Elon Musk has said that “it is time to bring” Tesla Semi electric trucks to volume production in a memo to all Tesla employees.
In a new email to employees last night, Musk that he wants to go “all out”:
“It’s time to go all out and bring the Tesla Semi to volume production. It’s been in limited production so far, which has allowed us to improve many aspects of the design.”
A new version of Google’s mapping service being rolled out will display pandemic-related transit alerts and let people know when buses or trains might be crowded.
Updated versions of the free app for smartphones powered by Apple or Google-backed Android software will also let drivers know about COVID-19 checkpoints or restrictions on their routes.
“We’re introducing features to help you easily find important information if you need to venture out, whether it’s by car or public transportation,” Google Maps product management director Ramesh Nagarajan said in a blog post.
The Italian sports-car company teamed up with MIT researchers to produce custom supercapacitors, an alternative to lithium batteries.
Over the years I have been covering electric vehicles, I’ve seen several companies attempt to add value to EVs by using swappable battery packs.
The idea is that if charging takes longer than refueling a tank of gas, we could just swap a battery pack for a fully charged one.
A startup called Better Place built its entire business model around it and went bankrupt.
As we head into summer, it’s hard not to think about traveling. Not only it is the traditional season for vacations, but we’ve also been cooped up inside for months and most of us are probably itching to explore something new. Of course, given that we’re in the middle of a global pandemic where travel—especially by plane—isn’t a great idea, planning a trip may be more fantasy than reality these days. Either way, you may be curious about which countries have opened up to tourists. If so, an interactive map put out by the International Airline Transportation Association is a great tool.
This tall and narrow battery-powered vehicle made in China by Changli isn’t really a car, but it will get you places and it’s extremely cheap.
FCA’s commercial vehicle arm Fiat Professional presents the production version of its all-electric Ducato van, the Fiat E-Ducato, a year after the first prototype was shown in mid-2019. It will be the first electric Ducato in the 39-year history of the model.
It’s expected to enter the European market within the next few months, starting from selected countries, and will be available in all body variants, offering a payload of up to 1,950 kg and load volume from 10 to 17 m3.
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Featured image: Tesla
Tesla has managed to attract the best artificial intelligence specialists to its Autopilot team who are committed to developing software that makes full self-driving possible. The company recently published two patents that relate to improvements in this area.
Tesla Filed Patent ‘Enhanced object detection for autonomous vehicles based on field view’ https://www.tesmanian.com/blogs/tesmanian-blog/patent-enhanc…um=twitter pic.twitter.com/IU6tdaOlH7 — Tesmanian.com (@Tesmanian_com) June 5, 2020
While it probably won’t make it to your dining table, a new scientific achievement might be able to help in everything from radar equipment to electric cars: scientists have been able to form salt, aka sodium chloride (NaCl), in a hexagonal shape.
This is work done at the smallest of scales, with researchers able to get a thin film of hexagonal salt to form on top of a layer of diamond, due to the chemical interaction of both film and diamond substrate – something the team actually predicted would happen in advance through simulations.
It’s the latest in a series of discoveries where scientists have been able to synthesise 2D materials with unusual crystal structures, and it’s partly this self-imposed restriction to two dimensions that is enabling new and exotic structures to be formed.
