-
Manufacturing plans
-
Manufacturing plans
updated 1 week, 2 days ago
40 Members
·
69
Replies
-
That 10 panels a day is for their pilot plant. They are building (or have built) a facility that will have a much higher production rate.
I would imagine that they will not bring the mass production on-line until it is needed, about the time that the vehicles go into mass production. Until that time I am sure that they will be doing all the production they can in the pilot plant, learning all of the pitfalls and tricks of production that they can to incorporate into the mass production.
-
At 40 a day it will take Aptera over 2 1/2 years just to fill the pre-orders. Am I missing something? It seems like it will take a 100 a day to keep up with the demand.
Fair winds and Smooth sailing,
Lawrence Leonard
-
Lawrence, once the first shift is up and running with 40 a day production, a second shift will be added to add another 40 a day, 80 a day is what APTERA’s goal is for the factory in Carlsbad.
-
> “Am I missing something?”
Several things –
firstly, is the conversion factor. Typically only a fraction of people with pre-orders go on to actually order the vehicle (lets say 20%-40% is not unusual).
Secondly, is that a lot of these orders are outside the USA. Carlsbad will only be producing vehicles for NA, so you can discount those.
Thirdly, as Paul says, there will be secondary local factories in other regions – for example, an EU factory would be set up once the design has been modified to be legal within the EU. These secondary factories would most likely be funded via an IPO at the time that NA vehicles start to be delivered.
Fourthly, as John says, they’ll do a second shift once the first has ramped up.
-
Not all the reservations will be converted to eventual sales. I think the conversation rates can trend lower with production delay and more lower cost EVs entering the market.
-
I won’t beat the same drum here, but you do have a point. Putting the orders vs. reservations aside, I don’t think they will constrain themselves at 10 panels per day with a 40 vehicle per shift assembly plant. I know nothing about their intentions, but this is what I speculate based on my experience. I think they are using their pilot mold for production if they are running them now. There is a lot to unzip if that is the case. They did announce they are done with solar design. So why run your pilot/scale up equipment for production? Could be because it is cheaper to preproduce vs. invest high speed capital right now to reduce their fundraising hurdle. It could be a very long lead time for solar production equipment (ie. Longer than their 9 month projection) so they need a buffer, etc. So if they are in low volume production on a pilot scale, they must be adding a slow cash burn which would be a good sign for those worried if the company will make it to the market.
-
From the Republic investor site about three weeks ago:
Question:
I’d ask how much or what percentage of the tooling/equipment costs will go to CPC for molds and to other suppliers as a one time cost before bringing some operations in house? In that same vein, is production still planned at an agreed upon existing facility in Taiwan, is that a cooperative with shared costs, and is there an expected time frame for that? Trying to get an idea of repeatability cost for a second final assembly plant there and/or in Europe since much of the supply chain is EU based.
Chris Anthony Answer:
We think about a quarter of our CapEx for high volume production will go to our efforts with CPC. The rest goes to motors, batteries, solar, interior, and glass along with some other mechanical parts. We will do final assembly at our Carlsbad facility which is capable of 20,000 units per year. To duplicate this level of assembly in a new plant we feel it will cost about $60M for each additional plant. We plan to have 8 assembly plants open by 2028 around the world.
-
LE Pre-Order numbers 5,001 and above SoL?
The LE has everything that was on my original pre-order except the wrap (Sol), interior (Coast), and 2WD. I don’t have a problem with AWD so now the only differences are the wrap and interior which are minor and easily changed.
-
CA’s answer was “about 5,000” “but if we get overwhelming support, we may expand that number.” leaving the door open for it to be an ever expanding number.
-
It’s also possible that they would build fewer than 5,000 LE’s if there’s not enough demand.
-
@Dennis Swaney At about 9:00 in this video, Chris Anthony sorta addresses the LE build quantity:
Aptera CEO Chris Anthony Talks Launch Edition with DC Fast Charging – YouTube
-
I saw that video earlier today and it was pretty informative. I do have one question though: should we send Dark Chocolate flavored Rum, or Rum flavored Dark Chocolate to CA? 😆
-
-
A new video describing the manufacturing:
-
I think this is one of the best and most significant videos from Aptera to date relating to production. Thanks for posting this to the forum!
This video demonstrates (For those that are familiar with R&D and product production) that Aptera is no mom and pop shop WRT production control for cost containment, speed of operations, and defect minimization.
A significant advantage is that Aptera is starting from scratch with these systems and implementing them as a meta system. Other manufacturers trying to adapt this tech are trying to collage out of what they have currently and what they want. This includes keeping bad or reduncent data in the systems.
They have simulated the operation as a first step instead of putting it in production and debugging it as they go along.
And finally they used it to control the manufacture of their PV, operational verification testing.
The presenter is impressive. Articulate, knowledgeable, and good presentation skills.
Many on the forum (Even on this thread) miss the signifcance of this post. This is my area of technical expertise. Process implementation and improvement for R&D and production of mechanical products. I have been doing it for more that 50+ years. This is the best I have seen! I have just come from a consulting engagement with a vehicle manufacturer who is trying to make a transition. The Aptera implementation runs rings around them.
So for the haters and doubters on her, find somewhere else to criticise something you know nothing about.
-
-
I think it’s no longer “if” but “when” Aptera finally starts production. They are making a lot of progress getting things lined up and sorted out. Starting from scratch and completely reimagining not only what transportation could/should be, but also the entire manufacturing process and design aspects is a big job, one that I think they are doing right, even if we don’t see the full picture of what’s going on behind the scenes right now.
As an aside, I once worked for a company that was so focused on the bottom line that they always built to a cost standard and struggled with quality issues, rather than build to a quality standard and look for cost savings. I remember when they launched a redesign of a product line; rather than building a few alpha/beta prototypes to sort out the manufacturing process, they launched it with almost no warning! We didn’t have fixtures or tooling, and most of the outsourced parts didn’t fit. That was a costly mess, and all because they didn’t want to spend the time and money on it.
-
Some of this was mentioned/shown on the investor webinar but Jason Hill made this post today:
“Steel makes it real.”
-
I’m guessing that this is one of the tool steel moulds for CPC? I’m not entirely sure which component it is for though. Could it be the rear-left fibreglass body casting?
-
This reply was modified 3 months, 3 weeks ago by Michael Marsden.
-
This reply was modified 3 months, 3 weeks ago by
-
-
This was posted on Discord – looks like they are starting to buy/get/install production stuff (most of that was empty floor last month)
-
Which discord?
-
Discord group name: Aptera Owners’ Club. It’s from the same person how runs the Aptera Owner’s Club, YouTube Channel.
-
-
As I understand things, much of the initial Apteras will actually be built in Italy. Body pieces assembled. Motors installed. And whatever else it takes to make sense shipping to San Diego for finishing. Consequently, it would be interesting to get a spy into CPC to see how THAT assembly space is shaping up.
-
-
If the extra $50 million in capatiol needed for orderig productioon equipment dosen’t come soon. Aptera may want to concider planing for a transistion, from limited Delta to LE without all of that equipment. That will at least give them some income until all af the necessary equipment until can be ready to go.
-
Either they can raise the capitol needed for production or they can’t. Building a handful of low quality vehicles at a loss will just hasten their demise. The Aptera is a very low priced vehicle, there isn’t any room to make a profit unless the production process is very optimized, hand building is expensive. The quality is also likely to be low which will give them a bad reputation.
They aren’t trying to raise a lot of money by car industry standards, it’s only about 1-5% as much as what their peers raised. They’ve kept their burn rate low so they can keep the light on for a while but eventually they have to raise that money or go out of business.
Josh
-
Sandy encouraged the team to “bet the farm” on a high volume production, higher capital hurdle approach. It might be the right strategy if the company has sufficient investors. I have experience starting up flexible manufacturing lines and I am biased toward reducing capital risk by starting up without full investment in the short term, prove out your product, then justify your additional investments based on cost savings (which becomes very low risk). Having open options are valuable. You let those options expire when you bet the farm. The company needs to keep the story moving along and if they are entering a prolonged period of time burning cash while struggling to find investors, then they are playing a dangerous game. Not only would they be delaying the product, but they delay the story too.
-
Further confirmation that the use of Vista facility may be winding down and solar production being moved to Carlsbad:
“Aptera solar manufacturing has a mixture of human labor and precision robotics to ensure the highest quality solar panels are being produced.”
-
Unfortunately, the “mixture of human labor and precision robotics” didn’t “ensure the highest quality solar panels” were “being produced” for Gamma and “filling shelves”. Hopefully, of course, things will be better for Delta and beyond!
-
-
Posted on the socials today:
“Special delivery! Can anyone guess what these are used for?”
-
Red Viking Automated guided vehicle number 5
-
Unless the contract with Red Viking states that Aptera must purchase them now, why would Aptera be spending capital on things that they will not need for a year? Or will Red Viking allow payment to be made after high production starts?
-
Or maybe they will be needing core production line equipment to be set up in considerably less than a year. Once everything is in place it will still take a while to get it all working as intended.
-
There is probably a lot of software (such as their MES system) which needs to be written to interface with the robots, and anything which interacts with the real world needs a lot of testing.
-
-
Of course, even if we were experts on production planning with specific experience in production planning for EV startups, (Very few if any on the forum are) we would not be able to comment or question with any authoritatively on Aptera’s plans. Adding to that, not having ANY knowledge of the factors Aptera needs to balance to achieve progress towards production in the most efficient and effective manner and having no knowledge of the details of their plans as outsider, armchair quarterbacks, there can be no credible speculation on this topic. This is only one person’s opinion without any supporting evidence. Certainly, all forum members have the right to make such posts.
-
This reply was modified 1 week, 6 days ago by John Malcom.
-
This reply was modified 1 week, 6 days ago by
-
Could it be that this was one of the expenditures outlined in the California matching grant? Perhaps they needed to spend the money on this in order to get the matched funds as part of that grant.
-
Totally makes sense. Why not spend when you get what is probably 100% rebate. Excellent observation.
-
Certainly was one of the ones on the list. $1.44M.
Page 5. Incidentally, note the obvious problem with the Bosch entry 🤣
-
-
We know they want to use these for production and it will take some time to program and verify exactly how this plan will work. These are likely reimbursable from the California grant, so while they may be paid for first by Aptera , they should get a lot of that money back to use again. I am happy to see them now even if they just use them to go get coffee.
-
David, if you believe Sandy Munro’s statement in an interview at Electrify Expo, they’ll be needed NLT late August, or in 3 months.
-
I suspect that would be Delta rather than customer vehicles, and it seems reasonable given the progress on the CPC dies. For Delta they don’t necessarily need the production line up and running, just enough production intent parts to assemble some vehicles by hand.
Having said that, I do think ordering the robots now is useful – it will take quite a bit of time to integrate them, and they’ll want to be rehearsing the production process.
-
Possibly, but they’ll need to have the production line ready to be tested and that will require the Red Viking units be in place.
-
-
-
-
Jason Hill had photos of what looked like the carriers for the assembly line.
