Ride the Lightning: Tesla and EV Podcast Oct 19, 2025

Episode 533: Special Guest: Franz von Holzhausen (Yes, Again!)

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Company

Accelerate Auto

Accelerate Auto is a company that helps car owners by offering services like extended warranties to cover repairs after the original warranty ends.

Car

Tesla Model 3

The Tesla Model 3 Performance is a fast version of Tesla's electric car that can go from 0 to 60 mph quickly. It's packed with tech and is designed for a fun driving experience.

Company

Xcare

Xcare is a service that helps you pay for repairs on your electric car, like a Tesla, after the original warranty ends. They offer plans that can last longer than what Tesla provides.

Term

battery and drive units

The battery is what powers an electric car, and the drive unit helps it move. These parts can be very expensive to fix, so it's important to have coverage for them.

Term

FSD means Full Self-Driving, which is a technology from Tesla that allows their cars to drive themselves without needing a driver. However, drivers still need to pay attention and be ready to take control if necessary.

Concept

robot taxi service

A robot taxi service is a way of getting rides in cars that drive themselves without a driver. It's like calling a taxi, but the car comes to you and drives you where you want to go all on its own.

Concept

autonomy

Autonomy means that a car can drive itself without needing a person to control it. This is part of the development of self-driving cars.

Term

full self-driving

Full self-driving means that a car can drive itself without any help from a person. It can make decisions like turning and stopping all on its own.

Car

Tesla Model X

The Tesla Model X is an electric SUV that stands out for its unique doors and is designed for families who want a high-tech vehicle.

Car

Tesla Model S

Term

front bumper camera

A front bumper camera is a camera located at the front of the car that helps drivers see better when parking or driving slowly.

Car

Tesla Model Y

The Tesla Model Y is a small SUV that runs on electricity instead of gas. It's popular because it has a lot of space inside and comes with cool tech features, making it a great family car.

Car

Tesla Cybertruck

The Tesla Cybertruck is an electric truck that looks very different from regular trucks because of its sharp, boxy shape. It's talked about a lot because it offers a lot of power and can do many of the same things as traditional trucks, but without using gas.

Term

Frost Blue

Frost Blue is a color that you can choose for your Tesla car. It's one of the options that makes your car look unique.

Term

Signature Red

Signature Red is a unique color that Tesla offers for their cars. It's very popular and not many cars are painted in this color, making it special.

Term

unicorns

In car collecting, 'unicorns' are special cars that are very rare or unique. They are often hard to find and can be very valuable because of their rarity.

Car

Ford Explorer

The Ford Explorer is a family-friendly SUV that has been around for a long time. It's popular because it has a lot of room for passengers and cargo, making it great for trips and everyday use.

Term

EV

An EV, or electric vehicle, is a car that runs on electricity. Instead of using gas, it uses batteries to power the motor.

Term

aero efficiency

Aero efficiency is about how smoothly a car moves through the air. The better it is at cutting through the air, the less energy it needs to go the same distance, which is especially important for electric cars.

Part

carbon ceramic brakes

Carbon ceramic brakes are special brakes that help cars stop faster and are lighter than regular brakes. They don't get as hot, which is great for performance.

Term

Tesla paint color

Tesla cars come in different colors, and some colors are made in fewer numbers than others. The rarest colors are special and can be more valuable to collectors.

Term

brown metallic

Brown metallic is a shiny brown color used on some cars. It has a special finish that makes it look sparkly or reflective.

Term

sentry mode

Sentry mode is a special security system in Tesla cars that watches the area around the car and can record videos if something unusual happens while the car is parked.

Company

Abstract Ocean

Abstract Ocean is a business that sells extra parts and accessories for Tesla cars, and now they also sell items for Rivian cars. They are known for having good products because they've been in business for a long time.

Term

puddle lights

Puddle lights are lights that shine down to help you see the ground when you open your car door. They make it easier to avoid stepping in puddles or other things in the dark.

Term

license plate bracket

A license plate bracket is what holds your car's license plate in place. Some are easy to take off, but others can be tricky because they use strong glue.

Term

snap plate

A snap plate is a special holder for your car's license plate that makes it easy to put on and take off without hurting the car's paint.

Company

Everyamp

Everyamp is a company that makes car accessories, like special plates for your car's license plate.

Term

ceramic coating

Ceramic coating is a special layer you can put on your car's paint to protect it and make it shiny for a long time without needing to wax it.

LIVE

On this week's episode of Ride the Lightning, the Tesla and EV podcast, Tesla chief designer

Franz von Holsheusen sits down with me, yes, again, to discuss Masterplan Part 4, his role

as the company evolves, Tesla's rarest paint colors, and so much more.

What's happening friends, I of course am Ryan McCaffrey and this is the 533rd episode of

Ride the Lightning, the Tesla and EV podcast coming at you every single week for the past

10 plus years.

This one's being released on October 19th, 2025 and I am just back from Los Angeles.

What a privilege this week as you've already gathered from the intro there.

I once again had the extremely good fortune of getting to go visit and sit down with Franz

von Holsheusen, the chief designer at Tesla, at his design studio in LA.

I know episode 500, he was my big guest for episode 500, that was only 33 short weeks

ago, but yes, he is back, I'm so grateful, really to be very sincere for a minute, anytime

I get the opportunity to sit down with him or any of these folks at Tesla, I know it's

a rare privilege and I try not to take that for granted.

I know it might not seem, you might be like, well rare, he was just here six months ago.

It is still a very rare privilege, even though I've had the extreme good fortune now of sitting

down with Franz twice in one year.

I flew down for a day trip, just I'm fortunate to be in the San Francisco area, so it's

a quick down and back for me.

This interview was recorded this past Tuesday, so that's October 14th, so if anything crazy

has happened in the world of Tesla since then, that's why it's not addressed on this episode.

Flew down on Tuesday and as always Franz was extremely gracious with his time.

I also want to extend a big thank you to long time listener Matt Para for once again doing

some really awesome post production work on the audio of the interview, to get it sounding

as good as possible, his help is so appreciated.

Now I've put time codes in the episode description if you would like to jump around to any specific

topics, but I hope you will enjoy the interview in its entirety.

That'll be coming up in just a few minutes, but first I do have a couple of quick housekeeping

things.

First I hope that all of you who are kindly supporting this podcast, supporting my work

here on my Patreon page, enjoyed this week's Lightning Round bonus mini episode, which was

a chat with long time listener and Patreon backer Kevin Yank who talks about life as

a Tesla owner in Australia, which I had a great time talking to him and just getting his perspective

on Tesla life in a completely different spot.

I talk a lot about how I am very much living in the Tesla bubble for better and for worse.

That is my perspective on the Teslaverse, is from right here in what used to be the headquarters,

still the home of the Fremont factory, still where four of the five Teslas get manufactured,

and Kevin has his own unique perspective being an enthusiast and Tesla owner in Australia,

so we had a good time chatting there.

Once a month I've been trying to spotlight a different listener, different Patreon backer,

because I just like talking to people about their Tesla stories.

If you're with me on Patreon at that $10 per month level or higher, I hope you'll enjoy

that one.

If you're not already with me on Patreon, a reminder that all the tiers of the Patreon

get early access to each week's episode, which means those of you on Patreon already

got early access to this episode, this new, I think surprise, it's fair to call it, surprise

interview with Franz von Holzhausen.

So you can join my Patreon and get early access to whatever the next Tesla executive interview

is, if and when the time comes that I'm lucky enough to get another one.

So you can visit my Patreon page found at patreon.com slash Tesla podcast.

Also, if you are planning to keep your EV Tesla or otherwise beyond the manufacturer's

warranty, I very much encourage you to check out Xcare from my friends at Accelerate Auto.

As I told you last week, I just bought a new policy.

So I had a three year extended plan, extended warranty service with them.

That three years is up.

I've renewed it again because my wife and I do plan to keep our 2018 Model 3 performance

for at least three more years, probably a lot more than three more years if everything

goes okay with the car, but now even if it doesn't, we are covered.

Now also, I realize that Tesla does offer their own extended service agreement now,

so I know you're saying, well, hey, I should price shot both.

Yes, you should, but Xcare is actually a better value in my humble opinion than Tesla's because

it covers your Tesla six years past your four year 50,000 mile warranty from Tesla

that's two years longer than their own ESA and it also covers way more than Tesla's extended plan

does like the battery and drive units, for example.

So they are Tesla owners themselves, Tesla former employees in fact.

So if you're considering an extended service plan on your Tesla or other EV,

you owe it to yourself to compare the two and to do so and shop Xcare for your Tesla.

Just go to xcare.com, that's X-C-A-R-E dot com and they have a new off menu 18 month pilot offer,

no interest on the payments for your plan for 18 months.

So to take advantage of that and or request a custom quote, give them a call.

You'll get a human, not an AI, not a robot.

1-800-655-3509, again, that's Xcare.com, the number one ranked EV protection plan

according to, and this is true, GROC and chat GPT.

You ask them and that's the answer you're going to get.

All right, it is time for the main event, my fourth

interview overall with Franz von Holsthausen, second one of 2025, covering, as you heard at

the top, master plan part for his future role at Tesla as the company's ambitions and intentions

evolve, autonomy versus cars with steering wheels, paint-colored trivia,

all kinds of fun stuff covered in this 59 minute interview.

I hope you enjoy it and when it's over, I will come back and give you some

parting thoughts, some other few little things to wrap up, but for now, enjoy the interview with Franz.

Music

Twice in one year, I'm back at the Tesla Design Center

with the great Franz von Holsthausen, the chief designer at Tesla.

Thanks for having me back, Franz.

Lucky me, right?

Yeah, pretty soon, I'm going to need a desk here.

I know, right?

You're going to have to set me up.

So there's, even though we just talked six or seven months ago for episode 500, thank you again

for that, by the way, that was such a fun way to celebrate that little milestone of mine.

I've got a, there's a million new things to talk to you about.

So few, yeah.

Let's start with kind of the most urgent topic.

We've got a big vote coming up, big shareholder vote coming up, master plan part four, it's all

tied together.

And it focuses a lot on sustainable abundance.

That's kind of the key phrase now through robotics, through autonomy.

Elon talked a lot on the last earnings call about really what I interpreted as a hard pivot

to focus on those things.

But my initial reaction to it as a Tesla shareholder, Tesla owner, Tesla fan,

and I saw a lot of this in the Tesla community was that it seemed like it was,

it was a little lacking in details compared to the previous master plans, which were pretty

concrete.

So why are you excited about master plan part four and sort of how is Tesla going to get this done?

Well, that's a big question.

Yeah, we'll do the Tesla fashion, of course.

I'm excited about it.

This is, I think, like you said, hard pivot.

I'm not sure it's, for me, it doesn't feel like a hard pivot.

It feels like we've been working towards this for quite a long time.

We've been working on autonomy, humanoid robots, maybe is new, but it's been newish,

but it's been something we've been working in the background on.

And our FSD concept is just improving month over month, week over week for many years now.

And so I feel like this is just a continuation of all those really great things that we've

been working on.

And from a design perspective, we've been developing our products to accommodate autonomy

and energy, obviously.

You know, it's the continued improvements in energy.

So it doesn't feel necessarily new.

It just feels like this is, we've gotten FSD now to a point where we're really confident

in its continued path to removing the driver completely from the experience.

And rolling that out in a robot taxi service with our cyber cab that we're working on.

We debuted a few days ago, a year ago, a year or two days ago.

It's already been a quick year, yeah.

So amazing how fast time flies.

But we've been developing that idea for a while.

So I think, to me, it feels like the work that we've been doing has been leading to this

and leading up to this since almost the beginning.

When we set out and we're designing Model 3 back in the early teens,

if you look at that car and where our headspace was,

we were designing that already around this idea of autonomy.

Right, no instrument cluster.

Yeah, there's no instrument cluster in front of the driver that you could remove the wheel

and pedals and you would have an equally balanced interior on both sides.

And that was a big vision of that interior direction.

And you see that continued forward and just, you know, hopefully waiting and waiting in a way

for full self-driving to become a reality that we could remove the wheel and we would have

this design set up and I think, you know, with the infotainment screen in the middle

becoming the hero of the interior, it was really, that vision was alive, you know, 10 years ago.

So now it's really coming to fruition.

Now our products are, you know, really falling.

They're really optimized now for the software stack that's enabling this full self-driving

experience and, you know, that same, a lot of the same hardware and honestly the firmware

software as well as, you know, is going into the robot as well, so into Optimus.

I am very much of the opinion.

So, you know, I fell in love with this company because of the cars and the,

your beautiful design work and just how fun and thrilling these cars are.

And certainly I'm of the opinion that society is still going to want, even if ultimately they

don't necessarily need cars with inputs because autonomy is fully capable, but I feel like we're

going to need 10, 20 years worth of new cars in new segments that people can actually drive

themselves. So will there be new vehicles, not just variants, if you just launched a

couple of big new variants, which we'll talk about later, the standard three and standard

y, but are you going to be going into any new vehicle segments here in the next five to 10

years because I love your work, your team's work and I want to see, I want to see you guys cook

some more. I mean, of course we will continue to design great products. The focus is really going

to be around autonomy, but just because it's autonomous vehicle doesn't mean that style goes

out the window or that your impression and your experience when you're inside the vehicle or

how you feel about it, whether it's an owned vehicle or your kind of leasing time with it,

will always maintain an incredibly high bar and high standard for, you know, just good design and

aesthetics that are pleasing and things that you actually can love, like we have been doing

with our products all along. So, you know, however the path forward goes, I think you can

kind of rest assured that we'll continue to maintain a high bar for a beautiful product

and that nothing about that will change. So Lars recently called the next, the new roadster,

the last great driver's car. Is that going to be the last steering wheel you ever designed?

Are there going to be future Teslas released with steering wheels, steering inputs in them?

I think you have to wait and see, but I think, you know, on our immediate horizon right now,

you know, that statement from Lars is probably correct. You know, I think

autonomy is coming, like an avalanche. And I think we're in a position where we won't,

as a company, be able to keep up with kind of the demand of that. And I think that's where,

you know, as a company, we can do the best to society by serving the kind of crazy demand

and need that autonomy will have. And the ability to bring transportation and kind of democratize

transportation for people that are underserved currently, people that can't afford to get from

A to B or, you know, can no longer drive or handicapped or, you know, older, bad vision,

whatever. I think suddenly will be those people will find a freedom that maybe they once had

and now can have again, or they never had, they aspire to have it, but just were never financially

able to get there. And suddenly unlocking that ability, I mean, that's, that in a way is a more

grand vision than, you know, an affluent person being able to drive, you know, down the street,

I think. So not to say that we're not going to, you know, focus on all means of transportation,

but I think the importance of, like I said, democratizing transportation is huge

in our vision right now. Because like for me, it's, you guys seem to have certainly the financial

resources to do both, to do, to keep making new cars, new segments for people that want to drive

sometimes or go autonomous other times versus, I guess the way I've interpreted the messaging

from Elon and the company so far is that it's really going to be almost 100% focused on autonomy.

I mean, I think that's the right interpretation. Okay. So.

All right. So Roadster really is going to be the last great driver's car from Tesla.

It will be a great driver's car for sure. Will it be the last one? I don't know.

All right. I'll have to paint you with that corner, I guess. Although those were Lars's words,

not mine. Sure. And they'll remain Lars's words. But, you know, you never say never,

but I think Roadster will be an amazing driver's car, amazing car that really looks at the limit

of physics. We've talked about that in relation to Roadster for many years now. And I think you've

really gotten to a point where we are going to be achieving that kind of standard that we set out.

I'll come back to that later, but I want to cover these kind of higher level things that more people

than just me care about. So kind of tying this all in to Masterplan Part 4. You got this big

share. Like, I have seen this huge, huge push from you guys, like getting the word out. You

think it's really important, both from, you know, a Tesla perspective, but also just from,

you know, all the things we just mentioned about the great things that we can do with the,

you know, to improve the labor force or transportation, energy, AI, bringing all those

together only happens if we get, you know, this vote approved with Elon's leadership.

Like, look, Tesla wouldn't be here today without Elon's leadership. The EV kind of

revolution and the revolution in energy would not really exist if it wasn't for Tesla and,

like, honestly, like Elon's leadership. So, and I think in order to incentivize him to like

continue to push on behalf of Tesla, like, that these things need to be approved. And you know,

we just urge everybody to get out there and vote. It's incredibly easy. I just did it. It's

like, take a second. Yeah, I got a thing in the mail and I got an email to log in and do it.

It's, they seem like they've made it pretty simple to do. And it is. And I think it's, you know,

you get this stuff from other companies that, you know, maybe you're invested in and kind of don't

ever pay attention to it. But I think this one's really important. I think it's worth

taking the extra 10 seconds out of your life to, you know, if you, if you've invested in Tesla,

then these things should be important to you. And if you want Tesla to continue to

be successful, we need Elon's leadership. So what would, I'm curious, you know, I'm

just a big fan of your work specifically. I just, I love both my Model 3 performances.

What would your role in Master Plan Part 4 be? I mean, obviously you're doing design work on

Optimus, but can you kind of speak a little higher level as to sort of what your next five to 10

years, not late any sort of specific services, but just sort of higher level. Well, like I was

explaining before, you know, we need the vessels that put people in to get them from A to B. If

you're talking about autonomy and self-driving. And, you know, I think if you're, if you're still

owning a vehicle, you want that, you want that vehicle to be beautiful and great. And all the

things that you love about your current cars, you know, we'll continue to develop and expand on that.

And those cars can be put into service or used by yourself, you know, and you get time back

through autonomy to focus on other things, you know, like the time that you spend driving now

could be in traffic especially, you know, just horrible. That time can be given back to you

to use as you please for entertainment, for, you know, rest, for work, whatever, whatever you

deemed. So we want to continue to create the space for that. But I think, you know, transportation

and vehicle design, it's a little bit like fashion and architecture where, you know, you,

there's a representation of your own character in the things that you spend good money on

that represent you. And you want to feel good about those things. And you want to feel like

you made a great decision, both, you know, internally and also I think be viewed as making

a great decision. And we want to be able to deliver that. So our world will continue to

work on the products like CyroCab and, you know, the Reboven and products like that that

continue to bring this vision of transportation and, you know, whether it's singular mass

transportation in a really futuristic and beautiful way, you know, and, you know, whether

we continue to develop Roadster and Roadster versions down the road that are exciting to own

and drive, you know, who knows where the regulations go. Maybe one day, you know, we'll be regulated

out of being able to drive on roads except for private areas, which then, you know, we'll need

a very forefront of establishing what this new experience is going to be like.

I don't think it's going to be like cattle in a back of a van or, you know, like,

you know, economy class in an airline or anything like that. We want to make it a really great

experience. And I think, you know, CyroCab is the beginning of just the, you know, touching the

toe into the waters of where, where, you know, futuristic transportation can take you.

Yeah, the lounge style seats, the 20, I believe 24 inch display in there, which in the,

in what is the smallest Tesla, at least since the original Roadster, right? It's got this,

it's got the biggest screen out of any of the cars. Yeah, that's, you guys, your team does the UI

too, right? Not just the outside of the cars, but also the, on the software side.

Yeah, we work on like all the components that people come in contact with and, you know,

whether it's, you know, the, the contents that, that we put on the website, the website itself,

the, the experiences that you have and the user interface, I think, you know, all that

is a part of the overall design and design language that we want to offer. And where

there's many groups that are touching all of that. And I think, you know, we're trying to

bring that together in a really cohesive element where the overall experience from the first

touch points to sitting in the space to the interaction, the experience that you have is

fun and enjoyable that you love your experience. And you, you know, I was just talking to somebody

who got a Tesla recently, and I think they're, they can't ever imagine themselves going back

because they've had this experience now that just is not served to them and by any other

manufacturer in any other way. And, you know, they just can't imagine that they haven't had this

experience in their life already in, in their transportation environment. And can't imagine

ever leaving it, you know. And that's amazing to hear that, you know, because we, we think we're

doing it right. And we're always asking, how do we do it better? But it's great to step back and

hear the impact that happens. That's the, that's one common thing that I hear, I'm sure you do too,

from these, you've got other manufacturers that are making some pretty good EVs out there now,

but the common thing seems to be for most of them, the software is just, it's just not as good as it

is in the Tesla in various shapes and form. And I think, you know, we work really hard on that part

as well as all the other pieces. And I think we really tried to bring an experience that's unrivaled

and is fun and, you know, interactive and has a sense of humor. You know, it's, it's an, it's an

appliance, but we want to make it not really an appliance and make it like an experience that

you remember and you want to talk to your friends about and laugh about and have a good time and

something that you want to get back into and keep on rolling, you know. I know you, you mentioned

earlier that you've been working towards autonomy for years and that is evident in even on the

software side on the UI, but as we get closer and closer to full, full autonomy and, and not

having to sit in the driver's seat and monitor the car, is the UI as we see it fairly indicative of,

of what that full autonomous experience is going to be like? Or do you, do you envision a,

yeah, there's a, you'll see a, you'll see a improved for like a user experience, I think,

yeah, that really focuses on the time that, how you want to spend it, not necessarily reporting

back about what the car is doing and, you know, you can think of it like when you're on a train

or a plane, like what are the things that are important to you? You check in on your destination

or you're going to be there on time. Do you need to look at the map all the time? You know, some

people sit there and stare at the screen in front of them and just watch them out. But I think,

you know, most part you're, you're kind of checked out and you're doing work or you're, you know,

watching a movie or playing a game or something like that. So we will offer all of those things

and make that experience just refreshing and fun. So related to autonomy, it would be journalistic

malpractice if I did not take the opportunity here getting to sit with you to go to bat for

my fellow new Model 3 owners, new Model S owners, new Model X owners that have AI4 cars

that don't have a front bumper camera on the car. I know this is kind of more of a large thing.

Maybe we just call them up right now and bug him and just put the phone next to the mic. But

it's seemingly being utilized for FSD to make, make the autonomous driving experience better.

It's nice just as a convenience when you're parking in your garage or at a curb stop. So

can we please get a paid, you know, it's not expecting anything free here,

a retrofit for those of us with model, new Model 3, new Model S, new Model X that want

to pay you money to have that front bumper camera because my car has less than a year old and

it's got hardware for. Theoretically, it's got all the ports in the FSD computer.

Franz, please. I will talk to Lars. You got to make this happen for me. You're like the number

two guy in the company. We'll see what we can do for sure. All right, we can, we can bug Lars later.

So you guys put out a little master plan part four little sizzle video when the plan was announced

and I know you've been asked about this before, but again, I've got to, I've got to throw my,

my question in here. I have to figure that you go over, you've, you approve every frame of

that video before it goes out. You know where this is going. So in the background of a, there's,

there's a cyber cab. I think it might even be a clay model of cyber cab in the foreground.

But then in the background, up on racks are what appear to be sort of smaller scale.

One of my listeners called it a cyberbin, sort of a cyber truck, but an SUV form. So

is, are you going to be doing more with the cyber truck platform? I think this is,

maybe we've like set a precedent beyond what, kind of what we expected that

anything that comes out of the studio is going into production. And, you know, we, we are like,

we are constantly looking at all sorts of iterations and ideas for all of our products.

Yeah. A lot of those never see the light of day. A lot of them are, you know,

good ideas. They go on a shelf. Maybe they surface, maybe they don't. So, you know, that,

that was some exploration that we had done years ago. And, you know, we'll see.

I mean, it's interesting to hear the, the demand for it and maybe that demand.

Well, that's what I'm talking about with new market segments. Like it seems like, you know,

there's still, there really isn't pretty much an electric minivan out there. And there's a lot of

families that want something like that. There's, you know, there are smaller pickups. There are,

I mean, you know, 10 times better than I do, obviously. But, and there's certainly a market

for a like larger three row, seven, eight seat passenger SUV that, that the cyber truck platform

seems like it, it could be a great fit for. Yeah. I know. And like, this is something that we get

all the time. Like, why aren't you making this or are you making that? And I think, you know,

if we chased all of those, we would be making, you know, 100 different types of vehicles. And,

you know, I think inhibiting ourselves from doing great, as opposed to, you know,

maybe we could do all those things and, you know, well, but it would be tough to make them all

really great. And, you know, I think focusing on a few really great things, especially as we move

into autonomy, where I don't know that you need everything in the kitchen sink, you know, in,

in order to achieve that plan. So, you know, for us, people being able to really

create a few great products is kind of always been our thing. And, you know, I think we'll

continue on that path. So is that, is that more of a sort of a design? Well, I don't know that we

need to like hit every niche market, you know, and you see a lot of manufacturers that do that,

and they spend a lot of energy, like it costs energy and time and, you know, brain cells to go

into doing all these niche things that last a year or two years, and you make a few of them, and

they quickly go by the wayside and, you know, their experiments sometimes. And I think, you know,

for us just focusing on the real core pieces that really make the most sense is, you know,

where we're set up to do and what we can do really well.

Well, one market you are serving, maybe that's, that you hadn't before, to an extent, is in China,

the Model YL. So six seat, little more luxurious, got the captain's chairs. And it seems to have

enormous demand in China so far. It seems to be off to an absolutely flying start.

It's a really great product. You know, we spent a lot of time looking at that and,

you know, optimizing. We didn't want to make the car too big. We wanted to make it still

affordable and really make the third row experience, I think, better than any of our third row

experiences to date. And, you know, we had a lot of experience come out of Model X, and that's,

you know, understanding how people use the second and third rows and how they get

around inside the vehicle to get there. And that's the space demands that people want. And so

we're able to use that experience and optimize the long wheelbase for Model Y and come up with a

really, I think, compelling, good design that is, you know, clearly so far really successful.

And so, yeah, it's a hit over there. Elon has commented on X that doesn't, there's no sort of

indication, no plan that it's coming over here. Why wouldn't you guys bring it over here if you're

seeing that kind of interest in it in the Chinese market? I mean, I think, you know, we still have

a third row vehicle here with Model X. And you can get a third row in the Model Y. And I think,

again, like where the Model Y is really successful as it is right now and just adding that extra

pain point at the moment, maybe makes the right sense, maybe doesn't, we're still looking at it.

Well, you mentioned third row in the Model Y, not at this exact, that was actually on my list. So

when you and Lars went over to see Jay Leno, beginning of the year when the new Y was just

launching, I think it was, Lars had mentioned to Jay, oh, the performance and third row,

seven-seater version, pardon me, was on the way this year. Should we be on the lookout for the

seven-seat Y soon-ish? I'll have to get back to you on that. Oh, classic bronze dodge. You know,

you've already introduced a couple new variants this quarter. So maybe next quarter I should

you again. I mean, Model Y Standard is a great product. I think that was a really interesting

exercise in making a more affordable product, but not taking value out of the car, not taking

this idea that we're just stripping the car out to its bare minimum and you get ripped off when

you get this product. We want to make sure that you had a great experience. And it's got a different

center console, which is something that we started with Model S and we see that trend kind of moving

around through different manufacturers as well and really a space that you can put anything.

Yeah, handbag or whatever. Yeah, so and that's proven to be really popular. There's a lot of

climates that I think the textile seats are, you know, going to be wildly popular and especially

the warmer southern climates where are not leather is sometimes, you know, people are

complaining about that. But I think it's, and it's a good modern looking vehicle.

Yeah, hopefully you wouldn't take offense if I told you that I genuinely, I think the front end

looks better. It just looks a little sportier, a little more aggressive to me without the light

bar. It does have the kind of more traditional headlight arrangement that we're familiar with

from in the automotive environment. And I think, you know, with with a Model Y and Model Y,

you know, that that new facelift, we really wanted to, you know, start to look at something

that was fresh on the road and unique and didn't have the normal, you know, like same as Cybertruck,

you know, just doesn't have the quintessential face elements and really looks kind of futuristic

because of that. And we wanted to bring that same thing to Model Y. And I think it was really

successful. And I think Model Y is great. But we wanted to have a differentiation between the

standard version and the premium version. And, you know, I think the standard version has a

really modern feel to it, really super clean. You know, I love how clean and almost stoic it is,

even though it has like that kind of traditional vibe to it. It's just really

pretty minimal. And even though the body sides are, you know, from the more sculptural

you know, original Y, I think the front and rear end are really nicely integrated in a much more

modern way. We've got a lot of, you know, got rid of a lot of the baby fat out of the original Model

Y in the front, you know, the chubby cheeks. Same as the three, right? It's three really leaned out,

too. And now you can see, like, kind of a cousin relationship between the standard Y and the

current Model 3. Yeah. And how about Model Y performance is a thing now, since you and I

at last talked. What were sort of the design exercise for you there?

Yeah, Model Y performance to me is kind of really geared around the person who

enjoys the journey to the hobby or the sport or the thing that they really love doing,

that they pour a lot of energy and thought and time into, you know, like they're really,

they're dedicated to the type of equipment they bring, whether it's like skiing or it's

rewarding or hiking or, you know, that they're into the real specifics on it and they're kind of

over and above the normal person, I would say. And so it's Model Y performance is really around

the person who enjoys that journey to get to the thing that they really love. So they have now

product that they can really enjoy getting there. They can, you know, it's tailored to the carving

turns or the acceleration burst or that kind of euphoria they have when they're like, imagine myself

like skiing down a hill or snowboarding, whatever. And the car is kind of tailored to that. So it's

not about, it's not about arriving to the destination. It's about the journey to it.

And you care just as much about that part as you do the thing that you're going to be doing when

you get there. Would you describe me the Model 3 performance owner the same way as well?

Yeah, exactly. Like you enjoy the journey as much as the destination and you care about like

that experience as much as you do, like you care about the experience once you arrive.

And, you know, I think so both of those vehicles, both performance are really kind of tailored

to the person who thinks like that. Literally anytime I'm having even this the slightest bit

of bad day, if I'm stopped in the car and have a safe opportunity to slam the accelerator,

it is, it is genuinely like a, it's a physical reaction of I can't help but smile like it is,

but I think the best part about these, you know, they may be the performance versions,

but they do all the other things that a Model Y does extremely well. You can still use it as,

you know, like as a Swiss Army knife. It's incredibly capable on the utilitarian side

as well. We didn't give up any of that, of that aspect that makes the kind of current Model Y

great or the Model 3 great, you know, from that perspective. Are you still dailying Cybertruck

or what are you dailying right now? I'm trying the Model S, but yeah, I go back and forth between

Cybertruck and the new Model S Plaid. You know, it's, Model S is like near and dear to my heart,

you know, it's been around for so long. You've always said that's your favorite whenever I ask you.

I mean, it's always the next thing is my favorite, but in terms of like picking something to drive,

I think that has like, you know, the new Plaid with the improved seats,

just as a, it's a great overall car and there's, I find it hard to find any other car that's better.

I love the Cybertruck ride and dynamics of the rest of Cybertruck. I think that's

pretty unparalleled. Like the Cybertruck in a way is like just a bigger Model Y. It's a

moment's notice. It can do anything, which it's really hard to find a vehicle that can do that.

Like in a split second, it can be, you know, a completely different type of vehicle

and manage like all of it gracefully and all of it in a way that you can actually really

enjoy and have fun. Like from, you know, the bed doubles as a huge trunk and can take luggage or

whatever. And then in the next moment, you can go to Home Depot or go out on the farm and like

pile stuff in it and beat almost any car off the line in a race. You know, it's just like,

I don't know, it's a great all-round, does everything really well at a moment's notice.

I think that's the kind of way to put it. You rocking that new Frost Blue on that new

Plaid of yours or what did you go with? Yeah, the Frost Blue is great. I think, you know,

colors are always something that we talk about. Yes, you know, I love asking that.

And the Frost Blue is really a color we've been working on for a while.

And I think you told me the story last time of you had it, you had it, you wrapped a

wire or running around with it. We wrapped a Model S and developed a car based off, you know,

we developed the car, the color for the wrap and then it just proved like,

like hiding in plain sight and getting a lot of responses and proved really popular. And so we're

we got to make a paint. Still no glacier over here though. Yeah, Glacier is a challenging color

to paint. And so all of our factories are not set up with a paint shop that can paint that.

But you know, I think Frost is a really good option. It's interesting. So I wonder if you

would indulge me in that for just two seconds, because that Quicksilver was originally a gig

of Berlin exclusive for what at the time was the same reason I was the more advanced paint shop

over there. But now we've got Quicksilver everywhere. So is our are they're kind of ongoing

are all the paint shops trying to be except on S and X. Right. So, you know, the Fremont,

the Fremont paint shop is slightly different and doesn't we can't put Quicksilver into that shop.

Oh, so we all the Quicksilver. No, because they're a Quicksilver threes and all the threes. Yeah.

Come out of there, but they're in a different paint shop. There's two. Okay, I see. Okay,

right. That makes sense. So Glacier blue still kind of maybe for the future. Yeah,

in the rest of the world. Yeah, cool. Glacier blue is a great color too. It just like it

accentuates the form. I think, you know, the highlights on it are really crisp and clean.

Yeah, we have a lot of blue colors. Yeah, another new one, too, that I haven't even it

is as of this, it came out like right when I published last last week's episode over in Europe.

So, another new blue. Another dark blue. Yeah, that's, you know, I think the European

team really saw that dark blues resonate really well over there. And so we developed a really

great blue that has this beautiful flash in the sunlight, but looks really sophisticated and

is a slightly darker on the more normal cloudy days. And so looking like Midnight Cherry Red,

indeed retired, which I know I brought up last time. No color is truly retired.

Signature red, I guess, maybe would be an exception to that, right? That was specifically

limited to the first thousand S's and X's. It was. Oddly enough, I think signature red might be the

color of all the colors that we developed, the one with the least, the smallest amount of take.

Well, that was, yeah, I had sent along, I don't know if you got, I tried to assign you some homework

for this interview. I was curious. I brought some notes. Oh, good, okay.

We might as well just do it now while we're talking. So, yeah. Let's see if we correspond.

Yeah, so I'm, this may be of no interest to anybody but me, but I guess if I'm something of

a Tesla historian, I was always curious, A, what the rarest color is, and I'll give you a guess

before you give me the answer, because I think the answer is going to be brown metallic from the

old Model S days, because I really, you know, I see everything in the Bay Area at home,

and I see green more often than I see brown, but I was always just curious how many signature

reds exist, because it was limited to begin with, and can I give you a guess before you give me

the real answer if you have it there? Yeah, let me see if I can, yeah, okay. Because I'm going to

guess, like if it was, that maybe like a third of those thousand S and X buyers of Signature

Series, so I'm going to say maybe like, are there 700 total signature reds? It's pretty close. From

the info that I have, the most rare color is signature red. It is, okay. By just a few cars,

and Brown, and to Brown is next. Is next, okay, so I'm not completely off base. No, no, no, not at

not at all, but it was just over 800 signature reds. Yeah, that's but oddly enough, we did

six, I'll call Unicorn, one off colors at one point. That's right. George R. R. Martin has one

of them. It's purple. There's a purple car. paint shop manager. I actually saw this car once when I

was visiting an employee friend of mine in Fremont. It was just in the parking lot, so I wasn't

breaking any NDAs. Yeah, because the old paint shop manager had like this lime green Model S, right?

We called it lime green because you back then you could pay, I believe it was 15 grand and you

could you could get any color. Yeah, so I did one to electric blue. Oh, really? Where's that car

now? Is it at home? It's here in Santa Monica. Nice. And yeah, there's six of them. So there's a

the blue, a lime green, there's a burnt orange. Oh, cool. There's a pink. Wow. And then there's

another one called Crabber blue. And then the purple one you mentioned. Nice. So those are the

true unicorns. True unicorns, yeah. One of ones that are out there. Hopefully they're still all

live. I don't know. I hope so. I would imagine that people kept them alive, but that's really,

well, I appreciate you sharing that like honestly, because that's technically it's like internal Tesla

data. And I wasn't sure if you were going to, you were going to break that out for this, but

there you go. So about 800 signature red. Yeah, just over. Yeah, that's pretty cool.

And indeed brown, brown up next. I think, yeah, brown is, I feel like I see more sick red cars,

older cars around than I do brown. Brown for me is really brown with the the aero wheel.

Oh, gosh, that's yeah. That combination is true unicorn. Yeah, that's like a handful of those cars.

Not, not a big fan myself of that particular wheel design. No offense,

but efficient. Yes, did the job. Obviously it was, you know,

totally 265 miles on the original, you know, there's a balance between efficiency and

sure small wheel design. Let's see here. I wanted to get back to, oh,

the, the wheel covers for standard three and standard Y. So obviously we got a couple new

wheel designs here. Just how many iterations does that go through before you finally land?

Oh, you're just, he's rolling his eyes back on those wheels. I mean, that was, that's a,

that was an interesting one because it's really just a one piece wheel. Yeah.

Cover and like, does it even, this is an ignorant question. So I apologize if this is like just

dumb. Does the design on an aero one piece cover even matter too much in terms of the efficiency?

Or is it all, it does. It does. It does. And, you know, we're trying to find the balance between

something that's not just a flat disc, although on Cybert cab, the flat disc is actually quite cool.

Fits the car. Fits the car. But, you know, this, that's a much more modern and all new design. And

I think, you know, the standard cars are, are, you know, a, we call it refresh. And I think, you

and had some dimension to it and didn't look like a flat piece of plastic on the side of it.

Thanks for making them dark color, by the way. It's just, that just looks better. I think you

ask like nine, nine to 10 people, you know, there's, I think there's, you know, there's camps of

people that like light wheels and dark wheels. And I think, you know, the caps to me with just

enough texture. And if you notice, we put texture into them as well to kind of catch light and,

and make them a little bit more dramatic. I think they blend into the tire and just kind of creates

a more of a mono volume. But we went through a lot of iterations. So you're talking about the

challenges of doing the standard Y and standard three, because it's, you know, you don't want to

take out too much of the car, but you need to bring the price down. So like, was, did you, were

you able to take any learnings from the Cybertruck long range rear wheel drive and that because,

because that I think kind of like different, they're different projects. The standard model Y,

I think, you know, they're, they're ideas that we had going into developing model Y that we,

we kind of brought for, we brought back out kind of dusted off as we were developing it.

And so I think, you know, some of it was just looking at how do we create a new fresh experience

in the car. And I think bring some of these ideas that we had previously to, to light. So

it was kind of a fun exercise and taking like, it's a little bit of pressure to like screw around

with the world's best selling vehicle, you know, because any little thing you could do could,

could totally tip it, tip it sideways. And so we were, you know, conscious of that, we wanted to

make sure that we were making the right moves. And, but I think what we were able to achieve is,

is potentially, in kind of in my opinion, I think you get more than what you pay for anyway,

I think it still feels potentially more premium than the price point. So in terms of just the

overall balance of the car. Well, what was the most challenging part of it? Because, obviously,

you're, you're working under more of a, I guess, for lack of a better term, just a cost constraint of,

you know, we could use this material or this material, but this one costs more. So when we're

trying to, we've got a price objective here. So for your team, obviously, Lars's team has his

own challenges. Has their own challenges with that? What's design team's biggest challenge

when you're doing the standard three and the standard one? I think, I think like the material,

materiality of the interior is always challenging. And we want to make sure that we still felt like

it was a premium experience. It's, and we know the price point of the car, we want to make sure

that we're still delivering a high caliber, high level feel, even though we're using alternative

materials to kind of our standard, like non leather, vegan leather products. So

the textiles were, you know, good Explorer. We've been, you know, you're seeing textiles

show up in the interiors across the board of our cars. And I think expanding on that

was super fun because it was another texture to bring into the interior instead of just having

kind of monolithic, similar material and, you know, trying to guess which is plastic and which

is a TPU or something. So that, that's been really cool. And I think in a lot of aspects,

the textiles feel in some ways, you know, more premium than the vegan leather.

I just remembered, so I'm starting to run out of time here. I just remember I had,

there was the one other bit of homework and I'm not sure if you got it. I had asked you last time,

if we remove price from the equation, which the Model 3 performance and the Model Y performance

now do, the paint colors are all just included, what's the most, what do people choose the most?

Did you happen to, I don't know if you got that. I don't know that, but I think historically,

I think historically the pearl white is still the most popular color.

Interesting. And that's normally an up, you know, an up charge on that. It is a really nice white.

It's a great white. I believe it's now the last of the original colors that still,

that hasn't been changed out. Yeah. And I think still looks, you know, incredibly appropriate

on our products. And like, it's just, it's just a great all-round color.

I'm going to pivot here in the last few minutes. Tesla Diner. We were talking about this for a

minute before we got started. I've had the pleasure of going a couple times. We should do this next

time there. Let's do it. Absolutely. That would be, yeah, that would be an awesome way to do it.

So you did the unofficial ribbon cutting. You've been over there a bunch of times. I've had listeners

say, oh, I saw Franz over at the Diner. So you and your team were obviously heavily involved in

the design. How are you kind of feeling about the Diner? Was it three, four months later at this

point? I mean, the Diner is settling into kind of its normal mode. And so I think, like we were

saying before, one of the things I'm excited about is we're starting to bring more healthy products

to the menu. And so in the next couple of weeks, I think you'll start to see some exciting new

things emerging on the menu that aren't going to, you know, make wait times longer or anything like

that. But just, you know, we have the staples there that, you know, the burger and things that

you've tried, the grilled cheese, those, those will remain, you know, as Diner favorites. But

I think, you know, we also want to look at how do we look at like, what does sustainable abundance

mean in the food sector? And, you know, we're new in food. And, but I think we can apply the same

metrics to providing, you know, food that like is efficient, is healthy, keeps you productive.

And ideas around the menu that can, you know, that just fit in to the overall model of what

Tesla starts with. Are you meeting with Chef, it's Greenspan, I believe. Is this, I'm blanking on

the gentleman's name. Are you meeting with, with the team on the right-hand side? I'm

no longer part of the team, but that's okay. We're, we're still moving forward. And I think,

you know, he was great at bringing the Diner up to where it is now, but we're moving and adding

some elements. And I think, you know, I'm just excited with the team that's there,

kind of hit our groove. And it's a really great balance between, you know, you know,

whether you're in a Tesla or not, you can go, you know, charge up, get, you know, recharge.

We have some great breakfast items coming now. And yeah, I'm just excited where that's going to go.

And hopefully, you know, we'll be rolling out more of them in the near future.

Yeah, I just, it, my, and my two experiences so far, it just, I really liked the, the vibe.

I mean, that's like an unquantifiable, like almost nonsense thing to say.

It's hard to explain. It just feels like a welcoming, like everybody here has something

fun in common in that they drive a Tesla or other EV like they're, there's, there's,

there's that kind of common ground. In the same way, like that we design our vehicles in the UI

and the experiences that you have with them, you know, they're, they're kind of efficient,

but they're fun. There's a, there's a sense of humor with it. I think you get all of that

over at the Diner as well. And we're excited to continue to just expand on how do we do great food,

just as we do, you know, great products. So yes, there will be more diners and more locations.

I hope so. Yeah. We get just, I'm going to, I got to put in a good word for the San Francisco Bay

area. You know, it's, we got a big, big, big, big Tesla community up there. No lack of opportunity

for sure. Ah, CyberCab. Yeah. I got a million questions and I'm going to have to come back

again. We can go. This is, so CyberCab, you, you did a short segment on CNBC not too long ago that

I caught and you mentioned, of course, that as is pretty normal with Tesla, you, you tend to ship

the prototypes in, you know, largely how they are, unlike most manufacturers where the concept

looks nothing like what you take home. Yeah. I think just part of the process that we do is really,

if we're going to show something, why don't show what you can actually get. And we want to,

we want to like, we want to make what you can actually get better than what we showed. And,

you know, we're going, that same process is going to happen with CyberCab.

And that's, that's what I, you, you had mentioned on the CNBC segment, the, the said, well, yeah,

minor improvements. So what, like, what are you still kind of dialing in on the design stuff?

Oh, I mean, I think, you know, we're, we've been designing it, you know, to meet the wear and tear

of putting a vehicle into operation like that and having, you know, multiple rides per day and the

use case for that. And so just make sure we have the, a robust material story, like we've been

focusing on, you know, how do we get a, like a carpet on the floor that, you know, can clean

easily that hides dirt that, you know, doesn't look like a disaster after one five minute ride.

Yeah. Arrow efficiency, you know, that's overall efficiency on that is just means, you know,

less, less charge time or uptime. And, you know, we're constantly working on, we tweak the arrow

side of the vehicles right to the bitter end, just eking out every, you know, 10th of a mile in

terms of range possible. And so we're, we've been doing that on the vehicle, but by and large,

like the vehicle that you saw at the 1010 event you've seen kind of here and there as we've showcased

that same, those same vehicles, essentially the same product. I mean, it's like, there's nothing

dramatic, no big dramatic change. In fact, I think it's, it's become slightly more mature and more

robust and presumably those will deploy first in Austin, San Francisco Bay are the places where

Robo taxi is already, I think that's the plan. Yeah. What's obvious, I'm sure you've gone to

Austin or come up when you've been up, up by me. How, how have, how have your, your Robo taxi

experience has been of just not having the car do everything? Yeah. I mean, it's great. I think

it just really showcases the future of, of transportation. And I think, you know, now you're,

now you're in a, in a space where you can have, you know, private conversations, you can kind of

enjoy the space for yourself as opposed to sharing it. And, you know, all the benefits that come

with that. And I think it really just shows how far we've come with the technology and how safe

you feel almost immediately you get in and relax. I was, I've had several rides so far up by now.

They're in California regulation. There's someone in the driver's seat, but they, in my experiences,

they've, they've yet to intervene. So it's the cars doing all the work. And I've been

not shocked, but just almost, uh, I don't know, it's just been uneventful. So it's like, oh,

there's really, when I go on a podcast, it's like, yeah, there's like, oh, there's, well, there's,

I don't really have much to say about this. It was just very, it did what it needed to do. So,

in a weird sort of way, that's kind of what you want. Yeah. Um,

since you and I last spoke, S and X got a slight update. I've been poking you about that. And you

just played, you did the France thing and played, played the cards close to your chest. So I think

it's a super nice improvement to the car. I think it's actually the best version. I love the front

end. I actually, the rear end with the, on the, on the plaid specifically with that, um, I think,

you know, now model S plaid versus the long range has a unique character, right? And I think same

way that my model three, I really, I like how my model three performance is from any angle now,

very clearly a performance compared to any other. Yeah. And I think, you know, like your model three

performance has a slightly better stance, the, you know, the arrow retire is slightly better,

the, the stagger is great. Um, and it has unique front and rear. So really feels different than,

and you feel like you got your money's worth, I hope. Um, and I think we wanted, we wanted

modelized plaid to kind of take on that same thing. So it has a unique front end, the stance is

slightly better. Now you can get the big carbon ceramic brakes and new wheels. And I think it's

just, for me, probably the, it's the best version of model S that we've ever made. And

you know, it's, it's just so nice to drive. Yeah. When, um, when you and Lars brought the,

the new plaid over to Jay Leno, um, something that made, made air, I don't know that I just

wanted to just ask you about, um, one of you mentioned that the plaid has the carbon ceramic

brakes as the default in the, like when you're just buying the car, but that's, that's not the case.

Did a plan change there? I think, um, we were excited about it probably. So

that's, they were on the car and we're just, oh, okay. All right. Well, that, yeah, that makes

sense. Um, so I would say, uh, a lot of people were maybe hoping or expecting for some, some bigger

changes on, on SNX with this last little refresh, you know, steer by wire there.

Elon had always said that SNX were kind of the, the technology leaders. Um, so I,

but, but also realistically, the numbers are SX Cybertruck are about 3% of Tesla's overall sales.

And so you spending your time on standard needs to go in, in the place where it really

makes the biggest impact. But I guess the question would be,

how do you look at SNX these days and sort of what are those cars look like in five

years from now in terms of, from the outside, but also on, on the inside?

Um, I think, you know, uh, SNX has had an incredible, they both had an incredible 10-year

like their, their lifespan is like far as succeeded. Anybody's expectation. And they

still like incredibly modern on the road today. So, um, I think the current iterations are,

I think they're the best, most comfortable, um, both inside and outside. I think they have

like great modern amenities and, you know, we'll continue to build on, on that ethos. Um, see where

it goes. Uh, all right. Last thing, I, it wouldn't be a, a Ryan McCaffrey interview of Franz von

Holshausen without asking about the new Roadster, which we continue to wait for. So once this most

epic product demo ever that your boss talked about happens, um, A, well A, is that, or is that still

this year or, or we're, can you give an update on when we can expect to see this?

We're planning on this year. Yeah.

Great. Okay. That makes me feel good. So once that demo happens,

what's the timeline for that car after that? Like, is it, should, is, is there kind of a

unofficial 18 to 24 month? Cause you're not going to show it again. And then it's going to sit,

it's just going to be another eight years. That's not, that's not going to happen. So

is it going to be more, we'll move, um, we'll move more quickly into having, um,

saleable product than we did last summer.

Well, that, can I pin you down any further than that? Like, like two, within two years of this

next? Definitely within two years. Okay. That's that. Cause we're, we're coming up on, I told Lars

this, we're coming up on the 20 year anniversary of the original Roadster. I know. And I'm not

really looking for the new one to be like a 20th anniversary, like maybe 20, 27 would be, would

be good. Well, that's, that's, uh, I don't doubt that. Uh, all right. So last, I guess last question

and, and I'll make it another paint question. Can we expect the new Roadster to have its own

complete unique set of paint options relative to the four painted Teslas? I think that's, um,

that's doable. Good. That's, uh, yeah, I like that. Is that, that'll be, that'll make it a

little extra fun. Yeah. I mean, I, I'm excited to, um, just showcase the, the, the new Roadster

for a lot of different reasons. And I think, um, the way it will be worth it.

I don't doubt it. All right. Last thing, um, and I feel like I can ask you this now that we're on

Franz Von Holzhau's and the guy outside of work, like, what do you like to do for fun?

Are you a, do you have any pets? Like just give me, give me a quick little, you don't have to,

I don't want to pry into your whole personal life, but just, just let, let me into your world.

Just tell us a little bit about guy outside of these walls. I have two kids, two boys that,

um, you know, they're growing up in a world where, you know, they're, they're not actually

very excited about driving. Um, neither is my 14 year old daughter, by the way.

They just, they don't think about it. They're kind of, they're not really into cars at all. And

they're, they're like social experience with their friends is completely different than,

you know, mine was when I was their age and maybe yours as well, where for me, a car was

like freedom and escape and like get to go to see your friends. And now, you know, they're,

they see their friends on FaceTime or they're chatting with them constantly for us. It was like,

like this thing you had to dial and you had to be standing at the wall, you know, waiting for,

for somebody to call you. Um, and so it's been fun, um, just seeing the world a little bit

differently through their eyes and, and like the, and the world that we're creating with autonomy

will, I think cater to where their head spaces and, and kind of what their vision of social

interaction is in a, and, and they're actually super excited about it. They're like, when can

we get a, a cyber cab that we can go, you know, we can just go to school or go visit our friends

that we wanted to or ride around, you know? So I think that's, um, that's different than

like sneaking out in the middle of the night, trying to like learn how to drive when you're

12 or 13. Um, yeah, it's, I, I spent a lot of time with them and it's super enjoyable. Love it.

Franz Von Holzhousen, the one and only member of the Ride the Lightning four-time record.

Wow, my gosh, you're kidding. Yeah. Wow. You gotta get, tell Elon to come back in.

Yeah, of course. Get Lars to come back in. Well, you'll be sick of talking to all of us.

No, it's, it is always a genuine privilege. I know I'm just trying to speak on behalf of

the Tesla community. Again, we, I love your work. We love your work. Thank you for letting

me in here to do this. Of course. And if I can say one last thing, please get out there and vote.

Yes. Vote your shares. Vote your shares. It's super important. We need Elon. This doesn't

happen without him. So go make that happen. Perfect. That's my plug. That's a, that's a good

plug. That's what we're here to do. Go out and vote. Thank you, Franz. Awesome. This is Bill Daniels,

the voice of Night Industries 2000 or Kit. You're listening to Ride the Lightning,

the Tesla unofficial podcast. Happy electric motoring.

Oh, that was fun. That was fun. Hope you enjoyed that. Thank you again to Franz. Thank you to Matt

Para for the audio cleanup. And thank you to everybody that voted in this week's Patreon poll,

which has, those of you that voted in it probably figured out by now, I played, I was a little

sly devil. I secretly tied the poll question into the Franz interview, but when I first put up that

poll, you guys didn't know it yet. So the poll question was, you already know the answer, but

now you're going to find out how everybody voted before they knew the answer. What do you think

the rarest official Tesla paint color ever is? And I, by the way, I'm so grateful to Franz and his

team. I sent that ahead of time because it had come up last time in the episode 500 interview,

just off the cuff where I was like, wait, what's the rarest color? And, you know, he, he didn't

know off the top of his head, which is completely understandable. And so I asked ahead of time

if they could dig up the data and his team did. And how super cool is that? I'm so grateful for that

amazing little courtesy, just helping me scratch that just historical Tesla itch.

So here we go. I asked all of you, what do you think the rarest official paint color ever is?

Again, we're excluding the original Roadster because those were painted by Lotus. There were

also only 2,400 cars total. So pretty much all of the original Roadster colors would be the,

the rarest. They'd all dominate this list. So since Tesla began painting their own cars in 2012

with the Model S, what was number one? Of course, you heard Franz say it is in fact signature red,

just barely eking out brown metallic. And the poll results were pretty overwhelming in favor of two

colors. And I'm kind of surprised signature red wasn't higher on the list, although if I'm being

honest with myself, I think I would have voted for brown metallic. And that was a lot of you

voted for brown metallic. So the winner of this poll at 42% of the vote, 222 of you voting at the

time that I'm recording this, Green Metallic won the poll at 42% Brown Metallic, which again,

I think I probably would have voted with those folks that chose brown, 36%. And then it drops off

to single digits after those two. So you had two clear front runners, signature red coming in not

even third. It came in fifth actually. So after Green Metallic and Brown Metallic, we had Midnight

Cherry red at 7%. That's a good guess, honestly, because it was only available in one region for

a couple years. Titanium Silver Metallic, which predates the Model 3. That was a color on S and

briefly on X at 6%. Then signature red 5% of you voted for that. So thank you to everybody that

kindly took the time to vote in this week's Patreon poll. They are free. So you'd, unlike the

Lightning round bonus mini episode that I do every week, the poll is open to everybody. You don't

have to be giving me a dime. So just swing on by the Patreon page every week. The new poll

question typically goes up on Tuesday nights. Again, my Patreon page, you can either click the

link in the episode description, or it is at patreon.com slash Tesla podcast and come back

next week and vote again. My entertainment recommendation for this week, it's a good one.

It's a brand new game available for Xbox as well as PC. You can either purchase it for $30

or download it if you subscribe to Xbox Game Pass Ultimate or PC Game Pass. And that game is Keeper.

It just came out just a couple days ago on Friday the 17th. It is from Double Fine Productions,

the makers of Psychonauts 2. Of course Psychonauts 1 way back in the day. That was their first game

as Double Fine and they've made a ton of great stuff over the years and Keeper is a absolutely

beautiful light puzzle adventure game. It's not like a brain buster. It's hard to describe,

but it's basically you play as a walking lighthouse. Some many perhaps eons after humanity has gone

extinct and there's just all these remnants of humanity like something like a lighthouse and

it's again kind of hard to explain, but it's an extremely beautiful game visually. The music

is phenomenal and it's a really neat story even though there's no dialogue at all. So I do genuinely

recommend this game. My day job at IGN. We gave it a 9 out of 10. I've completed it. In fact,

I just interviewed the lead creatives for this one, the great Tim Schaefer, the studio head at

Double Fine, and then the project director, a gentleman by the name of Lee Petty who's

got some excellent games on his resume as well. Over on my day job podcast, podcast unlocked

if you'd like to check out that interview, but anyway I very much recommend Keeper for Xbox and PC.

Getting back to Tesla stuff, here is this week's pro tip of the week. It comes from Tom in Littleton,

Colorado. Hey Ryan, as you likely just said, this is Tom from Littleton, Colorado calling in with a

pro tip. I was driving my 2024 Model Y to a bingo hall where I do tech support for one of the

computers there and I parked right in front. My wife was with me. She stayed in the car. I went in.

I took my phone in with me which caused the car to lock itself because of the walk away lock feature

which is fine. That's no issue. She's not locked in the car. She still can get out as normal. It

just makes it so other people can't get in and it turns on sentry mode which is the issue

because while I was in the hall they had an intermission and the smokers came out to smoke

and people were close to the car so actually one guy leaned on the car and that caused the

recording to occur. Again, no big deal. My wife opened the door and the alarm went off at that

point and there's no way for her to turn it off so she had to sit there and endure the alarm for

five minutes or however long it goes. My phone did get a notification that I didn't notice and

my watch. I have an Android phone, Android watch. They both had a notification on them but I didn't

notice it so my one suggestion to Tesla, I mean that's a great feature. Most car companies

would charge you 20 bucks a month for a security system like that but I so I greatly appreciate

getting that for free after you know just over the year update but one one improvement could be

to persistently notify until the notification is acknowledged since it's kind of an emergency event

so I appreciate all the info you give and have a great rest of your week. Thanks, bye.

Thank you Tom. I think that is a very good constructive suggestion for Tesla with regard

to that accidental alarm or just the alarm in general I would say so I appreciate that if

anybody else out there has a good Tesla or EV related pro tip of the week you can give me a call

and there are two easy ways to do that either use your smartphone's built-in voice recording

software then just record your question. I humbly ask that you try to keep it to 90 seconds or less

and you can send that my way to teslapodcastatgmail.com or you can take that same 90 second or less

pro tip of the week and send it in as a phone call to the ride the lightning hotline. I will get

back to your phone calls soon actually I had to stop myself from saying next week because

next week's the earnings call so I'll have my earnings call recap highlights analysis

typically those episodes are long and media enough that I don't get to the hotline phone

calls but I promise I will get to your phone calls again soon if it's not next week it'll

be coming up quick anyway the toll-free number that you can call either with a pro tip or just

with a regular ride the lightning hotline call if you'd like to respond to something

that fran said in the interview etc drop me a line the toll-free number is 1-888-989-8752

that number again is 1-888-989-TSLA and before I wrap this episode up I just wanted to mention

some friends of ride the lightning that I hope can be useful to you maybe sooner maybe later but

just file them away maybe take a look this week if you're curious about any of these

starting with abstractocean.com they've got so many great aftermarket Tesla accessories in fact

not just Tesla anymore they've got Rivian stuff as well they've been around for many many many

years now so they have really built up a great reputation a great lineup of products I do

encourage you to check them out again it's abstractocean.com and they've got everything from

lighting kits for both the interior and exterior of your car things like puddle lights

changing the the colored lighting the accent lighting on the inside and I'm not talking about

the strip of of RGB I'm talking about like the the lights in the door pockets and the footwells

you can swap those out for nice bright purple lighting if you want to like that's the kind

of stuff abstractocean.com has the tempered glass screen protectors custom fit for every Tesla all

that and so much more check them out abstractocean.com if you want or are legally required to have a

front license plate on your Tesla I am not personally a fan of the free license plate bracket that

Tesla gives you with your car because it adheres to the front of your car with automotive tape with

adhesive meaning if you ever want to get it off good luck doing so without scratching or damaging

the paint in some way so I recommend the snap plate or the newer stronger snap plate plus from my

friends at everyamp.com slash RTL they also now kindly offer a discount to ride the lighting

listeners as well so whichever one you choose for whichever car throw it in your online shopping

cart and when you get to check out use the coupon code RTL it's a nice clean minimalist design

that goes on safely and securely with tools but if you ever want to take it off it will leave no

unsightly anything behind so there's snap plate and the newer stronger snap plate plus both are

made with recycled made in the USA plastics with stainless steel reinforcements I definitely

I'm a believer in both of these check them out everyamp.com slash RTL and don't forget to use the

coupon code RTL as well. Meanwhile if you are looking to get your car beautified by a professional

detailer maybe you want to do ceramic coating so that you don't have to wax it for the next five

to seven years because that's what ceramic coating does it is basically a 21st century version of

car wax that will last a long long long time again the the ceramic coat on our 2018 model 3

performance lasted seven years before it now it now needs to be redone and I need to save up some

money to do that there've been a there've been a lot of unnecessary well I won't say unnecessary

there've been a lot of just tough expenses lately I can't I can't complain too much but I gotta I

gotta save my pennies and get it back over to immaculate reflections for a fresh five to seven

year ceramic coat anyway maybe you want to do that maybe you want to do paint protection film on some

or all of the car and maybe you want to do paint correction to get the actual paint finish looking

as good as it possibly can so if you're in or are going to be in the greater San Francisco Bay area

with your tesla or another car in your garage that you care about I encourage you to reach out

to immaculate reflections via their website which is irdetailing.com you'll see a contact form there

and mention that you're a ride the lightning listener any services that you have done there

you will get the ride the lightning listener discount which is super awesome of immaculate

reflections to continue to offer finally or I guess almost finally my patreon page I want to

mention that one more time I did mention it briefly near the top but if you get a lot out of this

podcast week in and week out and you know I'm here week in and week out to take a lot of pride in

that and if you see it in your heart to support me you can do so through my patreon page found at

patreon.com slash tesla podcast or just click the link in the episode description that way when

these awesome executive interviews roll around as if I may humbly but but proudly say this was the

fourth major tesla executive interview this year granted two of them were with the same person

but hopefully you found both of them interesting episode 500 and this one so france twice lars

moravy the chief engineer and the co-founder former cto and now board member of tesla jb

stravel all in one year and if you're with me on patreon at any tier you're gonna tier start at just

five bucks a month you not only get ad-free versions of the episodes but you get them early so you

would be the first to hear these cool interviews when they do happen so join me on patreon if you

decide that it's that I am worth that I would be humbled and grateful if you would consider that so

patreon.com slash tesla podcast make sure you're following the podcast on whatever podcast service

you like the most statistically that's apple podcasts for most of you so just type in ride the

lightning tesla in the search field there you should see this podcast pop right up click the

follow button and that way you'll get a push notification every time there is a new episode

which with this podcast it's every sunday at 9am eastern 6am pacific unless of course you're with

me on patreon in which case you get it early but i'm also on besides apple podcasts i am on spotify

youtube podcasts tune in and i think pretty much all the big ones there as well finally if you'd

like to follow me on social media i am on x as well as instagram i have the same username on both

and that username is dmc underscore ryan you can also email me anytime about tesla or ev related

things at tesla podcast at gmail.com finally this week let me say hello and thank you to the

top tier patreon backers the folks at the roadster in space the maximum plaid and the grandfathered

in plaid level supporters i'll start with the maximum plaid group big thanks goes out to jonathan

wales cameron clark daniel grummer seth capello nick and tony the galpin family ryan from new

york city darren nickle cos barns patrick wisneski gill cabrera todd badger joe edgel

kevin yank the tesla owners club of sandwalking valley wil steadman justin pares jeremy harris

chris beach tom mills choreo donnell erin john codie jol sap paul caserino chris osborne kb

adam lavoix jason chelukas travis krenzel bruce otterstein tom behan josh pennington

john from cream ridge new jersey dustin hart derek finley charles clement daemon kline

jeff brown jerry slinger kenneth corbett brian bertoglio kim bae troy sievers nick jacoby

chip hooper mat chenander robert moran rav and christopher man another big thanks goes out to

the roadster in space tier backers they are pete white lile austin steve radspinner

fernando cordero laughton from chicago shone nightig neal weaver jackson wallace rolf and

evers howard anthony smith victoria aya coveto tesla hitchhiker 42 carol weston robert from

near philly american home contractors dug carry michael gallo and tony figaroa and finally the

awesome grandfathered in plaid level supporters thank you so much to george cassiopo logan willis

peter chalet eric randolph dory and steve guberman the tesla owners club of taiwan

ron lee charlie gillespie jeff angwin chase cabaneas the lidia family erin altshule jared

brown gerome strack jamie dalton mike and barber from louisville matt nixon the tesla owners

club of wisconsin ish not elon musk in quotes peter and the bear boys of colorado and that will

wrap it up for a very very special episode 533 seriously just thank you all so much for listening

i never in a million years would have imagined when i started this thing 10 years ago that i would

i would have talked to the chief designer the guy that designed my car

four times in the span of those 10 years and really those those four times have all come in

the last uh let's see here i don't know thoughts four years five years it doesn't matter anyway

i'm just humbled and grateful to get to do this it is a privilege it is a pleasure i mean i as i

hope is evident i put a lot into this every week you know i i care like maybe you don't like the

podcast although if you're probably not hearing this if you don't like it you probably didn't

make it this far but you know you don't have to like me you don't have to think i'm any good

and i'm not saying i'm any good but um i'm just i i do put my heart into this every single time

and it's it's weeks like this when i get the rare opportunity the privilege to sit down with

somebody like franz again that it it's just like man i don't know how i got here but i'm so grateful

to be here and i thank you all for coming along on this journey with me and listening in listening

week in and week out and with that i will say happy electric motoring and i'll see you back here for

should be an eventful week uh an eventful episode next week too with the big earnings call the q3

earnings call uh so i'll do my usual song and dance with that all the the highlight clips from

elan and the tesla executive team uh the recap the analysis the whole the whole thing that i

typically do that i i do enjoy doing so stay tuned for that next week and until then happy electric

motoring

elan musk people don't like elan musk the guy founded paypal and tesla and people are like

climate change also have you been in a tesla have you been in a tesla my buddy let me drive

his tesla i laughed out loud at how fast it went been clinically depressed my entire life

on dozens of medications in a tesla for 13 seconds cured forever

i mean i think a tesla is the most fun thing you could possibly buy ever

or that's what it's meant to be our goal is to make it's it's not exactly a car it's actually

a thing to maximize enjoyment it's maximum fun

About this episode

Franz von Holzhausen, Tesla's chief designer, returns for an engaging discussion about Masterplan Part 4, his evolving role at Tesla, and the company's future direction. He shares insights on Tesla's rare paint colors, the design philosophy behind upcoming models, and the balance between autonomy and traditional driving experiences. The episode also touches on new vehicle segments, the CyberCab, and the importance of community engagement through voting. With a blend of technical details and personal anecdotes, this episode offers a unique glimpse into Tesla's design and innovation strategies.

Abstract Ocean Accelerate Auto aero efficiency autonomy battery and drive units brown metallic carbon ceramic brakes ceramic coating EV EveryAmp

Ford Explorer Tesla Cybertruck Tesla Model 3 Tesla Model S Tesla Model X Tesla Model Y

Original notes

Tesla Chief Designer Franz von Holzhausen sits down with me – yes, again! – to discuss Master Plan Part 4, his role as the company evolves, Tesla's rarest paint colors, and so much more!

TIMECODES:

8:00 Interview start
9:25 Discussing Master Plan Part 4
13:26 Will Tesla be making new vehicles in new segments in the next five years?
14:38 Will there be new Tesla vehicles other than the new Roadster that have manual steering inputs?
16:13 Autonomy is the focus
16:49 The next-gen Roadster will be a great driver's car that "looks at the limit of physics"
17:50 Franz says it's important to vote your shares in the current board proposals and shareholder vote
19:40 What Franz's role in Master Plan Part 4 would be
22:07 Cybercab is the beginning of where futuristic transport is going
22:40 Franz and his team work on the user interface and the Tesla website too
24:14 The Design team's software work is as important to them as its work on physical design
25:15 The user experience/in-car software will change when Tesla reaches full autonomy
26:00 Ryan advocates for a front bumper camera retrofit for new Model 3, S, and X owners; Franz responds
27:20 About the "Cyber SUV" seemingly hiding in plain sight in Tesla's Master Plan Part 4 video
29:26 Franz on why Tesla doesn't pursue lots of vehicle segments
30:49 Franz on the Model Y L
32:06 Why not bring the Model Y L to the US?
33:01 Is the 7-seat Model Y coming soon?
33:16 Talking about designing Model Y Standard
36:09 Franz on the new Model Y Performance
38:31 What Franz is daily driving right now
40:19 Frost Blue paint color's origins
40:52 Why Glacier Blue isn't available in the US yet
42:14 About Europe's new Marine Blue paint color
42:34 The fate of Midnight Cherry Red paint color
42:52 Tesla's rarest paint color
44:30 The six Tesla unicorn paint colors
46:33 Iterations of design to arrive at the new wheel designs for the Standard 3 and Y
48:41 More on the Model Y Standard
50:13 Biggest challenge in designing the Model Y Standard and Model 3 Standard
51:37 Most popular paint color when removing price from the equation
52:46 How the Tesla Diner will evolve in the coming weeks and months
56:30 What is still being tweaked on the Cybercab
57:44 Where Cybercab will deploy first
58:05 Franz on his experiences riding in Robotaxi so far
59:09 Franz on the refreshed Model S Plaid
1:00:52 How Franz views S and X these days and in the next few years
1:02:40 When the new Roadster will be re-revealed and when it might finally go into production
1:03:48 New Roadster's paint options
1:04:41 What Franz is like outside of Tesla's walls

If you enjoy the podcast and would like to support my efforts, please check out my Patreon at https://www.patreon.com/teslapodcast and consider a monthly or (10% discounted!) annual pledge. Every little bit helps and there are stacking bonuses in it for you at each pledge level, like early access to each episode at the $5 tier and the weekly Lightning Round bonus mini-episode (AND the early access!) at the $10 tier! And NO ADS at every Patreon tier!

Also, don't forget to leave a message on the Ride the Lightning hotline anytime with a question, comment, or discussion topic for next week's show! The toll-free number to call is 1-888-989-8752.

INTERESTED IN A FLEXIBLE EXTENDED WARRANTY FOR YOUR TESLA? Be a part of the future of transportation with XCare, the first extended warranty designed & built exclusively for EV owners, by EV owners. Use the code Lightning to get $100 off their "One-time Payment" option! Go to www.xcelerateauto.com/xcare to find the extended warranty policy that's right for you and your Tesla.

P.S. Get 15% off your first order of awesome aftermarket Tesla accessories at AbstractOcean.com by using the code RTLpodcast at checkout. Grab the SnapPlate front license plate bracket for any Tesla at https://everyamp.com/RTL/ (don't forget the coupon code RTL too!).

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