What’s inside a Tesla Model 3 battery?

AIRES is a company making radio-controlled planes and they have a special interest in Tesla batteries.  They design battery packs and related products using Tesla batteries.

They recently posted an informative video on YouTube that shows a teardown of a Tesla Model 3 battery cell.  The video is 2 minutes 40 seconds long and is a must-watch.




Last year, ARIES posted video tearing down a Model S/X 18650 battery and he goes more into depth on each part.

On the ARIES website, they share some more info on Tesla batteries and why they’re safer than other Li-Ion batteries:

 

Lithium Ion 18650 Tesla Cells cells are much safer than most standard cells sold by Panasonic, HP, Sanyo, and other common Li-Ion distributors. The key reason for their safety is that Tesla batteries are put to use in automobiles. For this reason, they undergo greater safety protocols than most other Lithium Ion cells, most of which are intended for laptops. When Tesla started constructing their Roadster model, their goal was to produce a battery with a very low defect ratio. The result is a battery that has a defect ratio of 1:10,000,000. Very few 18650 batteries can even come close to this standard. Additionally, the battery can withstand higher Amp outputs with minimal heating. When we compared NCR18650’s to a Tesla battery at 60% amp draw, the Tesla cell remained at room temperature while the NCR18650 reached 90*F. Even at 8 Amps draw, the Tesla battery remained well below 85*F.

 




This morning InsideEVs published their January estimates of how many electric vehicles each manufacturer has sold in the U.S.

Tesla doesn’t not publish monthly sales figures, but rather reports deliveries on a quarterly basis.  So, InsideEVs uses their own method to estimate deliveries:

We never know for sure what the monthly numbers total up to until Tesla’s quarterly (or annual) updates add more clarity. However, we do our best to keep our finger on the pulse of what’s happening.

To come to an estimated monthly number, we don’t simply take the quarterly estimate given by Tesla and divide it by 3 and hope it all works out. This is surely not how it works in the real world. We simply report from the data we accumulate ourselves, including first-hand accounts available from the factory and from the community itself.

Historically, while InsideEVs hasn’t been exact on monthly Tesla deliveries in the past, their estimates have been generally in the ballpark and provide useful information.

Most notable, InsideEVs estimates that Tesla has delivered 1,875 Model 3s in January.

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The current Tesla Referral Program expired last night and Tesla has updated the referral program with the following changes.

First, the referral program is now extended through April 30, 2018.  This means that since its an extension, previous referrals made in the last program count toward this program.  So, if you were one referral away from Arachnid wheels or a Powerwall 2, then this is a great opportunity for another chance.

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