Tesla recently announced plans to use mega casts and structural battery packs for the Model Y manufactured in Giga Berlin before the end of 2022, as per InsideEVs.
Notably, using front and rear mega castings and structural battery packs on Germany-made Model Y will save production costs by reducing the number of parts and assembly processes.
Tesla stated in its Q3 2022 Shareholder Deck last week:
“At Gigafactory Texas, we have begun production of Model Ys since early this year that use front and rear body castings in conjunction with a structural battery pack. Castings of this size have never been mass-produced before in any industry by anyone except Tesla in our Fremont and Shanghai factories. […] We plan to introduce front castings and structural battery packs at Gigafactory Berlin-Brandenburg before the end of this year.”
Mega Casts production
Tesla produces the enormous castings for the Model Y’s front and rear underbodies using 6,000-ton Giga Press machines. These machines are designed by Italy’s manufacturer of die-casting machinery, IDRA.
Tesla asserts one of the difficulties it experiences while removing over 170 distinct components is that “all the aluminum needs to be injected into a die in about one-tenth of a blink of an eye, through a single point of entry, without solidifying or distorting.”
According to Tesmanian, such vehicle parts offer an enhanced modular design with a high level of integration. It expands the anti-collision beam’s coverage area, increasing collision safety by over 20%. Furthermore, this manufacturing technique is more eco-friendly and energy efficient.
Structural Battery Packs production
Tesla stated during the latest earnings call that 4680-cell manufacturing tripled in Q3 2022 and remains progressive. That said, the automaker is currently concentrating on increasing 4680 production capacity in North America.
The launch of the structural battery pack to Giga Berlin signals that Tesla is also set to start deploying 4680 battery cells for Model Y vehicles there. Tesla is also reportedly prepared to begin incorporating 4680 cells in Model Ys manufactured by Giga Texas.
Giga Berlin vehicle production
Meanwhile, Tesmanian reported that vehicle production at Giga Berlin is steadily increasing. In fact, Tesla said in its third-quarter earnings report that it had surpassed a weekly production capacity of over 2,000 Model Ys.
Giga Berlin has three months to hit its weekly target capacity of 5,000 units by the end of 2022.
