Drone flyover of Tesla’s massive new casting machine shows new parts outside

A new drone flyover of Tesla’s massive new casting machine, which is apparently the biggest in the world, shows new casted parts outside.

Last month, we reported on Tesla installing what is believed to be the world’s biggest casting machine outside Fremont factory.

The machine is so big that it couldn’t be assembled inside the factory, so Tesla seems to have assembled it outside and built a roof over it.

Two weeks ago, Tesla China announced that they started operating the machine.

Now a new drone flyover of Fremont factory got closer than ever to the new casting machine and showed stacks of parts apparently produced by the machine:

The parts appear to be rear subframes for the Model Y electric SUV.

Here are some stills from the video:

As we previously reported, Tesla has made some significant casting advancements with the introduction of the Model Y.

The electric SUV’s rear underbody is built with only two cast parts, compared to 70 parts for the Model 3.

The improvement has been praised by car manufacturing experts like Sandy Munro, who did one of the first breakdowns of the Model Y.

But Tesla CEO Elon Musk said that it wouldn’t stop there as it plans to make the entire rear underbody in one single part and other bigger cast parts after installing a new giant casting machine at their Fremont Factory.

It looks like these new parts might be the new single part subframe that Musk was talking about.

Furthermore, as we previously reported, along with the new casting machine, Tesla has upgraded its GA4 assembly line last month.

It built a parallel line and a new subframe line, which should be fed by parts from these new casting machines.

Update: As some of you pointed, the video also reveals that Tesla is already deploying the second Giga Press

Electrek’s Take

While it’s kinda weird for Tesla to install such a machine outside and now even have parts outside, though those parts might be test prototypes and might not end up inside cars, I’m still very excited about this.

I am especially excited about the combination of all those upgrades at Fremont factory.

It should result in a decent bump in production.

Unfortunately, I’m not able to pinpoint it this quarter, but it looks like demand for Model Y is still outpacing Tesla’s production capacity going into the end of the quarter.

If you have any information about Tesla’s production or delivery, please reach out via Fred@electrek.co, via Wickr: Fredev, or through my social media: Twitter and Instagram.

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