Gigafactory Texas on 16 December 2022! This is where Model Y’s are built and soon Cyber Truck production will start!
Another early morning flight and today, we are greeted by some truly gorgeous skies and a vivid sunrise! What we see on the site is another very busy day with some interesting discoveries and progress all over, from far southwest to the far northeast and everywhere in-between!
Timestamps:
Tesla & Giga Texas 3,000 cars/week run rate achieved! 0:06 to 1:06
Introduction & highlights with discussion & illustration: 1:07 to 2:49
Drone flight footage & infographics: 2:55 to 28:58
In the video introduction, I start with my personal congratulations to all of the employees, contractors and sub-contractors who have worked hard to allow Tesla and Giga Texas hit another major production milestone … in this case a 3,000 car per week production rate! I also show you via a grid map where the celebratory image was taken inside the factory.
I also discuss the arrival of more IDRA parts and components for the larger 9,000-ton Giga Press in the northwest bay of the casting machine structure. We see two of the large, red-painted components and crates with sliding shafts for these components now on-site! More preparation work on or near the foundations for these large machines was evident as well.
I also discuss the changes underway at the new building foundation just west of the battery cathode plant, to include excavations for the south end footings for the building, making the overall outline of the structure much more apparent. We also see trenching around the dense reinforced piers and many more footings under construction.
Finally, I highlight the work on the far southwest area that is now known as the wests support facility and logistics yard. Quite a bit of earthwork is underway, with many trucks lined up for dirt loads via an excavator digging out remnants of some of the hills and then transported to fill in some of the valley remnants. The overall work is to level the grade over a vast area.
Here are the highlights from today’s video:
On the east side small parking lot, we see continued progress with the 32 supercharger station installation. More Model Y’s are being temporarily staged here, undergoing checkouts and testing before they are moved to the new car transportation staging & pickup lot a bit farther to the NE from this location.
At the electrical switchyard construction site, we see more work installing the primary cable trays, with most now having had concrete poured in them, with new projections out to the main switchyard area to make the final connections. On the top of the “A-frame” structures, we see recently installed lightning arrestors and poles to prevent damage from electrical storms.
We get a closer look at about a dozen newly added receiving doors on the west side of the main factory, having recently had the concrete filler panels removed and new load leveler systems and doors installed. This continues a trend to expand the receiving doors around the main building.
Across the highway on the southwest side, we see more trailer parking set up including fencing, parking markers and more prepared surfaces. This is an expansion of the east Warehouse-on-Wheels (WOW) Yard and trailers are already in place, so they are not wasting time for this expansion.
On the southwest end of the main building, we see a crane in operation moving solar panels, mounts, and other equipment up to the roof. This is likely related to the continued filling of the gap between the “L” and “A” of TESLA with the final set of solar panels.
Finally, on the south end of the main building, we see a lot of work trenching and installing huge steel corrugated water management pipes, including trenching into and under the south end of the building. This is in the area where the steel loading platform was recently removed to allow for this construction.
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. Primary song is “Pont de Abril” by Steve Adams, and ending song is “Mr. Sunny Face” by Wayne Jones
Drones used are DJI Mavic Mini, Mini 2 and Mavic Air 2.
Drone flight over Giga Texas is with permission of Tesla and CEO Elon Musk