From Joe Tegtmeyer.
Gigafactory Texas! This is where Model Y’s, Cyber Truck the Next Generation Car(s), Cybercab & the Optimus Robot production happens in 2025!
Windy morning to fly, but otherwise conditions were good enough to see much of the site and check up on the activity and changes since my last flight about a week ago before I headed off to Florida for the Tesla Space Jam event held at Kennedy Space Center!
While I was flying, Bonne Eggleston, the head of Tesla’s 4680 battery cell production met with me and we discussed some of the progress with batteries, the challenges they are working through and his pride in the team making all of this happen! If you haven’t watched his recent interview with Munro Live, you need to do so as he talks a lot about the 4680s, the current production rates and expectations, and a lot more!
Timestamps:
Drone flight overview with discussion & illustration: 0:06 to 2:48
Drone flight footage & infographics: 3:10 to 29:51
In the video intro, I recapped my trip and experience during the Tesla Space Jam event, including some awesome people I met and my discussion about on-orbit refilling and the importance of this capability to our movement beyond Low Earth Orbit to live, work and explore beyond the near confines of our home planet.
I also covered some of the sights at the Kennedy Space Center Museum and my trip out to LC-39 A & B to get close views of the preparations for both the Starship arrival and start of operations at Kennedy Space Center and the NASA SLS rocket launch facilities for the Artemis program.
A few other highlights:
There was many Long-Range Rear Wheel Drive Cybertrucks in the north outbound lot today, showing production of this new variant is picking up momentum. More of the other variants of the Cybertruck were present in the outbound lot as well as many new Model Y’s. The autonomous driving operations from the factory to the W End-of-Line facility is continuing as is now the normal operational process.
Glass has been installed in the transition area between the original window line and the new extension window line on the west side of the main factory near the temporary loading platform which itself had a large pipe with various connections being moved into the third floor.
On the north end, I noticed a lot of castings and casting racking systems, much more than I have seen in quite a long time. Model Y’s, Cybertrucks and Cybercab castings were visible in these racks and a few on the ground I’d say that there were several hundred Cybercab castings today, which is a great sign progress with the production line is going well and advancing into the final testing and set up stages and ahead of the first trail production of full Cybercabs in just a few months. This is consistent to what we have heard from Tesla and several executives recently.
The Megapack #2 installation is going well, with crews installing more of the connecting cables between the Megapacks and the transformers. Additional earthwork around this site and on the east side of the electrical switchyard was notable, along with the complete removal of the old hills and ponds. This graded area will now allow construction to being on the expansion of the electrical switchyard to double it’s over all capacity.
The Central Campus Support Facility (aka Cortex 2.0) facility has had several more sections assembled with steel columns and beams in the past week, working from the south to the north. We also see roof decking has begun installation, indicating this will be essentially a 1-story structure, at least so far on the south end.
On the north end, crews were finishing work on the perimeter grade beam, with almost all of this now poured in concrete. The perimeter grade beam forms the base of the exterior walls of the structure.
Thank you for watching and I hope this has been informative, educational, and entertaining for you. If you would like, please consider supporting me via Patreon (link is in the description of this video and in the video itself) so I can continue to make and share these incredible videos.
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Be sure to check out additional Texas Gigafactory footage on these channels:
@Jeff Roberts
@Brad Sloan
Video, photos, illustrations, and commentary on this video is by me, Joe Tegtmeyer unless otherwise annotated.
Music in this video is obtained from the YouTube free and unrestricted and royalty-free use library. Ending song is Mr. Sunny Face – Wayne Jones
Drones used are DJI Mini 2, Mavic Air 2 & Air 3.
Drone flight over Giga Texas is with permission of Tesla and CEO Elon Musk
