Lucid CEO and former Tesla chief engineer Peter Rawlinson claims that Tesla’s cost port location, and why everybody has to again into Supercharger stations, is because of Elon Musk’s storage structure again when Mannequin S was designed.
When you have ever charged a Tesla car at a Supercharger station, you almost certainly needed to again into the stall. That’s primarily as a result of Tesla’s cost port is positioned on the again left facet of the car.
There’s no standardization of cost port location on electrical automobiles, and it’s inflicting a little bit of an issue proper now as Tesla opened its Superchargers, with most of them outfitted with small cables, to different electrical automobiles with completely different port places.
Tesla was early in making electrical automobiles, so its alternative of cost port location was essential and influential.
Peter Rawlinson was the chief designer of Tesla’s Mannequin S, its first EV designed from the ground-up. Tesla CEO Elon Musk has denied that since Rawlinson is now a competitor main Lucid Motors, however there’s loads of proof that he was in actual fact in command of the Mannequin S engineering regardless of Musk’s vengeful claims on the contrary.
Now, Rawlinson has given some fascinating insights into the decision-making behind Tesla’s cost port location. He says that he was pushing again then (circa 2010) for the now standard entrance driver-side fender cost port location (through PC Magazine):
I instructed him, look, it [should be] the entrance fender on the left-hand facet. Most People drive nostril in reasonably than parallel park. And should you drive nostril in, you need the cost port on the entrance. You don’t need a lengthy, soiled previous cable coming previous the doorways. And also you don’t wish to put the cost port on the very entrance, just like the Nissan Leaf, as a result of it’s a susceptible spot. You’ll be able to have a slight bump or fender bender, which might imply you couldn’t open it if it was broken.”
The Lucid CEO says that Musk insisted that this wouldn’t work for him as a result of it wasn’t appropriate with the best way the storage in his rented mansion on the time was arrange:
Effectively, that wasn’t acceptable to [Elon]. He stated it wouldn’t go well with the structure of his storage in Bel Air. So I stated, ‘Effectively, the place would you like it, then? What fits the structure of your storage in Bel Air?’ He stated it’s going to be on the rear as a result of he might journey over the cable. He was renting the property, and he didn’t even personal the place, however we put the cost port on the Mannequin S on the left hand rear due to the structure of his rented storage in Bel Air!
Musk was in monetary difficulties on the time and was renting a mansion in Los Angeles. He even claimed he needed to borrow cash from pals to cowl lease.
With the Air, Lucid’s first EV, Rawlinson put the cost port the place he wished it initially for the Mannequin S, however now that Tesla has opened the Supercharger community to all different EVs, he needed to acknowledge that the worth the community brings to prospects is larger than the limitation of the cost port.
He stated that now the upcoming new Lucid Gravity could have the identical cost port location as Tesla’s:
Due to that, each Tesla charger throughout the land it’s a must to reverse into as a result of the cost port’s within the rear, which is simply nutty. [But] should you can’t beat them you’ve bought to hitch them. So now we’ve put our cost portion on the left rear of Gravity to be appropriate.
Rawlinson additionally added that he’s proud of Tesla’s assist to get Lucid automobiles engaged on the Supercharger community,
In any case, it’s undoubtedly the perfect fast-charging community in North America. There’s no query about that.
