Tesla explains how their single casting improves safety
Tesla
Tesla gave us a look inside the engineering crash safety lab with its latest video on YouTube (below). Vice President of Vehicle Engineering Lars Moravy shares some fascinating insights on what makes Tesla vehicles so safe. He explained that Tesla considers passive safety from the beginning of a design.
Passive safety refers to the features and structures that protect occupants in the event of an accident, as opposed to active safety systems that help prevent accidents from occurring in the first place. Tesla's two main priorities in passive safety design are protecting the occupant and protecting the battery.
Progressive Crash Structure
Moravy elaborated on Tesla's crash structure strategy, saying, "What we're trying to do is absorb as much energy from whatever object you hit before it gets to the cabin." This is achieved through a progressive crash structure consisting of a bumper beam, crush can, and a front underbody casting recently debuted in Austin.
Multiple Load Paths: Vertical and Lateral Energy Absorption
A key feature of Tesla's safety design is the multiple load paths, which accommodate various vehicle sizes and types. Moravy explained, "There's a higher load path for compatibility with other vehicles on the road...sometimes we need a lower load path if you hit a different sized object." These load paths work vertically and laterally to ensure energy is absorbed and the car is pushed away from the object it collides with.
Reinforcing Cabin Safety with Door Rings, Glass, and Battery Structure
The door rings, glass and battery structure reinforce the cabin's safety. One unique aspect of Tesla vehicles is the low placement of the battery, which creates a lower center of gravity. This, combined with the suspension system, significantly reduces the risk of rollovers.
Crash Test Success: Model Y's Five-Star Rating
Moravy proudly showcased a Model Y that had been crash-tested at NHTSA for a five-star rating, emphasizing the effectiveness of Tesla's safety systems. He pointed out that "all that energy was absorbed up front here, stopping really at the cabin," allowing occupants to exit the vehicle after the crash safely. In addition, the cabin remained largely untouched, maintaining its original space to ensure occupant survival.
Tesla's commitment to safety begins at the design stage, focusing on passive safety and innovative engineering. Multiple load paths controlled crushing, and a low center of gravity all contribute to the exceptional safety ratings Tesla vehicles consistently achieve. As Moravy so aptly put it, Tesla's top priority is to "protect the occupant," and their engineering efforts are a testament to that mission.
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With Q1 2025 now behind us, another round of Tesla’s Supercharger Voting has wrapped up. The previous vote took place back in December, and we now get to see which locations came out on top.
Let’s take a look at the Q1 2025 winners of the Supercharger Vote:
North America
🇺🇸 Lake Wales, FL
🇺🇸 Henderson, NV
🇺🇸 Clarksville, TN
🇺🇸 Roswell, NM
🇺🇸 Long Beach, CA
🇺🇸 Decatur, IL
🇺🇸 McAlester, OK
Europe
🇬🇧 Bournemouth, United Kingdom
🇮🇹 Bari, Italy
🇵🇱 Wrocław, Poland
🇨🇿 Hradec Králové, Czech Republic
Asia-Pacific
🇰🇷 Namyangju - South Korea
🇦🇺 Nicholls, Australia
Supercharger Voting Q2 2025
Another quarter means another round of Tesla's Supercharger Voting, giving Tesla owners the chance to influence where new Supercharger sites will be built. Following the Q1 2025 voting round, Tesla is now opening the polls for Q2 2025.
How to Vote
To participate in the Q2 2025 Supercharger Voting, visit the Tesla Supercharger Voting page and sign in to your Tesla account. You can vote for up to five different locations, with a limit of one vote per location, every three months. The most popular Superchargers are displayed on the leaderboard, and you can also suggest new locations for future voting cycles.
We’ve known for a while now that Tesla has been using a custom build of FSD to allow its newly produced vehicles at Giga Texas and Fremont to autonomously navigate themselves from the production line to the outbound delivery lot.
While we knew they were using a custom build of what was likely FSD Unsupervised, thanks to a recent post from Tesla AI on X, this has now been confirmed. Tesla has also confirmed it has accrued over 50,000 driverless miles, totalled from vehicles autonomously driving themselves to delivery lots.
Giga Texas production now uses FSD Unsupervised to deliver cars from end of line to the outbound logistics lot.
Over 50,000 driverless miles have been accrued between California and Texas factories so far pic.twitter.com/79zKY0U6Ox
For most of Tesla’s vehicles - that’s a 1.4-mile trip that is shared with pedestrians, cars, trucks, and construction equipment. You can see in the video that the Teslas are navigating public roadways and encountering real human drivers.
That’s great news, especially since many were wondering whether Tesla would secure the necessary approvals in time to launch their Robotaxi network in June.
Increased Confidence
Following Tesla’s post to X, Musk followed up by saying that when Tesla launches FSD Unsupervised soon, it will be the first time there will be a generalized, pure AI solution to autonomy. Tesla and several executives continue to post more content about autonomy and the Robotaxi network, leading us to believe they’re feeling confident in the June launch.
Model Ys autonomously navigate a 1.4 mile trip on a road shared with pedestrians, cars, semi trucks, construction equipment & more pic.twitter.com/iPx2fs78v2
Back when Tesla initially announced the autonomous travel of its vehicles from production to loading lots, they mentioned that the Cybertruck was the only vehicle at Giga Texas not receiving that same treatment.
Now, that’s changed - Cybertruck is now also navigating through the Cybertunnel to make its way from the factory directly to the loading docks, all on Unsupervised FSD. And that’s making us even more excited, especially because Tesla was supposed to launch an FSD Update for the Cybertruck a little while ago - but it hasn’t made it to production yet. This update is set to bring Start FSD from Park, as well as Actually Smart Summon - bringing the Cybertruck to feature parity with Tesla’s other AI4 vehicles.
Cybertrucks autonomously navigate a 0.6 mile route traversing beneath one of America's fastest highways, emerging through a steep 17% grade to reach their destination pic.twitter.com/3ZMYCRPhIj
Now that Tesla is confidently using a build of Unsupervised FSD to navigate the tight confines of the tunnel and park, we’re pretty sure that Tesla will likely launch the expected FSD update in the near future.
FSD Update Soon?
It’s been a while since any FSD hardware variant has received an FSD update. It appears that Tesla has been focused on Unsupervised FSD and launching FSD outside of North America.
It seems like we may get a new FSD update soon, and we don’t believe it’ll be just for the Cybertruck. Those who have the opportunity to sign up for Tesla’s new Early Access program will likely be some of the first recipients to receive the FSD update, so stay tuned.
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