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Tesla Adds Titanium Underbody Shield and Aluminum Deflector Plates to Model S

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Re: Tesla Adds Titanium Underbody Shield and Aluminum Deflector Plates to Model S

#31

Post by kordless »

smoyer wrote: post #9
userbinator wrote: post #2

Very, very good idea. Personally I think the ground clearance is still a bit on the low side. It looks like it lost a bolt or something in the first impact image... oops.

I noticed that too but can't tell whether it's a plastic "rivet". If you look at the plastic fairings on your car, you'll see that many are held to the body with a snap-fit plastic connector. These are also used as blind fittings on many interior panels (such as door panels). They break and detach often enough that my local hardware store carries the more common ones.

It's probably a plastic rivet holding the plastic aeroshield Elon mentions as the first line of impact absorption.

Re: Tesla Adds Titanium Underbody Shield and Aluminum Deflector Plates to Model S

#32

Post by kordless »

eiji wrote: post #11

I'm sorry but my first reaction is "What a waste". Titanium is ridiculously expensive for various reasons. The best these engineers could come up with is to put a sheet of metal under the car? You got to be kidding me. I see why they have to use Titanium for it, anything else doesn't work, but it shows how far away this car is from reality and from true mass production.

Your statements are in conflict with each other and are glued together with an ad hominem argument. You should focus on why you think increasing safety of a car beyond anything we've known thus far is a 'waste' instead of trying to use a simple bias to devalue the work they've put into it.

Re: Tesla Adds Titanium Underbody Shield and Aluminum Deflector Plates to Model S

#33

Post by jplur »

userbinator wrote: post #2

Very, very good idea. Personally I think the ground clearance is still a bit on the low side. It looks like it lost a bolt or something in the first impact image... oops.

I assumed that was part of the trailer hitch that was being run over.

Re: Tesla Adds Titanium Underbody Shield and Aluminum Deflector Plates to Model S

#34

Post by Theodores »

eiji wrote: post #11

I'm sorry but my first reaction is "What a waste". Titanium is ridiculously expensive for various reasons. The best these engineers could come up with is to put a sheet of metal under the car? You got to be kidding me. I see why they have to use Titanium for it, anything else doesn't work, but it shows how far away this car is from reality and from true mass production.

My feelings too. However, as much as I like steel, I find it incredible that most cars use very heavy materials, e.g. steel, instead of aluminium, plastic, carbon fibre and titanium. Such materials are common on bicycles and planes.

Moving a tonne or two of steel around is a real waste, particularly when it rusts. At least with this wondercar the bottom is flat and aerodynamically sound, unlike all of those legacy vehicles out there.

Re: Tesla Adds Titanium Underbody Shield and Aluminum Deflector Plates to Model S

#35

Post by 001sky »

Kudos for an engineering led solution. I have no idea what "ballistics grade aluminum" is (since nobody uses ALU for ballistics armour##), but Ti has more inherent toughness# and seems a better fit as a skid-plate.

# elongation and tensile strength.

## The ballistic standard for armour (RHA) is a 1/4 steel plate. Ballistic Alu is roughly 1/2 inch or double the thickness used here, in most applications.

Re: Tesla Adds Titanium Underbody Shield and Aluminum Deflector Plates to Model S

#36

Post by 001sky »

doe88 wrote: post #8

Why would Elon choose to post on Medium and not on the blog of Tesla? It would definitively bring more credence to post it on their official website. Until reading near the end I wasn't sure it was a Tesla employee/official or a third party story (and I use the term story here and not article on purpose because usually on Medium it is more stories than facts ).

Maybe Medium's new business plan is to compete with PR Newswire.

Seriously. Its a nice little niche.

Re: Tesla Adds Titanium Underbody Shield and Aluminum Deflector Plates to Model S

#37

Post by eps »

eiji wrote: post #11

I'm sorry but my first reaction is "What a waste". Titanium is ridiculously expensive for various reasons. The best these engineers could come up with is to put a sheet of metal under the car? You got to be kidding me. I see why they have to use Titanium for it, anything else doesn't work, but it shows how far away this car is from reality and from true mass production.

What was your second reaction? After you gave them a benfit of doubt and remembered how light titanium is.

Re: Tesla Adds Titanium Underbody Shield and Aluminum Deflector Plates to Model S

#38

Post by cma »

seunosewa wrote: post #12
zacharycohn wrote: post #5

"We believe these changes will also help prevent a fire resulting from an extremely high speed impact that tears the wheels off the car, like the other Model S impact fire, which occurred last year in Mexico. This happened after the vehicle impacted a roundabout at 110 mph, shearing off 15 feet of concrete curbwall and tearing off the left front wheel, then smashing through an eight foot tall buttressed concrete wall…

What's ridiculous about it?

That it sounds like it was written in Slashdot passive aggressive style: rather than just directly saying it was an extreme scenario, they used list of somewhat-hyperbolic-but-way-more-so-if-you-know-the-jargon descriptors of each element of the crash.

Re: Tesla Adds Titanium Underbody Shield and Aluminum Deflector Plates to Model S

#39

Post by [deleted] »

kzahel wrote: post #17

"With a track record of zero deaths or serious, permanent injuries since our vehicles went into production six years ago, there is no safer car on the road than a Tesla." I recall one Tesla caused death[1], and I'm sure there have been more. Not that I really think Tesla is any more dangerous than any other car in this regard though. [1] http://blog.sfgate.com/energy/2014/02/07/tesla-driver-blames...

[deleted]

Re: Tesla Adds Titanium Underbody Shield and Aluminum Deflector Plates to Model S

#40

Post by steve_benjamins »

corresation wrote: post #15
doe88 wrote: post #8

Why would Elon choose to post on Medium and not on the blog of Tesla? It would definitively bring more credence to post it on their official website. Until reading near the end I wasn't sure it was a Tesla employee/official or a third party story (and I use the term story here and not article on purpose because usually on Medium it is more stories than facts ).

Add that to Julie Zhuo (Designer @ Facebook) doing the same thing just a few hours ago and it makes for a very curious confluence, in both cases diminishing the immediate credibility of the articles.

Julie has been posting on Medium for a while though- this is I believe Elons first post on Medium.
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