[gwbas1c]

I never expected Tesla to deliver the Model 3 on time. I just "delayed" my order to AWD because my Leaf lease is up before I'll get the 2WD Tesla. (Also, because my wife wants a minivan and Chrysler now offers a plugin minivan.)

Remember, no car in history ever had 500,000 pre-orders. No car even came close. If anyone expected Tesla to ramp up to that kind of production overnight, they are delusional.

Besides, when I ordered my model 3, I assumed that it would be very late... So late, that I assumed I'd just wait for the AWD one to replace our AWD car.

[maxerickson]

The pre-orders are such a silly point.

Ford builds more pickups than that a year, with basically 0 pre-orders. They simply don't bother with pre-orders, they don't need the money, they don't need the promotion, etc.

Is the lack of pre-orders for the F-150 a sign of weakness? NO!, even though the thing is super popular they are able to produce enough to meet ongoing demand.

[jacquesm]

> Remember, no car in history ever had 500,000 pre-orders.

That's true, Citroen had a pretty good run with their record of 80,000 pre-orders (it stood for 60 years). But that was before the internet, all of the orders were made in person, they were non-refundable orders and there never was any doubt that Citroen would deliver the cars.

[CydeWeys]

Weren't all (many?) of these Tesla preorders made in person too? I remember lots of news footage of long lines of people standing out in front of Tesla dealerships?

[jacquesm]

https://www.tesla.com/nl_NL/model3/reserve

[lgbr]

> Remember, no car in history ever had 500,000 pre-orders. No car even came close. If anyone expected Tesla to ramp up to that kind of production overnight, they are delusional.

Although you could be pedantic about what consitutes a pre-order, this isn't strictly true. Demand for the Mustang is truly unprecedented, even by the Model 3. Have a look at the Mustang production from that timeframe: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/d/d7/19...

[dsfyu404ed]

You don't need to pre-order if you expect the thing you want to buy to be readily available in enough volume to meet demand. There's millions of fleet trucks out there on a fixed age/mileage replacement schedule. Nobody is rushing to pre-order F150s because they know they'll be available when they want them.

[frgtpsswrdlame]

>Remember, no car in history ever had 500,000 pre-orders. No car even came close. If anyone expected Tesla to ramp up to that kind of production overnight, they are delusional.

At the same time this is an admission that Musk is/was selling a delusion to people when Tesla set it's production goals.

[toomuchtodo]

Optimism isn’t delusional. They’re already making ~192k vehicles a year at their current 3/S/X production rate (which will only increase).

You would have to be malicious or ignorant to think that can’t be scaled up to NUMMIs previous 350k/year run rate in the next 3-12 months.

Disclosure: TSLA shareholder

[danso]

2017 was its best year, and it produced ~101,000 vehicles: https://www.theverge.com/2018/1/3/16846860/tesla-2017-delive...

[Robotbeat]

I believe he was referring to the NUMMI factory pre-Tesla, which produced about 6000 cars and trucks per week at its peak.

It does seem like Tesla will soon (3-12 months) eclipse that record.

[toomuchtodo]

Correct! And that NUMMI run rate Toyota achieved was (supposedly) only 60% of the facility's total manufacturing capacity. It appears to be entirely realistic for Tesla to meet their 500k/year vehicle production rate at NUMMI.

[Robotbeat]

Indeed. They originally planned to make 500,000 Teslas (including the Model 3) per year by 2020, and they'll almost certainly meet that.

Aim for the Moon, and if you miss, you may still reach Mars.