Elon Musk News - Issue 93

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Note From The Curator

The top three stories in this issue of Elon Musk News are: Falcon Heavy prepares for debut flight as Musk urges caution on expectations Tesla Model 3: rare look at the interior with picture of the backseat Elon Musk Received Verbal Approval For A New York-DC Hyperloop Since last Friday's issue Musk has given two talks. On Saturday Musk spoke at the National Governors Association, and on Wednesday he spoke at the International Space Station Research and Development conference. In typical Elon fashion, he covers a wide range of topics at both. If you have a few hours this weekend, I highly recommend watching both talks! Watch Musk's talk at the NGA here Watch Musk's talk at the ISSR&D here Thank-you so much for being part of this newsletter, and enjoy issue 93! Sincerely, Zachary

Featured Quote

"I do think getting good at digging tunnels could be really helpful for Mars."

— Elon Musk From Inverse

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SpaceX

Falcon Heavy prepares for debut flight as Musk urges caution on expectations As Elon Musk stated at the keynote to the ISSR&D (International Space Station Research and Development) conference on Wednesday, "it ended up being way harder to do Falcon Heavy than we thought. At first it sounds really easy to just stick two first stages on as strap-on side boosters. But then everything changes." Mr. Musk admitted, "We were pretty naive about that." Once a rocket has three cores working in tandem, the aerodynamics, structural loads, the Max Q envelope (period of maximum mechanical stress on the vehicle during ascent), and the subsonic to transonic transition region (where the vehicle accelerates through the speed of sound) are all greatly changed by the fact that Falcon Heavy is powered by 27 Merlin 1D orbital class engines. With all of these elements in consideration, Mr. Musk is urging caution regarding public expectation for Falcon Heavy's first flight, saying that there is a "real good chance that the first vehicle [won't] make it to orbit.  So I want to make sure to set expectations accordingly. I hope it makes it far enough away from the pad that it's not going to cause damage. I would consider that a win, honestly."

Propulsive landings nixed from SpaceX's Dragon spaceship "The reason we decided not to pursue (powered landings) heavily is it would have taken a tremendous amount of effort to qualify that for safety, particularly for crew transport." Musk said Wednesday at the International Space Station Research and Development Conference in Washington. "And then there was a time when I thought that the Dragon approach to landing on Mars, where you've got a base heat shield and side-mounted thrusters, would be the right way to land on Mars, but now I'm pretty confident that is not the right way, and that there's a far better approach." Musk did not elaborate on the new concept for landing on Mars. Additionally, a vision for gigantic interplanetary transporters Musk presented last year has been downsized, he said. "It's a little smaller, still big, but I think this one's got a shot at being real on the economic front," Musk said, adding that he might present more details at this year's International Astronautical Congress in Adelaide, Australia.

SpaceX to conduct second (or third) Falcon Heavy launch on April 30, 2018 According to The Planetary Society, SpaceX is planning to launch Falcon Heavy for the second or third time as early as April 30th, 2018. This information was given directly to The Planetary Society by "Air Force officials", and the timeliness suggests that it is relatively recent. This bodes well for what has been an anticipated launch date of Falcon Heavy's inaugural launch, which has been described several times by SpaceX executives as likely to occur by the end of 2017. The Planetary Society has been working closely with the United States Air Force for at least several years to coordinate the launch of their payload, LightSail-2, aboard a Falcon Heavy. The experiment is part of the Air Force's second Space Test Program (STP-2) mission, and will launch with as many as 19 other satellites weighing well over 6,500 kilograms.

Here's Why SpaceX's Next Mission Isn't Until August SpaceX won't be launching any rockets at all until August 10, when a resupply mission launches for the ISS, because Kennedy and Cape Canaveral are closed for repairs until August 3. The maintenance period is doubly important for the company. A spokesperson for SpaceX told Inverse that the company is using the downtime to continue to upgrade the Kennedy Space Center's SLC-39A launchpad for the Falcon Heavy, as well as repairing Cape Canaveral's SLC-40 launchpad to run standard Falcon 9 missions.

Tesla

Tesla Model 3: rare look at the interior with picture of the backseat Waldek Kubicki caught a new Model 3 at Tesla's Design Studio in California and it is believed that it could also be a production unit since it was given a Vehicle Identification Number (VIN000316). He shared a few pictures with us, including a rare shot of the backseat. It shows a few interesting things like the center console featuring vents and 2 USB ports. The seatbelts also feature red buttons, which are obligatory in certain markets and should facilitate the homologation process. Good news for Canadians!

Tesla Model 3 "000316" VIN suggests more than 300 release candidates produced Photos that surfaced on Reddit of a white Tesla Model 3 indicate that it's the 316th Model 3 to come from the factory, according to the VIN number ending in "000316". With 316 Model 3 release candidate cars already produced, it would validate Elon Musk's recent reveal that production is going smoothly and "ahead of schedule." Musk's initial tweets about the exponential Model 3 production ramp were received by many as an indication that 100 vehicles would be available by August, 1,500 by September and 20,000 cars would be produced per month by December. However, with the surfacing of the 316th Model 3 RC produced, could Musk's projection of 100 produced vehicles in August mean Tesla is poised to exceed what was presumed to be 100 production cars per month?

Tesla Model 3: Elon Musk virtually kills the possibility of a solar roof option Earlier this year, CEO Elon Musk surprisingly said that Tesla would "probably" offer a solar roof as an option on the Model 3. Now, Musk is throwing some cold water on the idea – virtually killing it. A car's roof is just not very big and efficiently positioned relative to the sun often enough to make a good support for a solar array. It's generally more efficient to have solar panels at your house and charge your car there. At the National Governors Association Saturday, Musk said that he pushed his Tesla engineers to look into integrating solar cells on their vehicles, but they came to the same conclusion. It sounds like we can forget about a solar roof option for the Model 3, or any of Tesla's vehicles for that matter. Unless, maybe the Tesla Semi?

Tesla Model 3 delivery event: Fremont factory, 7pm (PT) on July 28, Musk to present at 9pm First invitations to attend Tesla's Model 3 delivery event have been sent by the Silicon Valley electric car giant. The highly anticipated "handover party" will take place on Friday, July 28 at its Fremont, California factory. Those invited to the exclusive event will witness the first thirty deliveries of Tesla's Model 3 to their owners. This will be similar in nature to the Model X delivery event that was also held at its Fremont facility, where six early Tesla backers were handed keys to their new Falcon Winged electric SUV. Doors open at the event beginning at 7pm Pacific Time. Tesla CEO Elon Musk will present opening remarks beginning at 9pm PT. Musk is expected to open with a presentation outlining Tesla's grand vision for the future, that inevitably will touch on the range of Tesla Energy products. That will likely be followed by a presentation on Model 3's unique features and then a live grand reveal of the first production cars presented on stage.

Tesla appoints 2 new board members: JPC CEO Linda Johnson Rice and 21st Century Fox CEO James Murdoch Monday, Tesla announced the appointments of two new board members. Linda Johnson Rice, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Johnson Publishing Company (JPC), is joining Tesla's board of directors. The other new director might come more as a surprise. James Murdoch, Chief Executive Officer of 21st Century Fox (21CF) and the son of famed media mogul Rupert Murdoch, is joining the board. They will be joining board members Antonio J. Gracias, Ira Ehrenpreis, Brad W. Buss, Robyn M. Denholm and Steve Jurvetson. Tesla CEO Elon Musk also sits on the board as Chairman and his brother, Kimbal Musk, is also a director. The two new members are considered "independent members" of the board and they have no direct links to Musk either through family or through investments in Musk's other venture, SpaceX.

Tesla pushes new Autopilot 2.0 update with truly 'silky smooth' control algorithm Last month, Tesla started the rollout of a new Autopilot 2.0 with a new control algorithm that CEO Elon Musk described as a "smooth as silk". While it had some noticeable improvements, like with the Traffic Aware Cruise Control (TACC), some owners were let down by the update. But Tesla is now releasing a new version of the update and this one is better deserving of the hype created by Musk's comment. We talked to a few owners of Tesla vehicles with second generation Autopilot who already received the update and they all noticed improvements with both Autosteer and TACC. Their vehicles are not "ping ponging" between the lanes anymore, both on highways and also on single lane roads. They all called the update "smoother", like Musk's comment, but the biggest improvement is the Automatic Lane Change, which is now almost flawless, according to some owners. Though, we are also hearing about overall improvements.

The Tesla Model 3's First Insurance Rates Are 'Excellent News' Geico and USAA now list the 2017 Tesla Model 3 in their systems, allowing prospective buyers and impatient preorder holders plug in their information and see what insuring a new set of wheels is going to cost them. According to a few of the first fans to check it out, it's not that bad. "Mine seem pretty reasonable. This is excellent news," said Robert Murdock. Murdock tweeted out a picture of his quote from Geico, which quoted him a six-month premium of $631.87. Todd Wilson, another self-described "EV enthusiast," said that the quote he gotfrom USAA was 20 percent cheaper than what he's currently paying for a BMW i3, and only about five percent more expensive than what he's paying for a 2016 Mini Cooper Clubman.

Elon Musk: more than half of new vehicles will be electric and almost all autonomous in the US within 10 years At the National Governors Association Saturday, Musk said that he expects "more than half of new vehicles" will be electric in the US within the next 10 years or roughly 10 to 15 years ahead of most predictions. He said: "I think things are going to grow exponentially. There's a big difference between 5 and 10 years. My guess is probably in 10 years more than half of new vehicle production is electric in the United States." While he expects over 50% of new vehicles to be electric in the US within 10 years, he thinks that "almost all" new vehicles will be autonomous within the same timeframe. Add another 10 years and he thinks that all vehicles will not even feature a steering wheel anymore.

Tesla Energy

Here's Elon Musk's Plan to Power the U.S. on Solar Energy "If you wanted to power the entire United States with solar panels, it would take a fairly small corner of Nevada or Texas or Utah; you only need about 100 miles by 100 miles of solar panels to power the entire United States," Musk said during his keynote conversation on Saturday at the event in Rhode Island. "The batteries you need to store the energy, so you have 24/7 power, is 1 mile by 1 mile. One square-mile." It's "a little square on the U.S. map, and then there's a little pixel inside there, and that's the size of the battery park that you need to support that. Real tiny."

Tesla executive in charge of solar roof is leaving the company ahead of the launch After his brother and former CEO of SolarCity, Lyndon Rive, left Tesla last month, now Peter Rive, the former CTO and co-founder at SolarCity, is also leaving the company. Tesla confirmed in a statement on Tuesday: "We can confirm that Pete Rive will be leaving the company to explore new opportunities. As co-founder and CTO of SolarCity, Pete has played an instrumental role in expanding access to solar to hundreds of thousands of people across the country, helping to accelerate the world's transition to sustainable energy. Pete's responsibilities, including work on Solar Roof, will be distributed among Tesla's existing engineering teams. We want to thank Pete for everything he's done for SolarCity and Tesla."

OpenAI

Elon Musk Warns Governors "A.I. is Fundamental Risk to Civilization" Speaking to more than thirty of the nation's governors on Saturday, Elon Musk quieted the room with this warning: "AI is a fundamental risk to the existence of human civilization. On the artificial intelligence front, I have exposure to the very, most cutting-edge A.I., and I think people should be really concerned about it. I keep sounding the alarm bell, but until people see, like, robots going down the street killing people, they don't know how to react because it seems so ethereal." Musk said "we should be really concerned about A.I. By the time we're reactive in A.I., regulation's too late," he said. "Normally, the way regulation's set up, a whole bunch of bad things happen, there's a public outcry, and then after many years, a regulatory agency is set up to regulate that industry. There's a bunch of opposition from companies who don't like being told what to do by regulators, and it takes forever. That in the past has been bad but not something which represented a fundamental risk to the existence of civilization. Thus we need to the regulators to come in and say, 'Hey guys, you all really need to pause and make sure this is safe,'" Musk said. "When it's cool and the regulators are convinced it's safe to proceed, then you can go, but otherwise, slow down."

The Boring Company

Elon Musk Received Verbal Approval For A New York-DC Hyperloop Elon Musk revealed Thursday that he has received "verbal government approval" to build a hyperloop from New York City to Washington, D.C. Musk said that the new route would start in parallel to The Boring Company's first project, a tunnel under Los Angeles aimed at alleviating urban congestion. After these two projects are complete, Musk suggested that the company could start construction on a hyperloop in Texas, as well as a tunnel from Los Angeles to San Francisco. "Still a lot of work needed to receive formal approval, but am optimistic that will occur rapidly," Musk said.

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