we need to talk about what's going on

with the Tesla 4680 battery cell this is

the first battery cell exclusively

designed and manufactured by Tesla and

in theory this was done with the

objective of creating a high performance

and high efficiency nickel-based battery

cell that would be exceptionally cost

efficient to manufacture at extremely

high volumes in a very short amount of

time and after two years of anticipation

and speculation that much hyped new

Battery Technology finally arrived in a

Tesla production vehicle to a great

amount of fanfare which was quickly

followed by an equal amount of confusion

look I'll be honest here a lot of things

we reported about the 4680 over the last

couple of years did not come true or at

least have not yet been proven to be

true within the time frame that we would

have expected so instead of just

shrugging that off or pretending like it

never happened let's go ahead and dive

into the Tesla 4680 battery expectations

versus realities and do our best to

figure out exactly what's going on here

because I think I finally arrived at a

reasonable answer

let's start off with the initial premise

of the 4680 information which we and so

many of our Tesla YouTube peers have

been repeating since battery day in Fall

2020. the 4680 is Tesla's Next

Generation battery cell technology a

design that would check all of the boxes

in terms of what we would imagine as the

perfect EV battery increased performance

decreased cost with easier and faster

manufacturing at scale at 46 millimeters

in diameter by 80 millimeters in length

this was the biggest cylindrical battery

cell ever presented about five times

larger than Tesla's standard 2170

battery cell while also containing five

times the amount of energy storage so

equal density even with the massive size

difference that's fairly impressive then

six times the amount of power output

which is very impressive given that

inside a traditional cylindrical cell

the longer the role of the electrode

material is the more resistance is built

up and the harder it is to get the

energy out of the cell well Tesla defied

this with a brand new tablets electrode

design instead of directing all of the

electrons through a single metal tab the

entire electrode sheet was perforated so

that hundreds of tiny shingle-like tabs

could be folded over onto each other and

allow the free flow of energy across a

massive surface area of the electrode

according to the infamous slide deck

that is now burned into our minds the

new 4680 design would also promise a

range increase of 16 percent when

implemented into a Tesla vehicle and in

addition to that Tesla had invented this

amazing new structural battery pack that

replaced the entire Central frame

section of the vehicle with an ultra

rigid combination of these giant new

cells sandwiched between two sheets of

metal and filled with a structural

adhesive this would again increase the

efficiency of the vehicle manufacturing

lower the cost and result in a more

rigid vehicle with better handling

higher crash safety and most impressive

combined with the new cell efficiency to

render out 30 percent more total range

as compared to a standard Tesla vehicle

in 2020. sounds absolutely fantastic as

a consumer of course I want a car with

all of those things more range more

power battery safety and with the

promise that it could all come at a

lower price why thank you Elon let's go

Tesla promised that by using this very

impressive manufacturing process that

they called high speed continuous motion

assembly that they would just be firing

these things out in the near future 10

gigawatt hours annual run rate by 2021

100 gigawatt hour capacity in 2022 three

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something called the Gartner hype cycle

this is one of those classic examples of

just how derivative and predictable

human psychology really is as soon as a

new technology is introduced it will

quickly gain a lot of visibility AKA

hype over a very short period of time as

everyone is eager to learn about the new

product and discuss with their friends

while those of us in the media are quick

to jump in with our own take and drive

the visibility higher and higher until

we reach an entirely unrealistic fever

pitch of Hysteria and that's where we

were at around the end of 2021 about one

year post battery day the peak of

inflated expectations at this point we

had created an image in our minds that

no legitimate product could ever live up

to so when the reality of the situation

finally strikes that mass hysteria gets

knocked down pretty fast so welcome my

friend to the trough of disillusionment

in the first half of 2022 Tesla finally

Unleashed on the world their model y

equipped with 4680 battery cells in a

structural pack with dual Giga castings

the exact configuration that we had

promised would be the greatest vehicle

of all time I think I literally said

that this would be the best car in the

world what we got was not quite what we

had expected I'm not saying like Game of

Thrones season 8 level of disappointment

but it was very apparently underwhelming

a new standard Range model y with dual

motor all-wheel drive 279 miles of range

on 19-inch wheels and 0-60 in 5 seconds

flat not a bad car by any means but

coming off the peak of inflated

expectations literally anything short of

the best car in the world was enough to

knock the wind out of every Tesla Fanboy

and send us tumbling deep down the

trough in which we now reside and let's

be honest it was a rough Fall From Grace

I even remember some otherwise very

intelligent Tesla media figures that

were working overtime to come up with a

rationalization as to why the specs were

not more impressive even going so far as

to confidently state that the car

actually had much more range available

from the battery pack than what was

being stated but it had just been nerfed

in software to make it appear less

desirable as to not trigger an Osborne

effect and then someday in the future

Tesla would send out a firmware update

that would unlock the vehicle's hidden

potential like a Dragon Ball Z character

that was not the case it took Sandy

Monroe literally tearing the vehicle

apart and pulling its guts out followed

by a series of Laboratory Testing to

conclude that the 4680s and structural

pack in their current form do not render

out a 30 increase in range in fact they

provide you with less range and Tesla's

still charges more or less the same

price as the older car with the longer

range so thanks Elon but now we have to

turn to the limiting factor for some

hard numbers here this dude bought one

of the 4680 cells that Sandy Monroe

eviscerated from the model Y and then

sent it off to a lab for testing here's

what was found the cell level energy

density of the 4680 is about 244 Watt

hours per kilogram which is not a bad

result but it is a lesser performance

than the 2170 battery cell that has been

in circulation for years now those have

around 263 Watt hours per kilogram the

old 18650 cells that are still used in

the model S and model X punch even

higher with 280 Watt hours per kilogram

now as we can see from that Trend the

larger a battery cell gets the lower the

energy density and that is normal but

our expectations got the better of us

and we assumed that the 4680 would defy

traditional limitations it does not or

not right now at least and also thanks

to Sandy and his team revealing the

complete inner workings of the 4680 pack

it's been calculated that the Pack level

energy density of the new model Y is

around 160 Watt hours per kilogram

that's a little more difficult to say

confidently but give or take that number

should be pretty close and that's

compared to 180 Watt hours per kilogram

in the long range model y pack with 2170

cells so even though the new 4680 model

y does have a slightly smaller total

pack size

71.6 kilowatts versus 82 kilowatts of

total battery volume not usable volume

that's total installed volume the 4680

is not getting as much pound per pound

efficiency and again just for fun the

latest version of the model S with the

the 18650 cells is 186 Watt hours per

kilogram at the Pack level this

reporting and the excellent charts are

thanks to cleaner watt he's still

trapped in liminal space but he's doing

great work so again when examined under

a microscope like that things don't look

very good for the new 4680 battery pack

in its current form and I keep saying

that because we'll get there in a minute

but first let's pull back a little bit

and compare these numbers to the macro

environment aka the bigger picture

General Motors is pushing hard to rival

Tesla within the next three years as a

leader in electric vehicle technology

and production and GM plans to

accomplish that with their modular

Altium EV platform this is the Battery

Technology rolled out in the new

Cadillac lyric and Hummer EV it'll be

coming soon to the Silverado EV pickup

truck and eventually the entire range of

GM vehicles will have a fully electric

Altium powered equivalent the modular

pack can be loaded up with as many

battery modules as the application

requires for example the Hummer has a

massive 200 kilowatt hour pack with two

layers of battery modules stacked on top

of each other and the Hummer requires

such a large battery because the Pack

level density of the Altium battery is a

relatively low 160 Watt hours per

kilogram you might remember that's more

or less the exact same as the Tesla 4680

structural pack but unlike the Tesla

4680 the Altium battery is not cutting

edge it's not even particularly new this

is just a standard off-the-shelf nickel

Cobalt manganese and aluminum chemistry

from LG the same company that made these

spontaneously combusting battery packs

for the Chevy bolt and the pack

architecture is the bog standard

skateboard style platform that Tesla

introduced back in 2012. it's a fine

battery but at the same time this is

just the same old same old and what

brings us to the precipice of the next

phase in our journey through Gartner's

hype cycle what is the upshot also

wanted to give a quick shout out to our

amazing Discord Community here is our

question of the week and this was our

favorite answer and here is the meme of

the week winner join our Discord

Community to participate next week

through the link in the description

below

so if we kind of stand back and look at

where we are in the bigger picture we

have Tesla on one side trying to roll

out this brand new thing that they

literally just invented like a year ago

and on the other side we have the rest

of the EV industry sticking with the

tried and true method as of right now

the results that both sides are

achieving are about equal so where does

this go in a few years time what's the

upshot well the tried and true EV

battery method has arguably hit a

plateau even with all of the new

electric cars coming to Market over the

past year we haven't really seen any

noticeable increase in range or

efficiency the only company that's

really been able to push the envelope

with current generation battery cells is

lucid getting the air sedan over 500

miles of range is a great accomplishment

but that is a very expensive car that's

only produced in a very limited quantity

it is not indicative of the broader mark

Market while the Tesla 4680 pack

architecture is still in an infant stage

of development it still has all of the

future potential to level up and improve

this is something that Elon Musk and his

chief of Powertrain engineering Drew

baglino literally said themselves during

a 2022 Tesla earnings call when talking

about the existing design of the model y

battery pack Elon said that he would

give it a c grade within an a

architecture so what he's saying is that

the potential is there within the design

to be grade A but as it stands Tesla is

only scoring a c they're not realizing

the potential then Drew baglino stepped

in to Echo that sentiment and he

revealed that the structural pack they

are working on for the Cyber truck is

better but still not taking full

advantage of the architecture Drew said

that the Cyber truck pack would score a

b grade so the grade A 4680 structural

pack is still out out there Tesla just

hasn't quite figured out how to build it

yet and according to the limiting factor

and his examination of the 4680 battery

chemistry there is still an apparent

room for improvement where Tesla can

squeeze more energy density from this

cell design so that brings us to the

next phase of our journey where we drag

ourselves up from the trough of

disillusionment and begin to scale the

slope of Enlightenment this is going to

be a tough climb but this is our path to

finding the middle ground halfway

between expectation and despair lies the

plateau of productivity which I think is

the point where we all get over

ourselves and carry on with life

obviously we're not there yet on

December 25th Tesla's official Twitter

account posted that they had just

accomplished a run of 868 04680 cells

produced in a seven day period and they

showed photos from two separate 4680

production lines the initial pilot plant

in California and the newly constructed

cell production line inside Giga Texas

so again going back to the number

breakdown by cleaner watt in the cleaner

condo we can see that this is enough

batteries to make 150 of the new model y

packs per day or 1048 per week which

right now would reflect about one-third

of the total vehicle output capacity at

Giga Texas that also would add up to

about 4 gigawatt hours per year of

combined production capacity at the

current rate which again Tesla told us

back in September 2020 that they would

be making 100 gigawatt hours worth of

cells in 2022 they did not they're not

even close and that's why we still find

ourselves deep in the trough did Tesla

over promise and under deliver

absolutely did we in the Tesla Community

let ourselves get carried away with

enthusiasm also yes but the reality of

the situation is that progress is

happening it's not happening as quickly

as we had expected but it does carry on

nonetheless and that's all that really

matters Innovation moves at its own pace

and there's not really much that you or

me or even Elon Musk can do about it

regardless of how hard he tried to make

things go faster so in all of that it's

our job here to just continue reporting

things as we see them hopefully getting

better and better at recognizing those

situations where we are looking at the

world through rose-colored glasses and

quickly remembering to put our regular

glasses back on I can't see without any

glasses it's it's terrible anyway let us

know where you see things going with the

4680 battery cell how long until

progress finally moves up the slope to

the plateau of productivity give it

another year at least maybe two theories

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