The little car company that could be the catalyst for the mass adoption of electric automobiles is on the verge of unveiling the made-for-the masses Model 3. The March 31 unveiling of the Model 3 will flesh out the vision that Tesla Motors founder and CEO Elon Musk has been teasing over the last few months.
Last week, invitations were sent to the winners of a lottery Tesla Motors held for the short supply of seats that will be available at the unveiling. The invitations confirmed that the budget build of the automaker's electric vehicles will be shown off on March 31 in Southern California.
While we still have to wait until the unveiling to get a clear picture of the mysterious Model 3, there's a lot that can be gleaned from the bits and pieces of the puzzle Musk has casually dropped so far.
Specs And Expectations
Tesla Motors isn't quite ready to divulge the full specs of the Model 3 — that's what the March 31 event is for.
But so far, the company has revealed that the Model 3 will have a range of 200 miles on a full charge. That range falls just short of the Model 3's luxurious predecessors, which have roaming capabilities that range between 220 and 300 miles.
The Model 3 will be about 20 percent lighter than the other cars in Tesla Motors' lineup. That's because the car will be less complex than its stablemates.
The Model 3 will come in at half the price of the $70,000 Model S, but the $35,000 price point for the Model 3 will, in all likelihood, rise and fall with time.
The first version of the Model 3 won't have all of the bells and whistles that adorn the company's luxury models, as instead of offering options for additional costs, the company is working from the other end.
As the company has done in the past, the first Model 3s to roll off the assembly lines will be "relatively highly optioned versions of the car," Musk stated in during an earnings call last month.
"Because obviously, we've got to pay back the investment of all the tooling and everything," Musk said. "It makes sense to have the higher-optioned versions first. That's what we did with the S, and obviously again with the X."
As for how the Model 3 will look, an alleged insider claims the car will resemble a smaller version of the Model S "without luxury features like leather seats."
Production
That advance ordering period will give Tesla Motors a better idea of where the output of its battery Gigafactory should be before it's time to start building Model 3 cars.
Some analysts have raised concerns over the company's ability to meet demand for the mass-market Model 3, but last month, Musk and company asserted that their Gigafactory was more than capable of meeting the demand for Model 3s.
"Basically, to the best of our knowledge, you should not worry about the Gigafactory as a constraint on Model 3," Musk said. "That does not appear to be anywhere near the critical path for Model 3."
Purchasing
Tesla Motors will start accepting advance orders for the Model 3 on April 1, but the company won't begin producing the Model 3 until around the end of this year. From there, it will be roughly another 12 months before the company begins delivering the economy-priced electric vehicles to customers.
