Autoline Daily May 8, 2026

AD #4293 - Toyota North America Loses Money Despite Record Sales; Auto Groups Urge Trump to Save USMCA; Tesla Semi Battery Specs Revealed

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Concept

tariffs

Tariffs are extra taxes on imported products. If tariffs hit car parts or vehicles, they can raise costs and make it harder for manufacturers to plan production.

Concept

USMCA Trade Pact

USMCA is a trade deal between the U.S., Mexico, and Canada. It matters for car companies because it affects how easily car parts can cross borders to build and sell vehicles.

Car

Tesla Model Y

The Tesla Model Y is an electric SUV/crossover. In this episode, it’s important because it passed a safety test for driver-assistance features like automatic braking and lane help.

Concept

Advanced Driver Assistant System test

ADAS tests check how good a car’s safety tech is, like warnings and automatic braking. Passing means the system performed well in the test scenarios.

Term

pedestrian automatic emergency braking

This is a feature that can spot a person in the road and automatically brake if the driver doesn’t react in time. The goal is to help avoid a crash or reduce how bad it is.

Term

lane keeping assist

Lane keeping assist helps the car stay in its lane. If you start drifting, it can nudge the steering to bring you back.

Term

blind spot warning

Blind spot warning is a system that alerts you when a car is in your blind spot. It helps you avoid changing lanes into another vehicle.

Term

blind spot intervention

Blind spot intervention is like blind spot warning, but it can also help prevent a bad lane change. If you try to move into a spot with a car there, the system may step in.

Car

Tesla Model 3

The Tesla Model 3 is an electric car. The episode uses its China delivery numbers to show Tesla’s sales momentum improving.

Term

kilowatt hour battery pack

A kilowatt-hour (kWh) is basically how much energy is stored in the battery. More kWh usually means the vehicle can go farther, depending on efficiency.

Car

Tesla Semi

Tesla Semi is an electric big rig (heavy truck). The episode shares new battery and range numbers from a government document, which helps you understand how far it can go and how much energy it uses.

Term

kilowatts

Kilowatts are a measure of how much power the vehicle can produce. Higher power generally means the truck can work harder, like climbing hills or accelerating.

Term

energy consumption of one point seven kilowad hours per mile

This tells you how efficiently the truck uses electricity. If it uses fewer kWh per mile, it can usually travel farther on the same battery.

Term

maximum range

Maximum range is the estimated distance the EV can go on a full battery. It helps you plan trips and charging stops.

Term

electric reports they're not performing as promised

They’re saying the battery cells don’t do as well as Tesla promised. That matters because it can reduce range and make charging slower or worse.

Term

battery cells

Battery cells are the individual pieces inside the big battery pack. If the cells don’t perform well, the whole car’s range and charging can suffer.

Term

charging performance

Charging performance is how fast and how well the battery takes power during charging. Some batteries charge quickly, while others slow down sooner.

Term

energy density

Energy density is how much “battery power” fits into the battery. If it’s lower, you usually get less driving range.

Term

lap record

A lap record is the best time someone has set for one full lap on a track. It’s a way to compare how fast a car can go under similar conditions.

Term

downforce

Downforce is the “push down” from the air that helps the tires grip the road. More downforce usually means better cornering at speed.

Car

The Porsche Taycan is an electric car with a focus on performance. Because it’s built for speed, its shape and airflow are important for keeping it stable on the road. The podcast is bringing it up because it’s known for strong aerodynamic behavior, including downforce.

Car

Bmw M

The BMW M Coupe (E36) is a sporty two-door BMW made for performance. It’s based on the E36 generation of BMWs and was built with an emphasis on how the engine runs. The podcast mentions its ignition setup—how it fires the spark plugs—to highlight what makes it different.

Term

pre chamber ignition

Pre-chamber ignition is a new way to start the engine’s combustion. It helps the engine burn fuel more efficiently and can improve power and smoothness.

Term

two spark plugs per cylinder

Instead of one spark plug, this design uses two per cylinder. One helps ignite a small “starter” chamber so the main combustion happens more reliably.

Car

Honda Civic

The Honda Civic is a small car made by Honda, and it has existed for decades. In the 1970s, some versions were adjusted to help meet U.S. emissions test requirements. That’s why it comes up in discussions about how cars were changed to pass emissions rules.

LIVE

Speaker 1: This is underlying daily the show dedicated to enthusiasts of the global automotive industry. President Trump's tariffs were handed another setback,

but the ruling will not affect automakers or suppliers. Three

months ago, the Supreme Court ruled that the tariff se implemented under the IEEPA are unconstitutional. Now, federal judges on

the Court of International Trade ruled that the teriffs implemented under Section one twenty two of the Trade Act of nineteen seventy four are illegal. Trump imposed across the board

ten percent terraffs, using section one twenty two to justify them, but that section specifically exempts cars, truck's components, and any goods that qualify for the USMCA Trade Pact. And speaking

of the USMCA, automakers and suppliers are very worried that Trump administration wants to get rid of it, and they're practically begging him to keep it in place. At least

six industry organizations sent a letter to US Trade Representative Jamison Greer, telling him the free trade agreement is critically important to the industry's competitiveness. That included the Automotive Alliance MIMA,

the American Automotive Policy Council, the NADA, the American International Auto Dealers Association, Auto's Drive America, and the Autocare Association.

That's a very powerful automotive block of organizations that rarely get together to speak with one voice, and it shows just how concerned they are about the Trump administration breaking up the North American supply chain. Toyota reported record sales

in the US last year, and right now it's hybrids are practically flying off dealer lots, and yet Toyota is losing money in the North American market. It lost one

point two billion dollars in its latest fiscal year compared to making about a seven hundred million dollar profit a year earlier, and we think something weird is going on here.

Toyota sold two million vehicles in Japan and made a profit of fourteen point eight billion dollars, Yet it sold nine hundred and thirty four thousand war vehicles in North America and at lost one point two billion. We don't

think the tariffs even come close to explaining that discrepancy, and hopefully we can do some digging around to get a better explanation of what's going.

Speaker 2: On performance that shines even in the rain. That's what

really matters, rich don't pretends to tires, improved grip and wet conditions.

Speaker 1: There's a lot of Testla news today, and first up, the twenty twenty six Model Why is the first vehicle to pass nitz's new Advanced Driver Assistant System test. The test,

which started for the twenty twenty six model year, is part of the agency's five Star New Cars testment program.

The aight S test evaluates more basic assistance functions like pedestrian automatic emergency braking, lane keeping assist, blind spot warning, and blind spot intervention. In other good news for Tesla,

it posted a big gain in China last month. According

to the China Passenger Car Association, deliveries of the Model three and Wide built at at Shanghai plant were just shy of seventy nine th five hundred units, up thirty six percent from a year ago. That number also includes

models shipped to Europe and other markets. Tesla's starting to

turn things around out of its China plant last year, as sales dipped five percent, but now the ev maker has posted six straight months of delivery gains out of China.

Tesla has never revealed battery specs for its semi but now we know thanks to an official document from the California Air Resources Board. The Standard range version features a

five hundred and four dy eight kilowad hour battery pack and has a power output of five hundred and twenty five kilowatts with an average energy consumption of one point seven kilowad hours per mile. Its maximum range is three

hundred and twenty two miles. The Long Range model comes

with an eight hundred and twenty two kilowat hour battery, a power output of eight hundred kilowatts, and a maximum range of four hundred and eighty three miles. Both versions

use the company's forty six eighty battery cells, and speaking of those cells, electric reports they're not performing as promised.

When Tesla unveiled the forty six eighty cells in twenty twenty, it claimed they would hold five times the energy of existing cells, deliver six times the power, improve range by sixteen percent at the pack level, and cut costs in half. However,

the forty six eighty cells are delivering lower energy density, worst charging performance, and less range than cells Tesla used from suppliers like Panasonic and LG. Tesla uses a dried

electrode process to produce the cells that was supposed to simplify manufacturing. However, at last year's shareholder meeting, Elon Musk

admitted that the process was a mistake and was way harder than expected. Tesla is now equipping model wise in

Europe with the forty six to eighty cells, and that's led to backlash with some buyers canceling orders because of the lower specs. With sales and revenue down, Porsche has

made a number of big changes this year. Already, it

rolled back its EV plans, it named a new CEO, it sold at Steak in Bugatti and Rimak, and now it's getting rid of a seat on its board and axing more divisions of the company. Porsche's Car and IT

division will now be suspended and absorbed into its R and D in the future, which is why the board seat is going away. The company also announced three other

divisions are going away, one related to high performance it's battery cells, one for e bikes, and the last made software for data communication. As a result, more than five

hundred people will be laid off. But it's not all

bad news for Portia. It just set the lap record

for an electric sedan on the nurburg Ring For the first time, the automaker is offering a Manthe Kit on an electric car which more than triples the downforce of the Tikon, but not just the base tikon the top of the line Turbogt version with the Wysock package with an additional twenty kilowats or about twenty five horse power, it lapped the famous track in six minutes and fifty five seconds, twelve seconds faster than the Turbogt with the Wysock package and more than nine seconds faster than the

previous record holder. The Manthy Kit will be available in

June and prices could start at sixty thousand dollars or more.

BMW is introducing pre chamber ignition technology to its inline six cylinder engine that goes into the M two, U three, and M four. The company calls it BMW m Ignite,

and there's two spark plugs per cylinder in each one has its own ignition system. One of those spark plugs

has what kind of looks like a dome screwed over it with a number of little holes near its top.

When the injector sprays fuel into the cylinder, some goes through those little holes into the chamber under the dome, and when that spark plug fires, it creates a combustion event that shoots out in all directions and very quickly.

The vehicle's computers can then control when each of those spark plugs fires, allowing for performance and efficiency gains. While

BMW says it got the patent for mgnight in twenty twenty four, the technology was originally used in diesel engines in the early nineteen hundreds. Honda then used it in

a version of the nineteen seventy five Civic to pass the US emission tests. Formula one has used it since

the mid twenty teens. The supplier model developed its own

system called jet Ignition, Maserati adapted pre chamber ignition to its Neatuno engine, and the BMW system is very similar to what Stilantis will have in its new Hurricane four engine.

And that's a wrap for today's show and this week.

Thanks for tuning in, and I hope that you have a great weekend.

Speaker 3: Auto Line Daily is brought to you by alex Partners.

When it really matters, Bridgestone Solutions for your journey CSP The composites, solution Partner, Intrepid Control Systems, over the Air Engineering, boost your game and thanks to the following YouTube and Patreon members.

Speaker 4: The automotive and industrial sectors are undergoing a historic transformation electrification, digitalization, supply chain reinvention, regulatory shifts. The pace is accelerating and

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About this episode

Automakers and suppliers are urging the Trump administration to keep USMCA in place, even as legal challenges to certain U.S. tariffs continue. Tesla also remains in the spotlight: the hosts say a California Air Resources Board document revealed Tesla Semi battery and range figures, and they discuss reports that Tesla’s 4680 cells are underperforming versus earlier supplier cells. Elsewhere, BMW is rolling out pre-chamber ignition on its inline-six M models, while the show closes with sponsor talk about electrification and supply-chain reinvention.

Advanced Driver Assistant System test battery cells blind spot intervention blind spot warning charging performance downforce energy consumption of one point seven kilowad hours per mile energy density kilowatt hour battery pack kilowatts

BMW M Coupe (E36) Honda Civic Porsche Taycan Tesla Model 3 Tesla Model Y Tesla Semi

Original notes

- Federal Judges Rule Trump’s Tariffs Illegal - Auto Groups Urge Trump to Save USMCA Deal - Toyota North America Loses Money Despite Record Sales - Tesla Model Y Passes New U.S. ADAS Tests - Tesla China Deliveries Surge 36% In April - Tesla Semi Official Battery Specs Revealed - Tesla 4680 Cells Underperform Compared to Supplier Batteries - Porsche Cuts Board Seat and Lays Off Hundreds - Taycan Turbo GT Sets New Nurburgring Electric Record - BMW Introduces Pre-Chamber Ignition to M Series Engines

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