Sometimes it seems like Cory must think he's visiting his dad in the retirement home. Sandy, 72, lives in a world I can only slightly relate to being 65 myself, but also a mechanical engineer. His staff on the other hand are clearly experienced engineers. As soon as any of them open their mouths I gain an impression of their level of expertise and it's been all positive so far.
I'm all for the front and rear castings but am less comfortable with their traditional glued-together battery pack. Their design using cylindrical cells interlaced with rectangular cooling tubes result in long slabs that are very rigid in bending but also somewhat fragile. They need to be contained in a pack housing that has a higher structural stiffness and strength to avoid stress being transferred to the cell slabs under normal bending loads.
This concept has worked for them so far but now that the pack has become a "structural member" that requires a review of the concept. Under collision loading it's possible that the cell moldings would crack but as long as they don't short out, that result alone should not present a catastrophic problem.
Sandy comments near the end about Boston Dynamics' dancing robots suggesting that they "follow a prescribed path." What he misses is that the robots autonomously and in real time determine exactly how to follow that general path in fine detail without falling over and that's what's so impressive. I'm often amazed how out of touch Sandy is with the details of current technologies. The iD4 screen flummoxed him because he didn't understand the concept of vertical scrolling and as a result he's had a death wish for that car ever since.
Cory also comments on the length of HVAC plumbing in the Kona being a poor choice for efficiency. Noting that I own an early example, I don't think he understands that the heat content of a refrigerant is primarily contained in the latent heat of evaporation rather than the temperature of the fluid. Thermal losses or gains along a length of pipe are not as big a deal as he assumes, it's all about pressure.
These are exciting times for Tesla but for now I'm happy "driving" the shares rather than owning a car. These are amazing times for them.
