Tesla currently has two EV only factories, Fremont, CA and Shanghai, with Austin, Tx and Berlin, Germany Giga-factories coming online this month! Rising interest rates are going to kill Debt-riddled Legacy manufacturers, who still need to borrow even more money to catch up with Tesla and the Chinese invasion! RIP VAG😎
So EV's have less parts, less complexity to build, and VW has stepped up the automation dramatically, cutting down on cost of production, compared to ICE cars. But still, they are a lot more expensive. Was we not told several years ago, that the price of EV's would drop a lot and that soon we would have price parity between petrol and EV's. Price parity seems a LONG way away, still an EV is a lot more expensive, and this is even though most countries has not registration tax on EV's.
That was so interesting. Thank you VW for allowing Jack and the team access so we could have a glimpse behind the door. Thank you Jack for another excellent presentation!
They have A) a massive space for PV on the roof there and B) enough battery storage in their EV battery module store room to power a city. That's a missed opportunity to me.
Well Germany produce 46% electricity, not counting Scandinavia I believe it’s not one of the highest % in Europe and Germany actually is capable to produce even more but have nowhere to store the electricity. More battery storage facilities are needed!
Couldn't agree more. Why are they taking long distance hydro power needed for dull, windless days instead of solar literally from their own roof? Might also have a shadow effect in summer.
Let's be honest VW needed to do this, the diesel gate scandal saw them with their pants well and truly down. But credit where credit is due it looks like they have grasped the nettle with both hands and respect to them for doing it, they are still the people's car it seems.
Yeah... I remember when I toured the Nokia headquarters in 1998... they were the king of the hill, they had the mobile phone market completely in their grasp - and ten years later they are sold to Microsoft. Just complete devastation of a former great company. Same as with Blackberry. Adapt or vanish (even though Nokia is now successful in selling network equipment)
I agree that VAG totally needed to do this, and I believe their investment will pay off. Other manufacturers are watching on but they're all so far behind the Chinese. Only Tesla can compete at the moment but they're aiming for the wrong end of the market. The ID range are good but do they compete with their Chinese counterparts? Will be interesting to see what younger drivers choose as their first car in the next few years.
This question is will the public forgive them or punish them for their sins of the past. I for one have no desire to buy any of their vehicles and hope between Tesla and the Chinese Ev manufacturers we see VW go bankrupt.
@Mck Idyl sure because the problem was that regulators made cheating way too easy. The industry was allowed to check itself. This is also why SCOTUS in the United States dismantling the regulatory control will lead to more VW‘s in the future. OSHA not being allowed to enforce a testing mandate will kill more people than VW‘s diesels will. And nobody seems to care.
You mentioned 3 things ICU vehicles producing companies must do. Thank you for emphasizing on the human factor as #2. Enabling employees with new skills and the mindset it takes to adapt to the necessary change is one of the keys to transformation success. Especially in countries with strong employee advocacy - but not limited to them.
I'm not a huge VW fan but I've been surprisingly impressed by their efforts towards change. We went from faking emissions to spending billions on electrification and clean energy. I really, really hope they succeed!
They do too! They've invested 800 billion Euros into EV development and production. They are looking to have a range of around 40 fully electric vehicles on offer by 2040......
You could technically say that Tesla did that since the Fremont, California Tesla factory was previously the NUMMI plant that built Toyota's and Chevy products and previous to that as GM Fremont Assembly from 1962 to 1985 building many Chevy/Pontiac/Oldsmobile/GMC and Buick vehicles (including the bulk of the 1960s Muscle cars).
A most interesting and informative episode. I was a little surprised that they have retained ALL the workforce and can only imagine that this will reduce over time as people retire/leave.
Genuinely Impressed with this video guys! Really interesting insight in to what VW are doing. My Skoda will be delivered in the next few months and this was a great insight, thank you!
What a great tour. As a Brit who has lived in Germany for 40 years, I hope that the UK can see what it means to first modernise the DDR, and then modernise the Automobile industry. I helped pay for all of that with the extra "Solidaritätsbeitrag" (Solidarity Contributution), which Germans have paid for over 30 years. Has the UK got a "Solidaritätsbeitrag" for their industries, or for rebuilding the north of England after the collapse of industry? Now you know why I live in Germany, and have a German family. .... "Solidarity"!
“The first factory to be converted from ICE to full electric” I thought this was Tesla Fremont. GM ran it from 1962 as an ICE factory and Tesla paid to convert it in 2010 # Mary led the way 😀😂😅🤣
At 5:32 you can see a „Framo“ fully electric Truck. They are made only 25 km away from Zwickau in Löbichau and are shipped around the Globe. My Girlfriend works there. You are very welcome to visit the Framo GmbH if you like.
Technically GM's Lake Orion Michigan facility transitioned from ICE to EV back in 2016. GM's DHAM plant which started production in 2021 has also transitioned from ICE to EV. GM's CAMI assembly in Ingersoll Ontario is undergoing a transition right now and will start production this year.
An impressively clean, modern-looking implementation of traditional assembly methods. I suggest listening to any interview one can with Joe Justice, an agile development consultant that has worked with Tesla, among others, as a contrast. I'm not smart enough to predict which approach will be superior long-term but Tesla's approach certainly sounds much more radical and fresh. I've caught two interviews of Joe and am anxious to hear more. Note to Fully Charged, you should try to score an interview with Joe Justice.
Having growing up close to the plant it always gives me the chuckles when you pronounce the Z in Zwickau like S instead of Ts. The pronunciation is not soft. Tststs. In any case, I have been inside the plant as a kid 20 years ago and it is nice to see it after the change. Thank you for that!
That’s very English pronunciation, but not terrible. English speaking people usually have trouble pronouncing word’s with “ V “ not knowing that it’s actually spelled like “ F “. Makes me laugh still 😛
You mean transitioning under the same management? The NUMMI plant converted from ICE to electric in transition from Toyota/Chevy to Tesla. And Rivian’s Normal plant was previously for Mitsubishi ICE production. Right?
Those are not re-trained and transfromed plants like this. The Freemont plant was already closed. This is first step for OEMs to transition to EVs fully.
@@DanRyzESPUK yes, that is what I was getting at. It seems like the nature of that change at VW (and ahead of other legacy ICE automakers) could have been more clearly distinguished in that part of the presentation. We get there through the rest of the video.
This is a really great video and why I love Fully Charged. A nice study of the changes they have made, an interesting method of handling the culture change. I would love (with a management hat on) to understand how that has gone but that's not for Fully Charged... Jack, brilliant piece of presenting.
7:15 It's called "flexible specialisation" - we've had the tech to do this since the 1980s. Interesting how German and Swiss senior management frequently have PhDs - I'm guessing the majority of equivalent staff of blue chip companies in UK don't have a higher degree of any kind, or if they do it will be an MBA rather than a specialist technical qualification.
i know many people with PhD in economics, social matters, intl. trade, they all bought this title for prestige not bcs. they are scientists or professors at University
Have been driving our new id.3 for just over a month now around the Bournemouth and Poole area and we are so pleased with the car. The factory looks amazing. I would like to do a factory tour myself. I would also like to do some Beer tasting while i'm in the area. Cheers.
Excellent presentation of this impressive quaint little factory. Another great example of converting an ice factory into a modernized EV production facility. It may may not be close to being one of the best EV factories among All those factories out there, but it's a great start for VW to make a positive change towards surviving further into the future, they definitely needed to start somewhere.
Not a word of criticism in this report, as if this factory and the products are just flawless and perfect. VW's own CEO Diess just this week highlighted competitive and technological flaws in his company in a Verge article. I expect well rounded unbiased reports from this channel, not skin deep corporate fluff pieces like this.
Fully Charged never has and never will criticize VW. Well except when they do and have criticized VW, like hundreds of times through a multitude of videos. Me, I don't want to watch through an hour of explanation and details about VW's past (and perhaps currrent) crimes, just to get to the material that is relevant, the material that presents new data, new facts, new information. To quote the great Lister. "Spin on... Spin on."
I want unbiased reporting no matter who they report about, Tesla included. But you can bet your Amazon shares that a Tesla factory tour would start with a 5 minute recap of environmental lawsuits and anti-Tesla rallies. And I'm not asking for a VW history lesson since their glory days in Nazi Germany but I can't believe that this Zwickau factory rebuild went smoothly and without opposition from workers or nearby residents. What happened to the ICE cars they made previously. ID.3 and 4 sales are falling. What about "chip shortage"? Every ex-line-worker is still there just supervising robots now? No environmental issues, no protests, no financial troubles, just a clean transition without issues? It's suspicious and I don't buy it, period.
the point is the company that owned it changed it from ice to ev, not what tesla did which was never produce ice cars and just made it into one of the most dangerous car manufacturing plants on the planet with build quality that would make British Leyland blush.
@@jsgsmile I watched the statement again and he specifically says factory, not company. The Fremont factory was converted from ICE cars to EVs so he's wrong. He doesn't even mention Fremont as an aside so it seems he has no idea about the history of Fremont.
@@MikesTropicalTech you could make the argument for Fremont not being a working factory at that time. It was also seriously gutted musk has often said they legt them nothing usable only junk
Well that 17mins just went past in a heartbeat. Really interesting to see. Slightly disappointed the roof isn’t covered in acres of PV though, wonder why not?
Really enjoyed that thanks Jack. Will be great if/when gets to Giga Berlin so that he can do a compare and contrast! I still think VW are a long way behind but I hope they make it through the transition.
Do we have escape rooms? I only knew those from the change convention a few years earlier. I'll have to ask and take a look. And I've been working there for almost 22 years now and I thought I'd seen everything. But maybe I just missed that because I've had a lot of courses in body construction over the last two years. I've also read some comments and questions about the "missing" solar systems here. And yes, that is a fact that many of our employees certainly do not like. I hope our company will catch up a lot there. And the transformation in recent years away from combustion engines to electric cars has been a strenuous journey for the workforce. But everyone has played their part and is proud to have been the first factory in the world to have done so.
Amazing production processes, but I'd like to see a similar video when the Berlin Tesla factory is up and running, so that we see how Tesla manage to manufacture their vehicles so much more efficiently .
Good luck, Tesla don't pay for advertising so pretty tricky to justify contrasting them positively with any of the other manufacturers that will agree to sponsorship/advertisement deals with channels like this.
@Nicolas MIARD I'm not saying Tesla would need to pay, but that's part of the problem - other brands will pay or contribute towards a video and will predictably be an ongoing future source of revenue whereas Tesla never will and it doesn't make sense to upset the brands that pay the bills. Fully Charged being 'independent' may have a better chance than others at deciding to showcase Tesla, but I wouldn't hold my breath. Willing to be pleasantly surprised though ;P
@Nicolas MIARD I am a fan of the approach of designing a category killer and perfecting it, rather than trying to develop numerous overlapping/competing models which try to cater to many nuanced tastes.
@Nicolas MIARD The unified platform is a good start that I imagine is an easier transition for these old brands to make. If they can pull it off and wean themselves off ICE in the next 5-10 years then more power to 'em. I'm worried there's a lot of denial baked into the upper management levels of these companies. Would benefit a lot from trimming their dividends, slashing the ad budget and going ham on R&D. That's a big culture shift though...Lots of dead weight in their structure too, long standing relationships with suppliers etc.
1939 to 1945 is a very sensitive period for Germany. There are normally few references to it unless absolutely necessary. Any references to Nazism or displays of the swastika are expressly banned by law.
1:27 what about Tesla's Fremont Factory, which was General Motors Fremont Assembly, later operated by NUMMI? Tesla took ownership in 2010. You can say VW’s Zwickau plant is first in EU.
Oh my goodness... Dr Stefan Loth sure has one very intense staring thing going on when he talks to you...!! 😵💫 That aside... great content, as always, Jack. Took me right back to my motor-trade days, back in the 90s, taking corporate clients on factory visits in the West Midlands and Stuttgart... The robots are just so balletic in their movements - beautifully mesmerizing to watch...
A little mistake in he intro. Our Belgian Audi plant started in 1949 with ICE-cars and makes uniquely the Audi E-tron since 2018. They did this conversion earlier. AKA Audi Brussels or Volkswagen Vorst. Thx for the episode.
Such a nice video. Only thing I missed was a short insight into the history of the facility. It has a long traditon since 1904 and was the plant of Horch, Audi, Sachsenwerk (Trabant) and finally VW.
yes! i loved the episode, but the more i saw about how well thought-out the factory was, and how much money was spent on it - the crazier it seemed that they have hobbled their cars (I drove the ID4 for a couple of days, and the driving 'feel' was great) with an unusable user interface. I was considering one of the IDs to replace my 2013 Leaf, but there is no way I can live with the infotainment system or the weird touch-sensitive buttons and sliders - and using voice activation to try to get around the interface was useless (and a massive contrast to Tesla's, which seemed to work 95% of the time)... just odd that they would mess up these non-EV-specific things so badly... hope they do better in future.
@@DanRyzESPUK Still doesn't make this the first factory in the world to move from ICEV production to EV production. But it's understandable Jack said it: all facts and numbers in this video came directly from VW. The video is in fact full of VW marketing "facts" that are not quite true.
Why are there Golfs in the body shop side by side with the ID3s? How will they manage the high demand for ID3, ID4, Born, etc. if they still produce Golfs on that line?
Does anyone know what kind of batteries they are currently assembling in the ID3 and Cupra Born? Lithium Cobalt Oxide or Lithium Iron Phosphate? (LCO or LFP)
Very impressive but the waiting lists are still crazy. I know there are huge issues at the moment but my ID4 GTX has now been put back to the end of October 22….not sure going to wait.
@@convertorx 'wet dream'? It's an inevitable transition, better performance, better environmentally and easier to automate. BEV is 100% the solution for light vehicle. Even Toyota and Honda are shifting have announced BEV and are reluctantly moving from hydrogen. Plus what hydrogen offerings they do (mirai, clarity) have just don't sell.
@@DanRyzESPUK So it's OK that GM and Toyota abandoned the factory and fired all of the employees, but bad that Tesla resurrected it to make EVs? The fact is his statement at the start of the video is wrong.
@@MikesTropicalTech the factory was already closed, and this factory was fully functional since the beginning. The workforce was the same before and after, and they are fully unionised and no job losses, something Muskians love him doing.
Nice to see how my car was built; an impressive facility but it would be interesting to compare to a Tesla plant where they can produce cars in one third of the time - is it down to the simplicity of the Tesla range compared to the myriad of models they are trying to produce on one production line?
the "amount of time it takes to produce" is always a tricky measure... the important metric is number of cars per year. and this factory has been running for 2 years? 2 years after tesla started they were building a lot less than 300k cars per year.
@@mralistair737 Tesla Giga Shanghai started production December 2019, and in 2021 produced ~485k. Giga Berlin and Texas could possibly ramp even faster.
@@mralistair737 from cost and flexibility perspective through put time is important. You want to off load your capital cost asap and when doing a change you don't want long lead times or big batches of old versions.
Perhaps since they've been able to source 100% renewable energy from Austria at the right price, they haven't seen the need for roof mounted solar yet?
Inspiring video Jack, very informative glimpse into the future! Thanks a lot for the work you do, you and the team have really converted me to the EV cause. 👍😄
Agreed. We bought a Kona 2 years ago, largely because of Fully Charged's recommendation of it, and like it a lot! (apart from the battery swap shenanigans). If it were today, I think I'd be waiting for an ID4 . . .
The main story here is how VW transitioned from an ICE manufacturer to a BEV manufacturer. The automation part is also important but other manufacturers are ahead here. Great to see that the plant is green too!
the point is the company that owned it changed it from ice to ev, not what tesla did which was never produce ice cars and just made it into one of the most dangerous car manufacturing plants on the planet with build quality that would make British Leyland blush.
11:15 this reminds of the debate which is cheaper to make, DSLR cameras vs mirrorless cameras. The mirrorless cameras simply have less moving parts, it was only more expensive in the early years. On EVs, it is only the battery which makes EVs more expensive to make.
Fascinating stuff. Without the leadership of Herbert Diess who knows what this factory would be producing today. It’s incredible they can maintain efficiency while producing different vehicles. I need to know how the correct seats wind up on the freight elevator. We have been assured that Chattanooga built cars will use the same process and have the same quality as the German built cars. I hope this is the case because the German built cars are excellent.
It might be wrong to say it's the most advanced in europe if Tesla's in Berlin is significantly ahead. And the factory of the future has no people in it at all.
Great content and great presenter -- the Germans (and the French too) are really starting to show they mean business. Really like the look of the VW ID.5 GTX and the upcoming Renault Megane EV.
Stellantis is weird though, as a company they are executing pretty well (though id like to see a little bit more range out of their cars) but the CEO seems like he's totally not convinced/committed
Who will be next to have an EV only factory? tell us below
Ford
Hyundai or Kia!
Tesla obv
Tesla currently has two EV only factories, Fremont, CA and Shanghai, with Austin, Tx and Berlin, Germany Giga-factories coming online this month!
Rising interest rates are going to kill Debt-riddled Legacy manufacturers, who still need to borrow even more money to catch up with Tesla and the Chinese invasion!
RIP VAG😎
So EV's have less parts, less complexity to build, and VW has stepped up the automation dramatically, cutting down on cost of production, compared to ICE cars.
But still, they are a lot more expensive.
Was we not told several years ago, that the price of EV's would drop a lot and that soon we would have price parity between petrol and EV's.
Price parity seems a LONG way away, still an EV is a lot more expensive, and this is even though most countries has not registration tax on EV's.
Impressive to see the shift from ICE factory to EV factory and taking the workers with you.
This is the factory where the old Trabants 601 were produced during the DDR (East Germany) in the 60s. What a long journey!!
more like the location ...
the factory was build up in the 90´s ;)
That was so interesting. Thank you VW for allowing Jack and the team access so we could have a glimpse behind the door. Thank you Jack for another excellent presentation!
Kind of frustrates me that these factories with huge flat roofs, are not covered with solar panels. I did spot a tiny VAWT wind-turbine though.
10:50
They have A) a massive space for PV on the roof there and B) enough battery storage in their EV battery module store room to power a city. That's a missed opportunity to me.
Well Germany produce 46% electricity, not counting Scandinavia I believe it’s not one of the highest % in Europe and Germany actually is capable to produce even more but have nowhere to store the electricity. More battery storage facilities are needed!
The Xpeng & Tesla factories are covered with panels!
Couldn't agree more. Why are they taking long distance hydro power needed for dull, windless days instead of solar literally from their own roof? Might also have a shadow effect in summer.
Jack you are such a great presenter. Enthusiastic, charming, informative and entertaining. Keep up the great work.
Agreed! He's informative and entertaining and really understands the questions that we will have as a viewer. Excellent choice Fully Charged!
Excellent view inside the factory. Why is so important to the workforce. So often overlooked. Thank you.
Let's be honest VW needed to do this, the diesel gate scandal saw them with their pants well and truly down. But credit where credit is due it looks like they have grasped the nettle with both hands and respect to them for doing it, they are still the people's car it seems.
Yeah... I remember when I toured the Nokia headquarters in 1998... they were the king of the hill, they had the mobile phone market completely in their grasp - and ten years later they are sold to Microsoft. Just complete devastation of a former great company. Same as with Blackberry. Adapt or vanish (even though Nokia is now successful in selling network equipment)
@@SebastianPeitsch Another famous story is Kodak...
I agree that VAG totally needed to do this, and I believe their investment will pay off. Other manufacturers are watching on but they're all so far behind the Chinese. Only Tesla can compete at the moment but they're aiming for the wrong end of the market. The ID range are good but do they compete with their Chinese counterparts? Will be interesting to see what younger drivers choose as their first car in the next few years.
This question is will the public forgive them or punish them for their sins of the past. I for one have no desire to buy any of their vehicles and hope between Tesla and the Chinese Ev manufacturers we see VW go bankrupt.
@Mck Idyl sure because the problem was that regulators made cheating way too easy. The industry was allowed to check itself. This is also why SCOTUS in the United States dismantling the regulatory control will lead to more VW‘s in the future. OSHA not being allowed to enforce a testing mandate will kill more people than VW‘s diesels will. And nobody seems to care.
You mentioned 3 things ICU vehicles producing companies must do. Thank you for emphasizing on the human factor as #2. Enabling employees with new skills and the mindset it takes to adapt to the necessary change is one of the keys to transformation success. Especially in countries with strong employee advocacy - but not limited to them.
Hello im from Panamá and Panamá it d also away back un many technology salute to all of fully charge!!
Hope VW keep pushing, keep learning and survive.
Keep cheating and keep killing us too?
Me too. I believe in redemption. In full transparency I just reserved and ID.4.
@@JeremyHamaoui ya stay salty
I'm not a huge VW fan but I've been surprisingly impressed by their efforts towards change. We went from faking emissions to spending billions on electrification and clean energy. I really, really hope they succeed!
They do too! They've invested 800 billion Euros into EV development and production. They are looking to have a range of around 40 fully electric vehicles on offer by 2040......
You could technically say that Tesla did that since the Fremont, California Tesla factory was previously the NUMMI plant that built Toyota's and Chevy products and previous to that as GM Fremont Assembly from 1962 to 1985 building many Chevy/Pontiac/Oldsmobile/GMC and Buick vehicles (including the bulk of the 1960s Muscle cars).
"Without the car even stopping" - car stopps. Jack, you little troll.
A most interesting and informative episode. I was a little surprised that they have retained ALL the workforce and can only imagine that this will reduce over time as people retire/leave.
I thought the same...especially when you can hardly see a soul working in the factory
Unions.
They will have kept them all if the level of automation is the same, increased automation though definitely means less jobs.
that assumes they dont expand the plant to make more cars. which need more robots etc.
@@oBCHANo only if the level of production is level, if they keep the same staff (with investment) they could build more cars... more cheaply
I need to know more about the working of that solar panels.
Orion Assembly for the Chevy Bolt and Hamtramck for the Volt and now Hummer EV both were converted over from ICE to EV for GM
Genuinely Impressed with this video guys! Really interesting insight in to what VW are doing. My Skoda will be delivered in the next few months and this was a great insight, thank you!
What a great tour. As a Brit who has lived in Germany for 40 years, I hope that the UK can see what it means to first modernise the DDR, and then modernise the Automobile industry. I helped pay for all of that with the extra "Solidaritätsbeitrag" (Solidarity Contributution), which Germans have paid for over 30 years. Has the UK got a "Solidaritätsbeitrag" for their industries, or for rebuilding the north of England after the collapse of industry?
Now you know why I live in Germany, and have a German family. .... "Solidarity"!
“The first factory to be converted from ICE to full electric” I thought this was Tesla Fremont. GM ran it from 1962 as an ICE factory and Tesla paid to convert it in 2010 # Mary led the way 😀😂😅🤣
You're absolutely right and I probably should have been more specific. VW is the first legacy car brand to transform one of its own factories to EV.
And if I am not mistaken it was completely empty
The Rivian factory is also a former ICE plant.
@@ramdynebix empty or not still not the first, and not the second that goes to Rivian who also converted an ICE plant 2018
@@robdavidge4555 did they keep the staff?
At 5:32 you can see a „Framo“ fully electric Truck. They are made only 25 km away from Zwickau in Löbichau and are shipped around the Globe. My Girlfriend works there. You are very welcome to visit the Framo GmbH if you like.
VW’s Chattanooga, TN MEB expansion is very cool also. I was lucky enough to be able to tour.
Technically GM's Lake Orion Michigan facility transitioned from ICE to EV back in 2016. GM's DHAM plant which started production in 2021 has also transitioned from ICE to EV. GM's CAMI assembly in Ingersoll Ontario is undergoing a transition right now and will start production this year.
Love this! Great to see the extensive training program.
*Herbert Diess's strong character is highly understated considering this ungrateful but necessary and enormous task.* Kudos to VW!
An impressively clean, modern-looking implementation of traditional assembly methods. I suggest listening to any interview one can with Joe Justice, an agile development consultant that has worked with Tesla, among others, as a contrast. I'm not smart enough to predict which approach will be superior long-term but Tesla's approach certainly sounds much more radical and fresh. I've caught two interviews of Joe and am anxious to hear more. Note to Fully Charged, you should try to score an interview with Joe Justice.
Having growing up close to the plant it always gives me the chuckles when you pronounce the Z in Zwickau like S instead of Ts. The pronunciation is not soft. Tststs. In any case, I have been inside the plant as a kid 20 years ago and it is nice to see it after the change. Thank you for that!
That’s very English pronunciation, but not terrible. English speaking people usually have trouble pronouncing word’s with
“ V “ not knowing that it’s actually spelled like “ F “. Makes me laugh still 😛
@@JackieWelles Tzunami is easy enough to say. Once you apply it to Tzvickau it just rolls off the tongue :).
One of my favourite episodes so far. As Jack said, inspiring. 👍
You mean transitioning under the same management? The NUMMI plant converted from ICE to electric in transition from Toyota/Chevy to Tesla. And Rivian’s Normal plant was previously for Mitsubishi ICE production. Right?
Those are not re-trained and transfromed plants like this. The Freemont plant was already closed. This is first step for OEMs to transition to EVs fully.
@@DanRyzESPUK yes, that is what I was getting at. It seems like the nature of that change at VW (and ahead of other legacy ICE automakers) could have been more clearly distinguished in that part of the presentation. We get there through the rest of the video.
My id3 is in there somewhere 😂great video very interesting to see what happens behind the scenes 🔋 ⚡️
Hopefully it's not the one I fitted the suspension to at the transparent factory in Dresden 😅 vid of that coming to Plus channel soon
I drove a 2 stroke Trabi around Berlin recently on the Trabisafari, bloody good fun
Great!
Please, do more factory videos.
This is a really great video and why I love Fully Charged. A nice study of the changes they have made, an interesting method of handling the culture change. I would love (with a management hat on) to understand how that has gone but that's not for Fully Charged... Jack, brilliant piece of presenting.
7:15 It's called "flexible specialisation" - we've had the tech to do this since the 1980s. Interesting how German and Swiss senior management frequently have PhDs - I'm guessing the majority of equivalent staff of blue chip companies in UK don't have a higher degree of any kind, or if they do it will be an MBA rather than a specialist technical qualification.
i know many people with PhD in economics, social matters, intl. trade, they all bought this title for prestige not bcs. they are scientists or professors at University
Great video. More like this please. Fewer about cars the average person won't be able to afford.
Jack, Can you tell us anything about the solar arrays behind you during the introductory remarks. They look like that might be moveable on one axis.
Probably programmed to track the sun as it moves....
Great presentation Jack thanks .
UK Tesla Model Y first deliveries take place in Southampton at the Horizon Cruise Terminal on the 19th Feb 2022.
Have been driving our new id.3 for just over a month now around the Bournemouth and Poole area and we are so pleased with the car. The factory looks amazing. I would like to do a factory tour myself. I would also like to do some Beer tasting while i'm in the area. Cheers.
Jack is the BEST....
Love the giant solar cricket bats at 01:15. Fantastic stuff Jack!
They looked like they may have been rotatable too.....probably tracking the sun automatically.
An excellent video giving a fascinating view of that amazing factory. Well presented by Jack, he really is very good.
Excellent presentation of this impressive quaint little factory. Another great example of converting an ice factory into a modernized EV production facility. It may may not be close to being one of the best EV factories among All those factories out there, but it's a great start for VW to make a positive change towards surviving further into the future, they definitely needed to start somewhere.
Not a word of criticism in this report, as if this factory and the products are just flawless and perfect. VW's own CEO Diess just this week highlighted competitive and technological flaws in his company in a Verge article. I expect well rounded unbiased reports from this channel, not skin deep corporate fluff pieces like this.
Why would you criticise a company who has transformed a car factory to only build EV’s?
Would you have complained if Fully Charged did the exact same kind of video at a Tesla plant?
@@prerunnerwannabe I wish they did! I bet Giga Berlin would be impressive!
Fully Charged never has and never will criticize VW. Well except when they do and have criticized VW, like hundreds of times through a multitude of videos. Me, I don't want to watch through an hour of explanation and details about VW's past (and perhaps currrent) crimes, just to get to the material that is relevant, the material that presents new data, new facts, new information. To quote the great Lister. "Spin on... Spin on."
I want unbiased reporting no matter who they report about, Tesla included. But you can bet your Amazon shares that a Tesla factory tour would start with a 5 minute recap of environmental lawsuits and anti-Tesla rallies.
And I'm not asking for a VW history lesson since their glory days in Nazi Germany but I can't believe that this Zwickau factory rebuild went smoothly and without opposition from workers or nearby residents. What happened to the ICE cars they made previously. ID.3 and 4 sales are falling. What about "chip shortage"? Every ex-line-worker is still there just supervising robots now? No environmental issues, no protests, no financial troubles, just a clean transition without issues? It's suspicious and I don't buy it, period.
Wasnt Tesla's freemont factory the first to be converted to making ev's?
As Tesla never produced IC cars: no!
the point is the company that owned it changed it from ice to ev, not what tesla did which was never produce ice cars and just made it into one of the most dangerous car manufacturing plants on the planet with build quality that would make British Leyland blush.
@@jsgsmile but they bought the car factory, from Toyota I believe, as a traditional car factory and had to rebuild it to their needs.
@@jsgsmile I watched the statement again and he specifically says factory, not company. The Fremont factory was converted from ICE cars to EVs so he's wrong. He doesn't even mention Fremont as an aside so it seems he has no idea about the history of Fremont.
@@MikesTropicalTech you could make the argument for Fremont not being a working factory at that time. It was also seriously gutted musk has often said they legt them nothing usable only junk
Thank You for All that you are doing for World Peace and for our Planet...
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I like Jack. He’s a great, natural, interesting very informative presenter.👍
Well that 17mins just went past in a heartbeat. Really interesting to see. Slightly disappointed the roof isn’t covered in acres of PV though, wonder why not?
The world needs many EVs to be produced so it's good to see an ice plant converted to EV
Really enjoyed that thanks Jack. Will be great if/when gets to Giga Berlin so that he can do a compare and contrast! I still think VW are a long way behind but I hope they make it through the transition.
Do we have escape rooms? I only knew those from the change convention a few years earlier. I'll have to ask and take a look. And I've been working there for almost 22 years now and I thought I'd seen everything. But maybe I just missed that because I've had a lot of courses in body construction over the last two years. I've also read some comments and questions about the "missing" solar systems here. And yes, that is a fact that many of our employees certainly do not like. I hope our company will catch up a lot there. And the transformation in recent years away from combustion engines to electric cars has been a strenuous journey for the workforce. But everyone has played their part and is proud to have been the first factory in the world to have done so.
Amazing production processes, but I'd like to see a similar video when the Berlin Tesla factory is up and running, so that we see how Tesla manage to manufacture their vehicles so much more efficiently .
Great idea.
Good luck, Tesla don't pay for advertising so pretty tricky to justify contrasting them positively with any of the other manufacturers that will agree to sponsorship/advertisement deals with channels like this.
@Nicolas MIARD I'm not saying Tesla would need to pay, but that's part of the problem - other brands will pay or contribute towards a video and will predictably be an ongoing future source of revenue whereas Tesla never will and it doesn't make sense to upset the brands that pay the bills. Fully Charged being 'independent' may have a better chance than others at deciding to showcase Tesla, but I wouldn't hold my breath. Willing to be pleasantly surprised though ;P
@Nicolas MIARD I am a fan of the approach of designing a category killer and perfecting it, rather than trying to develop numerous overlapping/competing models which try to cater to many nuanced tastes.
@Nicolas MIARD The unified platform is a good start that I imagine is an easier transition for these old brands to make. If they can pull it off and wean themselves off ICE in the next 5-10 years then more power to 'em. I'm worried there's a lot of denial baked into the upper management levels of these companies. Would benefit a lot from trimming their dividends, slashing the ad budget and going ham on R&D. That's a big culture shift though...Lots of dead weight in their structure too, long standing relationships with suppliers etc.
Interesting video! I did notice that VW missed a few years between 1910 and 1958 in their history room tho 😉
1939 to 1945 is a very sensitive period for Germany. There are normally few references to it unless absolutely necessary. Any references to Nazism or displays of the swastika are expressly banned by law.
1:27 what about Tesla's Fremont Factory, which was General Motors Fremont Assembly, later operated by NUMMI? Tesla took ownership in 2010. You can say VW’s Zwickau plant is first in EU.
Oh my goodness...
Dr Stefan Loth sure has one very intense staring thing going on when he talks to you...!! 😵💫
That aside... great content, as always, Jack.
Took me right back to my motor-trade days, back in the 90s, taking corporate clients on factory visits in the West Midlands and Stuttgart...
The robots are just so balletic in their movements - beautifully mesmerizing to watch...
What a great video, very privileged too I guess to be allowed access.. Narrated to perfection also! 👏👏
A little mistake in he intro. Our Belgian Audi plant started in 1949 with ICE-cars and makes uniquely the Audi E-tron since 2018. They did this conversion earlier. AKA Audi Brussels or Volkswagen Vorst. Thx for the episode.
VW clearly put a lot into this shop:)
Billions of Euros in fact.......
That escape room concept is pretty cool
Such a nice video. Only thing I missed was a short insight into the history of the facility. It has a long traditon since 1904 and was the plant of Horch, Audi, Sachsenwerk (Trabant) and finally VW.
Fascinating stuff Jack, but you didn't ask the CEO when they're going sort out their infotainment software?
yes! i loved the episode, but the more i saw about how well thought-out the factory was, and how much money was spent on it - the crazier it seemed that they have hobbled their cars (I drove the ID4 for a couple of days, and the driving 'feel' was great) with an unusable user interface. I was considering one of the IDs to replace my 2013 Leaf, but there is no way I can live with the infotainment system or the weird touch-sensitive buttons and sliders - and using voice activation to try to get around the interface was useless (and a massive contrast to Tesla's, which seemed to work 95% of the time)... just odd that they would mess up these non-EV-specific things so badly... hope they do better in future.
1:28
Tesla Freemont factory used to make regular Toyotas.
Ir was closed, this was always functional. Shut up about Tesla already, will ya?
@@DanRyzESPUK Still doesn't make this the first factory in the world to move from ICEV production to EV production. But it's understandable Jack said it: all facts and numbers in this video came directly from VW. The video is in fact full of VW marketing "facts" that are not quite true.
Well done VW keep it up.
The Tesla Fremont, CA factory and the Rivian Normal, Illinois factory also used to be 100% ICE
Great video. Possibly my favourite Fully Charged video actually. Well done Jack and team. More please!
Why are there Golfs in the body shop side by side with the ID3s? How will they manage the high demand for ID3, ID4, Born, etc. if they still produce Golfs on that line?
I thought Tesla's Fremont factory was transformed from a former Toyota ICE factory or have I misremembered that.
Does anyone know what kind of batteries they are currently assembling in the ID3 and Cupra Born? Lithium Cobalt Oxide or Lithium Iron Phosphate? (LCO or LFP)
Great video, some auto makers like Ford and GM must despair seeing a future without them.
Very impressive but the waiting lists are still crazy. I know there are huge issues at the moment but my ID4 GTX has now been put back to the end of October 22….not sure going to wait.
Mad to think how many big auto brands are so far behind.... Possibly too late. I can totally imagine people saying one day "what's a Toyota?"
I'm afraid "all electric" is all but a wet dream of the Greens, not going to happen, EV's are only part of a "solution".
@@convertorx 'wet dream'? It's an inevitable transition, better performance, better environmentally and easier to automate. BEV is 100% the solution for light vehicle. Even Toyota and Honda are shifting have announced BEV and are reluctantly moving from hydrogen. Plus what hydrogen offerings they do (mirai, clarity) have just don't sell.
Someones been reading press releases. 🤣
Wasn't the Tesla factory in California originally an ICE factory for GM and Toyota too?
It was closed. This factory was always functional.
@@DanRyzESPUK So it's OK that GM and Toyota abandoned the factory and fired all of the employees, but bad that Tesla resurrected it to make EVs? The fact is his statement at the start of the video is wrong.
@@MikesTropicalTech the factory was already closed, and this factory was fully functional since the beginning. The workforce was the same before and after, and they are fully unionised and no job losses, something Muskians love him doing.
Nice to see how my car was built; an impressive facility but it would be interesting to compare to a Tesla plant where they can produce cars in one third of the time - is it down to the simplicity of the Tesla range compared to the myriad of models they are trying to produce on one production line?
the "amount of time it takes to produce" is always a tricky measure... the important metric is number of cars per year. and this factory has been running for 2 years? 2 years after tesla started they were building a lot less than 300k cars per year.
@@mralistair737 Tesla Giga Shanghai started production December 2019, and in 2021 produced ~485k. Giga Berlin and Texas could possibly ramp even faster.
@@mralistair737 from cost and flexibility perspective through put time is important. You want to off load your capital cost asap and when doing a change you don't want long lead times or big batches of old versions.
When Herbert Diess made that comparison (very deliberately), he was talking about Wolfsburg - VW's oldest plant - not this one.
@@Patrick-bu5vy - he was talking about id4 v Model 3.
I hope the escape rooms showed a Trabant, the famous DDR transport icon made in Zwickau.
I'm sorry, but whoever put that horn sound into the edit at 0:09 deserves a bonus :D
I really enjoyed that. That huge roof should be covered in solar panels...
It should!!
Perhaps since they've been able to source 100% renewable energy from Austria at the right price, they haven't seen the need for roof mounted solar yet?
Cool, great stuff, and great work VW
Very cool! Did I see an e-Golf in one of the shots? Are they still building those for Europe?
Love the “Best in Tesla” intro music! 😂
Inspiring video Jack, very informative glimpse into the future! Thanks a lot for the work you do, you and the team have really converted me to the EV cause. 👍😄
That's great to hear, Simon!
Agreed. We bought a Kona 2 years ago, largely because of Fully Charged's recommendation of it, and like it a lot! (apart from the battery swap shenanigans). If it were today, I think I'd be waiting for an ID4 . . .
Tesla's factory in Fremont used to be a GM/Toyota factory called NUMMI. Just a small correction, thanks for the video.
That was a change in ownership though.
The main story here is how VW transitioned from an ICE manufacturer to a BEV manufacturer. The automation part is also important but other manufacturers are ahead here. Great to see that the plant is green too!
Dear VW, please bring EVs to Australia, thank you.
Awesome work Jack.
VW have stated publicly and often that Australia can tell its story walking. They also stated why. Ask ScoMo, he knows why
Isn't the Tesla Fremont Factory the first full factory to be transformed from ICE to EV production?
the point is the company that owned it changed it from ice to ev, not what tesla did which was never produce ice cars and just made it into one of the most dangerous car manufacturing plants on the planet with build quality that would make British Leyland blush.
@@Alex-cw3rz still a bit strange to not say it like that then
@@Alex-cw3rz 😆 😂 well said.
@@lukasbaldo5022 I agree worded a bit weirdly, I guess VW gave them that talking point.
Is Freemont a factory ? I thought it was a collection of tents ;)
Jack is so good and is really hitting his stride in recent videos. Keep up the good work.
Thanks bud!
you didnt happen to see a huge car park full of cars waiting for there electronics did you? been waiting for mine since August
Wondering how the factory power is supplied today as the Dr mentioned gas early on.
Excellent Video! Thanks!
Intricacies of German pronounciation: the leading „z“ in Zwickau is very sharp, like the final sound in „hats“ 😉
11:15 this reminds of the debate which is cheaper to make, DSLR cameras vs mirrorless cameras. The mirrorless cameras simply have less moving parts, it was only more expensive in the early years. On EVs, it is only the battery which makes EVs more expensive to make.
Fascinating stuff. Without the leadership of Herbert Diess who knows what this factory would be producing today. It’s incredible they can maintain efficiency while producing different vehicles. I need to know how the correct seats wind up on the freight elevator.
We have been assured that Chattanooga built cars will use the same process and have the same quality as the German built cars. I hope this is the case because the German built cars are excellent.
It might be wrong to say it's the most advanced in europe if Tesla's in Berlin is significantly ahead. And the factory of the future has no people in it at all.
it's easier to design for human operators an easy task and leave bulky/fast/dangerous or uber precise operations to robots
I think VW could do even better than that but I still applaud VW for doing it, that’s the future!
Indeed. VW's efforts are more than some car makers are currently making...... but sooner or later they'll have to move over to EV production...
Very cool. I get to see where my VW ID4 came into the world.
65 years ago Zwickau was the birthplace of Trabant. What a difference
Waiting times only got slightly better...
This is that plant.
Thanks Jack. Love a factory tour. Hope to purchase an ID in the future or one of the VAG models.
Great job. In my opinion, this kind of companies is what we need to re-incorporate in Europe if we want to be big again.
This is all well and good but where is my ID3? I have been waiting months and months!! 🙂 great vid as usual.
Great content and great presenter -- the Germans (and the French too) are really starting to show they mean business.
Really like the look of the VW ID.5 GTX and the upcoming Renault Megane EV.
Stellantis is weird though, as a company they are executing pretty well (though id like to see a little bit more range out of their cars) but the CEO seems like he's totally not convinced/committed