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Toyota Will Adopt Tesla-Style Cast Bodies That Might Be Impossible to Fix

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Re: Toyota Will Adopt Tesla-Style Cast Bodies That Might Be Impossible to Fix

#121

Post by panick21_ »

crote wrote: post #46
GravityLab wrote: post #39

> Toyota anticipates it'll generate 20 percent higher productivity than its competitors, and could halve body assembly time from 10 hours. This is a nice efficiency gain, but they don’t seem to be constrained by how quickly they can produce cars…as far as I can tell, demand in the market for their product is more based on the cost of the supply, not how quickly they are producing units. Or are they thinking that by p…

Manufacturing cars currently still involves humans. Halving body assembly time also means you only need to pay half the wages for the humans. That's going to significantly reduce their expenses.

This isn't really true. The body assembly is overwhelming automated in any large volume car. Its basically a long assembly line with welding robots and robots holding the pieces. There are few humans involved.

Of course both the large casting machine and the fleet of welding robots need engineers and maintenance.

Its really just cheaper, and the resulting piece is higher strength while being lighter.

Its btw the official product name:

https://www.idragroup.com/en/gigapress

Re: Toyota Will Adopt Tesla-Style Cast Bodies That Might Be Impossible to Fix

#122

Post by panick21_ »

metadat wrote: post #23

It's interesting how the casting process produces a lighter, weaker, and impossible to repair or chassis. Why can't the blocks be modular and replaceable?

A casting isn't weaker. You can make much more complex shapes with castings. You have much more variety in the thickness on the right points and interduce structural cross members.

See: https://electrek.co/wp-content/uploads/sites/3/2020/04/Tesla...

There is a reason Tesla cars do so well on safety while been pretty light comparatively.

> Why can't the blocks be modular and replaceable?

Everything is possible. But if you have many independent pieces that are all independently bonded that introduces a whole lot of complexity. Each connection is an additional place for failure. There is a reason every single car welds these pieces together. Its just not smart to try to use fasteners to connect these pieces. Its much harder to design, much harder (and more expensive) to produce, much error prone its likely also heavier.

Re: Toyota Will Adopt Tesla-Style Cast Bodies That Might Be Impossible to Fix

#123

Post by panick21_ »

taylodl wrote: post #78

Minor accidents resulting in cars being totaled does what to insurance premiums? Makes them sky-high. There was an article earlier this week how some Tesla owners were facing extreme insurance premium increases and others had their insurance dropped altogether. All the savings you hear about with regards to EV’s are going to be more than offset by insurance premiums - which means these gigacast vehicles aren’t going…

> Minor accidents resulting in cars being totaled

That's not actually what's happening.

> which means these gigacast vehicles aren’t going to sell well.

The Model Y is one of the one of the most sold car in the world and uses more casting then any other vehicle in the world. But why bother with data when one can just make up stuff.

Re: Toyota Will Adopt Tesla-Style Cast Bodies That Might Be Impossible to Fix

#124

Post by panick21_ »

jgalt212 wrote: post #118
convolvatron wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I assumed that the gigapress was a large stamping die. neither casting (melt the metal and pour it into a mold) or forging (shaping softened hot metal), but deforming cold metal in one or more steps using alot of pressure and a very hard mold.

Yes, but that's the way it is with Musk. Nothing is actually what it claims to be.

They literally call them castings and have done so since the first time Tesla talked about them. And its still a 'press' its just a casting press not a stamping press. Is complaining about literally everything Musk related now just the default even when it doesn't make even the slightest amount of sense?

Re: Toyota Will Adopt Tesla-Style Cast Bodies That Might Be Impossible to Fix

#125

Post by RickJWagner »

I've become really skeptical of all the auto magazines that find ways to criticize Tesla in every article.

The most easily imaginable conspiracy theory is that Tesla has pioneered techniques that let it manufacture electric vehicles with good range at a reasonable cost, catching other auto manufacturers flat-footed. By continually improving and lowering prices, Tesla makes it nearly impossible for others to keep up. So the traditional auto makers deploy FUD to try to buy time.

But that's just a theory.

Re: Toyota Will Adopt Tesla-Style Cast Bodies That Might Be Impossible to Fix

#126

Post by alphabettsy »

loloquwowndueo wrote: post #2

“cast bodies might be more difficult to fix in the event of major damage, such as a crash.” Raise your hand if you’ve ever had a car NOT be written off after “major damage”. The industry already doesn’t bother to fix cars, they just get scrapped, so I don’t see what the actual difference is.

Was in a front-end crash with minor frame damage in addition to airbags deploying.

Vehicle was repaired, frame was able to be straightened on a rack.

Re: Toyota Will Adopt Tesla-Style Cast Bodies That Might Be Impossible to Fix

#127

Post by alphabettsy »

tomatotomato37 wrote: post #82
Tanoc wrote: post #63

Environmentally friendly my ass. Any minor damage and the car will be toast because the insurance company will total it. Even if it gets back on the road it'll have a salvage title, something that's poison to a car and ensures that it ends up either crushed or parted out. These are already problems with unibody cars thanks to how quickly insurance adjusters will take any deformation of the core unibody, even just cos…

Don't forget part of the reason a lot of older cars can survive an accident is because they don't have crumble zones. That's great for the structural integrity of the car, not so much for the humans that interact with it. It's better for society to just write the car off and keep people alive than try to keep some smelters a little less busy by killing people off

That’s true of even older cars, but the cars listed above all have crumple zones as did almost all cars from the 70s on.

And older cars definitely fold in crashes just not in predetermined ways that minimize intrusion and injury like modern cars. Generally older cars have far less rigid chassis than modern vehicles.

Re: Toyota Will Adopt Tesla-Style Cast Bodies That Might Be Impossible to Fix

#128

Post by jgalt212 »

panick21_ wrote: post #124
jgalt212 wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, but that's the way it is with Musk. Nothing is actually what it claims to be.

They literally call them castings and have done so since the first time Tesla talked about them. And its still a 'press' its just a casting press not a stamping press. Is complaining about literally everything Musk related now just the default even when it doesn't make even the slightest amount of sense?

So it's your contention that Idra Group came up with the term / misnomer Giga Press and not Tesla / Musk?

Re: Toyota Will Adopt Tesla-Style Cast Bodies That Might Be Impossible to Fix

#129

Post by taylodl »

panick21_ wrote: post #123
taylodl wrote: post #78

Minor accidents resulting in cars being totaled does what to insurance premiums? Makes them sky-high. There was an article earlier this week how some Tesla owners were facing extreme insurance premium increases and others had their insurance dropped altogether. All the savings you hear about with regards to EV’s are going to be more than offset by insurance premiums - which means these gigacast vehicles aren’t going…

> Minor accidents resulting in cars being totaled That's not actually what's happening. > which means these gigacast vehicles aren’t going to sell well. The Model Y is one of the one of the most sold car in the world and uses more casting then any other vehicle in the world. But why bother with data when one can just make up stuff.

Maybe you didn't see this news?

https://www.theguardian.com/money/2023/sep/30/the-quotes-wer...).

Re: Toyota Will Adopt Tesla-Style Cast Bodies That Might Be Impossible to Fix

#130

Post by panick21_ »

jgalt212 wrote: post #128
panick21_ wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They literally call them castings and have done so since the first time Tesla talked about them. And its still a 'press' its just a casting press not a stamping press. Is complaining about literally everything Musk related now just the default even when it doesn't make even the slightest amount of sense?

So it's your contention that Idra Group came up with the term / misnomer Giga Press and not Tesla / Musk?

No its most like Tesla/Musk that came up with the term. But it is in fact a press and its a bad name, hence Idra also calling it that.
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