Over the last few weeks we have seen several shipments of Tesla’s 9,000 ton Giga Press arriving at Giga Texas. The casting machine will be used to produce the Cybertruck’s body, which is slated to start production in mid-2023.
So far we have only seen large IDRA boxes arriving and the parts sitting inside the factory, waiting to be put together. But that has now changed as Tesla has started assembling the 9,000 ton Giga Press, according to the latest drone flyover of the factory on Friday morning.
Captured early this morning by none other than Joe Tegtmeyer, we can see the base for the Giga Press has been installed, along with one of the two massive compression plates (look at the people standing nearby for scale) already sitting on top, with the other laying on the ground in the background waiting to be installed.
https://twitter.com/JoeTegtmeyer/status/1613927887631179776
We can also see that Tesla has set up two foundations in this area of the building to support a second 9,000 ton Giga Press, although we can’t tell from these images if Tesla has received parts for two machines and will be installing them simultaneously. We reported earlier this week that Giga Press maker IDRA Group announced another Giga Press was ready to be shipped, but this one is heading to Asia.
Given that we have never seen such a large casting machine like this being put together we can’t say how long it will take for it to be completed, but this is yet another good sign that Tesla is progressing on their timeline and should meet their target to begin production in mid-2023.
Tesla has also already started hiring for the Cybertruck production line publishing numerous job postings over the last few months. All of the pieces are coming together, but two big pieces that we are still without are finalized pricing and the finalized design for the Cybertruck.
Hopefully this information will be coming during the Q4 and 2022 earnings call later this month, or possibly during Investor Day in March.
