out of thinking of how to justify merging spacex and Tesla which he’s wanted to do for a long time.
This isn’t a cool car, it’s a gimmick. It will never be road-worthy, would lose money, and I doubt they’ll ever even sell it to customers.
As to why he’s going this dog and pony show now, we can only speculate, but I can’t think of any reasons that are good for Tesla (vs Musk personally) can you?
Why do anything? Why don't we all live in a joyless, pointless world where nobody does anything on a whim because it doesn't contribute to efficiency and shareholder profits?
Musk also said production was starting on the Roadster in 2020. It turns out that things Musk says don't mean much.
And it can still be a distraction. The fact that they went through all this effort for a fantastically unreasonable thing just to wow for a company that is off the rails is...pretty telling. Have you never worked with someone who is late for everything, always overpromising and underdelivering, and as it becomes more apparently their promises get more exaggerated and unreasonable? That's Musk. Like "look you can play games on your screen", which absolutely no one asked for in a car, and for which it does much shittier than a $200 pad.
For that matter it's Trump too, and they're both cut from the same cloth -- don't like the dumb arch? Well now it has snipers and drones! And also it will eliminate the debt, deficit, income taxes, and...
So instead of just starting production of a vehicle 8 years behind schedule, look, new distraction! Amazeballs! Don't worry coming real soon now. Just put in those deposits!
I mean, the one part of this story that is unclear and no one seems to be asking hard questions is the compressor status -- there are vague, handwavy (oh we'll build a compressor claims, but I have huge doubts). A 5000 psi to 10000 psi compressor in the real world today is enormous. It's industrial equipment that generates enormous amounts of heat, is hilariously loud, and takes enormous power. While I am 100% certain this dog and pony show had their tanks filled by external massive compressors out of sight, I am pretty skeptical Tesla has any magic innovation in that field.
It can hardly be a "new distraction" when it was evidently planned and announced in 2018.
I also find it unconvincing that the purpose of the stunt is to receive deposits.
This being a prestige project to show off Tesla's advantage in experimental technology, or a personal pet project, would seem a much more likely explanation. Do we really need to bend everything into a malicious scam?
When it's by a repeat scammer, yes. Like, good god.
Hey remember when all of the Tesla factories were being retooled to make robots, and the hilarious robot demo where some remote controlled junk was pitched as next gen? Also SpaceX would be to Mars by 2021, and would have landed a crew there in 2023. Totes!
Musk is Elizabeth Holmes who lucked into buying a growing business. Like, he 100% does exactly what Theranos did, and which she is sitting in jail for, trying to boost the stock on bullshit and lies.
"prestige project to show off Tesla's advantage"
Advantage? The entire engineering world is going "why?", for a wide range of reasons.
Not unlike the CyberJunk nonsense where he needed to boast that it can stop bullets and double as a boat (https://nationalpost.com/news/world/cybertruck-texas-wade-mo...) and is made out of impractical materials. That massive, colossal flop didn't show any "advantage", it showed that a toddler was running the show, and when people just want cars he's off desperately trying to regain his Iron man allure, now that he's just a vile, garbage human being.
They shut down model x and s production to retool those Fremont lines for Optimus robots. They actually are making them btw. They’re using them in their own factories currently just like they used the Tesla semi for like two years for their own freight before selling them to the public.
> They shut down model x and s production to retool those Fremont lines for Optimus robots.
Another narrative that also fits the facts is that demand for their cars is so bad that they had to idle the X and S lines at that factory and they used Optimus as an excuse.
If demand was booming they'd set up a new facility to manufacture Optimus rather than dismantling a car factory
They’ve wanted to shut down the s and x lines since the y and 3 were first being manufactured at scale. His timelines are always wrong but Elon has said this for years.
> Do we really need to bend everything into a malicious scam?
Fool me once, shame on you, fool me 10 times, shame on me
Wild people are still falling for Musk's fake products. I guess what they say is true, there is a sucker born every minute despite the evidence of the last twenty years. This will never ship.
It would seem that your theory that the idea arose out of a need to distract from current financials doesn't hold merit.
He probably just wanted to design a cool car.