Dear Slate - you need to show these things before I'll buy

[E90400K]

The “production hell” will be very real. It’s an incredibly stressful period, but also an exciting one.

I was involved in the Model 3 production ramp as a manufacturing engineer, and while it was intense, the camaraderie inside the factory and the very public pressure to make it succeed were powerful motivators. When everyone knows the stakes and there’s no room for error, teams can do some pretty remarkable things.

Right now, Slate’s manufacturing process teams and equipment teams are almost certainly deep into sourcing custom machines and tooling with long lead times. The facilities work alone is a massive effort. Anyone who’s done a home renovation can appreciate the chaos of scheduling trades, inspections, and materials, now multiply that complexity by ten. You’re pouring concrete footings, bringing in precision assembly equipment, coordinating electricians and pipefitters, all while the vehicle design and supply chain are still evolving.

That kind of concurrent engineering, designing the product and the production system at the same time, is challenging but honestly one of the most rewarding parts of manufacturing. The next several months will tell the story for Slate. If they execute cleanly and get the fundamentals right early, a lot of downstream risk gets reduced. I’m rooting for them and genuinely curious to see how they navigate this phase.

Great post.

I too was part of a team that recently (beginning in 2007) implemented a national transportation surveillance network as a new "disruptive technology" to an existing legacy system. What we as a team accomplished was extraordinary. I too found it exhilarating as well as production hell (really "integration hell"). My early background was in aerospace manufacturing as an equipment planning engineer, so I am well familiar with the entire process of designing manufacturing space and filling it with production equipment. Slate's team has their work cut out for them. We called it spiral development in our system integration environment, which can be fraught with huge risks to successful completion. Just ask Ford about its MIC top for the Bronco.

 

[bmello]

Great post.

I too was part of a team that recently (beginning in 2007) implemented a national transportation surveillance network as a new "disruptive technology" to an existing legacy system. What we as a team accomplished was extraordinary. I too found it exhilarating as well as production hell (really "integration hell"). My early background was in aerospace manufacturing as an equipment planning engineer, so I am well familiar with the entire process of designing manufacturing space and filling it with production equipment. Slate's team has their work cut out for them. We called it spiral development in our system integration environment, which can be fraught with huge risks to successful completion. Just ask Ford about its MIC top for the Bronco.

Gone are the days of “throwing it over the fence to manufacturing.”

The only way to hit timelines like this is to develop the factory and the vehicle concurrently. Product engineers have to be deeply involved in production, and production engineers need a real seat at the table during product design. That’s not a new idea, automakers have been doing variations of this for decades, but the risk profile gets very real very fast.

There are always inflection points where you have to place an order for a custom machine with a serious price tag, long lead time, and no absolute certainty that either the machine or the product will work exactly as intended when it finally arrives. You mitigate risk with prototyping, simulations, and pilot builds, but at some point you still have to pull the trigger just to get the machine builders started and keep the schedule intact.

That’s the uncomfortable reality of aggressive programs like this. It’s also what makes it interesting. When it works, it’s because the organization is aligned end to end and willing to accept calculated risk rather than waiting for perfect information that never comes.

 

[ScooterAsheville]

I was involved in the Model 3 production ramp as a manufacturing engineer

I'd be super interested in your take on production ramping for the Slate. As a layman, my understanding is that the line finally comes together, and a few super low volume validation units come off the first month. Then a slow but steady ramp, depending on the glitches encountered, parts availability, etc.

Would be willing to walk us through a typical production ramp and timeline?

 

[KevinRS]

If Slate is smart, they will structure pricing such that if they only sell the "Plane Grey Slate" they can eek by. All else will be gravy.

I think that has been in the plan from the beginning.

From what I read in an article from September, they had quotes from the CEO that they would be installing the equipment by the end of the year, and start producing test vehicles early next year. So I would hope all those machines have been ordered, have arrived, and either been installed or are waiting to be installed by now. It's been a while since we've seen photos from the factory, it was a few months ago that they were demoing concrete that needed replacement, the new should be in and cured by now.

 

[E90400K]

I think that has been in the plan from the beginning.

From what I read in an article from September, they had quotes from the CEO that they would be installing the equipment by the end of the year, and start producing test vehicles early next year. So I would hope all those machines have been ordered, have arrived, and either been installed or are waiting to be installed by now. It's been a while since we've seen photos from the factory, it was a few months ago that they were demoing concrete that needed replacement, the new should be in and cured by now.

The way I see this process is Slate designed the manufacturing line and ordered production equipment well in advance of finding and buying/leasing the building space (in Warsaw). Site prep lead time was/is the big unknown they had, because as they reported, a lot of the concrete floor within the building space had to be upgraded. Removing old concrete slab is no easy task and is quite the unpredictable process. I've had to do concrete removal to install new machinery in a 70-year-old building (back in 1990) and just this year repairing my bridge. You can only get medium-sized jackhammers inside a building to not risk structural damage to the building structure and foundation. And with a printing operation previously being in the building, I'm sure there was/is some risk of soil restoration/cleanup from chemical contamination leaks through the old concrete slab.

The CEO reported just recently they are on track for vehicle rate production by the end of 2026, so kudos to the staff who have been developing and executing the site prep activities.

 

[E90400K]

And getting the production parts of all the MIC plastic body panels from the supplier(s) has some significant lead times as well.

 

[cadblu]

Removing old concrete slab is no easy task and is quite the unpredictable process. I've had to do concrete removal to install new machinery in a 70-year-old building (back in 1990) and just this year repairing my bridge. You can only get medium-sized jackhammers inside a building to not risk structural damage to the building structure and foundation.

Well said, I was in a similar situation with concrete removal for new machinery in about 3K sf factory space. We first used GPR (ground penetrating radar) to scan the slab to identify existing wiring, plumbing, drains, and column stay out zones, etc. before demolition. Often is the case with older factories, architectural drawings may not be available or illegible. Even if they are, they are not "as built" as there are always modifications that don't make it to the final drawing. I think people underestimate the complexities of demolition. Breaking up buildings in not fun, and the silica dust /FOD goes everywhere, even with the best HEPA / containment systems.

Why is demo so expensive? Because NOBODY wants to do it!

 

[ScooterAsheville]

I plead guilty to having watch many of Joe Tegtmeyer's videos on the construction of Giga Texas. I was constantly blown away that they'd lay rebar reinforced concrete. Then saw it up, dig it out, lay something beneath, then pave it again. Then they'd do it again in the same location a few months later. I could see those billions being spent in real time.

 

[cadblu]

I plead guilty to having watch many of Joe Tegtmeyer's videos on the construction of Giga Texas. I was constantly blown away that they'd lay rebar reinforced concrete. Then saw it up, dig it out, lay something beneath, then pave it again. Then they'd do it again in the same location a few months later. I could see those billions being spent in real time.

Yes. And according to Elon, if you close your eyes and listen to the whirring sound of the robotic machines inside the Giga factory, it's easy to imagine you're inside a FURNACE that's burning CASH.

 

[E90400K]

Well said, I was in a similar situation with concrete removal for new machinery in about 3K sf factory space. We first used GPR (ground penetrating radar) to scan the slab to identify existing wiring, plumbing, drains, and column stay out zones, etc. before demolition. Often is the case with older factories, architectural drawings may not be available or illegible. Even if they are, they are not "as built" as there are always modifications that don't make it to the final drawing. I think people underestimate the complexities of demolition. Breaking up buildings in not fun, and the silica dust /FOD goes everywhere, even with the best HEPA / containment systems.

Why is demo so expensive? Because NOBODY wants to do it!

In my case it was a plant outside of Baltimore, Maryland. It was the drop hammer building. A drop hammer is just what it sounds like, I giant hammer that hammers metal into shape. The building housed several steam-operated hammers, the one I was working on was a 20T hammer to add an in-ground 16' x 10' vapor degreaser tank next to the hammer next to it. The hammer sat on its own separate concrete foundation, 16 feet thick and isolated by a 12" rubber gap from the rest of the building's floor. The rest of the building's floor was 4-foot-thick concrete. Obviously, all to withstand the shock from the 20-ton hammer when it was dropped from 4 feet (if you were standing on the hammer's foundation and the hammer was dropped, it would shatter your leg bones into pieces).

As you know, concrete constantly hardens over its life and this concrete was poured in 1915 or so. It was 1990 so the concrete was 75 years cured. Granit. Took several months to cut the 4-foot concrete floor and then break up the concrete to remove it so we could then dig the hole to install the huge vapor degreaser. Hell of a job that was.

 

[ScooterAsheville]

Sounds like a good job for a tactical nuke. We used to have those next door when I was in Germany last century. Oh wait, they're maybe a little bit overkill...

 

[Luxrage]

What is the mitigation plan?

GM's concept with the Fiero and the several other spaceframe/plastic-panel derivatives, was a base platform that was easily and inexpensively remodeled for next-generation lifecycle iterations of the vehicle.

I'm hoping that Slate's plan here is just that, to keep the base "Slate" frame as long as they can and work subsequent redesigns that use as much of the same parts as possible. Benefits the new buyers as the price of the accessories should stay stable, and older owners can benefit from continued supplies of parts that fit, even if they're "Slate 2" designs that still fit onto the original Slates.

As someone that owns a car that was a 1 year color, and a car that was a 4 year only exterior body-revision, two of those years don't share the same dashboard, and an SUV that was a TWO year only exterior revision, I know the struggle of lacking specific parts availability 10, 20, 30 years down the line from OEMs mixing it up too much.

Jeep, in a move that was more of a cost savings than anything, never revised the front end of their Grand Wagoneers throughout the entire lifespan of the truck. If you remove a 1991 grille, the 1963 headlight and grill cutouts are still there behind it and can be back-converted, or forward converted if you smashed your front end and could only find a newer grill / headlights IIRC.

 

[AZFox]

Eric Keipper has referred to a "Slate portfolio of vehicles" that will presumably all be built on the OG Truck's slateboard chassis, or perhaps a variant thereof with a different length or something like that.

 

[KevinRS]

People have mentioned that it looked like the holes were in the right places in a view of the front end for drive shafts for a second motor. So they may have already designed the chassis with at least the next version in mind, maybe beyond that with no changes to the chassis.