News

Tesla creates new team to accelerate use of new materials in its products

Issued at 2021-04-28



esla is creating a new team to accelerate the use of new materials in its products and processes. This new move aims to capitalize on Tesla’s longtime focus on new materials science. For the last five years, Elon Musk has pushed Tesla and SpaceX to invest more in materials science.  

Electrek exclusively reported on the hiring of Apple’s alloy expert, Charles Kuehmann, to lead materials engineering at both of his companies simultaneously. Later, it was also reported that Kuehmann created a new cross-company material engineering team at Tesla and SpaceX to develop new advanced materials. 

The team has been focused on creating new alloys for its products, like new aluminum alloy for casting larger parts in Tesla vehicles or new stainless-steel alloys for SpaceX’s starship and Tesla Cybertruck’s exoskeleton. 

Now, we learned that Tesla is creating a new Materials Applications Team to help integrate those new materials faster. One of the main examples of Tesla adopting new materials is with Cybertruck’s exoskeleton, which will use the same or similar alloy as SpaceX’s Starship, which itself is still evolving. 

“We’re rapidly changing alloy constituents and forming methods, so traditional names like 304L will become more of an approximation,” said Elon Musk. 

The CEO confirmed that the new alloy will also be used in the new electric pickup truck coming to market later this year or early next year. 


Source: ASM Internationa



Related News