News
Tesla Model X Sightings and Spy Shots Gallery
Elon Musk has confirmed that first deliveries of the Model X to early reservation holders will take place by September. However with the Tesla Model X design studio not yet available, and with no official announcement that the Model X has even reached the final design phase, we thought it would be fun to create an ongoing list of recent sightings and spy shots of the Model X.
Join in on the fun and share your photos of the Model X (and any news from the rumor mill) through the comments section below. Or email us at
tips@teslarati.com.
- Location: Palo Alto, CA
- Date: August 29, 2015
- Description: A very first close up look at the Tesla Model X as caught on cell phone. A brave pedestrian courageously approaches the, previously covered in white transport wrap, blue Model X, and attempts to film around the vehicle, nearly catching a glimpse of the interior before it takes off from the traffic light.
- Source: YouTuber Missy P
- Location: San Jose, CA
- Date: August 27, 2015
- Description: A black Tesla Model X with falcon wing door, partially ajar, is seen driving down Hwy 85 in San Jose, CA. Illuminated rear brake lights seen on the retractable rear spoiler.
- Source: Submitted by Sameet via tips@teslarati.com
- Location: Palo Alto, CA
- Date: August 17, 2015
- Description: The first sighting of a blue colored Tesla Model X with protective plastic wrap. See the video.
- Source: Submitted by Instagram user SiliconValleyTeslas
- Location: Palo Alto, CA
- Date: July 31, 2015
- Description: A rare sighting of the Model X next to a Model S is spied on Page Mill Rd. near Tesla headquarters.
- Source: Submitted by Instagram user SiliconValleyTeslas
- Location: Palo Alto, CA
- Date: July 31, 2015
- Description: Model X Falcon Wing doors begin to take shape as delivery nears. See spy photos of the Model X leaving Tesla Headquarters.
- Source: Submitted by Lee
- Location: Gilroy, CA
- Date: July 22, 2015
- Description: Tesla Model X hauling a dump trailer with unidentified freight down Hwy 101 Northbound in Gilroy, CA. Read more
- Source: Submitted by Darin
- Location: Chandler, AZ
- Date: July 20, 2015
- Description: Video of a dirt covered Model X sparks rumors that Tesla is performing off-road testing of the electric crossover. Read more
- Source: YouTube
- Location: Berkeley, CA
- Date: July 21, 2015
- Description: New images (and video) surfaces of the Model X being tested with an active rear spoiler. Active spoilers and active aerodynamics have been used by performance carmakers for decades as a way to reduce drag coefficient by way of smoothing out airflow across the contours of the vehicle, but also as a way to increase downforce for added performance. The Model X is said to have range equivalent to the Model S and in order to achieve that goal, especially on a heavier and larger vehicle, Tesla will be outfitting the X with the new 90kWh battery pack and presumably the best possible aerodynamics in its class through the use of the active spoiler. Lower drag equates to less energy needed to propel the car forward at a given speed, and ultimately ensures maximum battery range.>>>> [VIDEO] Digital Wind Tunnel Technology Behind Tesla Model S Aerodynamics
- Source: Reddit
Fair warning: The owner of the cell phone video shot it while rotating the device making the video a little difficult to watch.
- Location: San Jose, CA
- Date: July 15, 2015 @7:15 pm
- Description: Randy Frei was driving down 280 South in San Jose, CA, near the Stevens Creek exit, when he came across the Tesla Model X. This is the first sighting of the Model X, submitted exclusively to TESLARATI, which shows testing equipment attached to the front contours of the vehicle. Other points worth noting are the taped gaps between the front body panels and the sharper nose design.
- Source: Randy Frei
- Location: Petaluma, CA
- Date: June 18, 2015
- Description: A side by side size comparison of the Model S and pre-production Model X posted by a member of Stocktwits.
- Source: User TslaUp via Stocktwits, Facebook
- Location: ???
- Date: June 13, 2015
- Description: The Model X falcon wing door is seen opened on the same test mule car that’s been spotted testing across Tesla headquarters. According to a reddit user (account has since been deleted by the user), presumably a contracted engineer working on the Model X, the user writes “Spent some time behind the wheel of a Tesla Model X today!”
- Source: Reddit
Updated June 26, 2015: The picture has been removed at the request of the user who originally posted the image.
- Location: Hwy 280N, Los Altos, CA
- Date: June 5, 2015
- Description: According to YouTube user kenken830, “Spotted on Hwy 280N in Los Altos Hills, California on June 5th, 2015 6:39 PM PD. No camouflage.”
- Source: kenken830
- Location: CA
- Date: May 27, 2015
- Description: A white Model X is seen testing on the streets with, what appears to be, new body panels. It’s questionable as to whether this will be the final version of the electric crossover, slated to go into production in a few months.
- Source: 60grayev
- Location: Foothill Expwy and Page Mill Rd. near Tesla Motors HQ in, Palo Alto, CA
- Date: May 8, 2015
- Description: A quick glimpse of the Model X interior shows that it’s largely the same design as the Model S. The large center touchscreen has been recessed under the protrusion of the center dashboard, identical to that of the Model S.
- Source: nbkagzw13
- Location: Rt 101 @ “near the University exit” by Palo Alto, CA
- Date: May 4, 2015
- Description: The contours of the Model X seen from the picture closely resembles that of the Model S. According to Ron’s comment from his Google+ page, the Model X “looks like a Model S with a pug nose. And the front had the classic black oval from the Model S.”
- Source: Ron Tailan
- Location: I-280 near Palo Alto, CA
- Date: Exact date unknown. Approx. Apr 21, 2015
- Description: Tesla Model X appears to be testing a lane departure system which automatically steers the car away from the shoulder and back into the lane.
- Source: Yann Kerhervé
- Location: I-280 near Palo Alto, CA
- Date: Exact date unknown. Approx. Apr 3, 2015
- Description: This appears to be the same test mule seen across much of Northern CA near Tesla Motors headquarters. Worth noting is the misaligned falcon wing doors, blacked out rear windows, fender flares and the trailer hitch.
- Source: Reported on imgur.
- Location: Palo Alto, CA
- Date: Mar 19, 2015
- Description:
- Source: YouTube user nbkagzw13 spotted the Tesla Model X testing on the streets near Tesla’s headquarters in Palo Alto, CA.
- Location: TBD
- Date: Mar 10, 2015
- Description:
- Source: Instagram user >@moriahdanielle
- Location: Arastradero Road leading to Tesla Motors HQ in Palo Alto, CA
- Date: Feb 26, 2015
- Description: “Tesla Suv out for a ride on 280, aka the test track.”
- Source: Twitter user @JKDmobile
Tesla Suv out for a ride on 280, aka the test track. pic.twitter.com/HFoN56FRis — John Donnelly (@JKDmobile) February 27, 2015
Elon Musk
The Boring Company’s newest tunnel vehicle runs on Tesla parts and no one is driving it
The Boring Company’s new tunnel vehicle runs on Tesla Model 3 batteries and drive units.
The Boring Company just introduced a new piece of hardware, and it runs on parts pulled straight from a Tesla showroom. Liner Truck 3, unveiled in a post from the tunneling company’s official X account, is an all electric vehicle built around Tesla Model 3 battery packs and drive units, purpose built to move concrete tunnel segments to the boring machine face without a single person underground.
Introducing Liner Truck 3 — our latest fully electric tunnel vehicle.
– Tesla Model 3 battery and drive units
– Transports 22,000+ lb of concrete segments to the boring machine
– 28 miles of range
– 12 mph max operating speed
– Remotely piloted from Global OCC in Texas, with… pic.twitter.com/XB7FgSXnpy— The Boring Company (@boringcompany) August 7, 2026
The job itself is unglamorous but critical. Each precast segment run weighs more than 22,000 pounds, roughly the load of a full cement mixer, and Liner Truck 3 hauls that weight repeatedly between the surface staging area and wherever the Prufrock machine happens to be cutting.
The Boring Company said Liner Truck 3 is piloted remotely out of its Global Operations Control Center in Texas, extending the Zero-People-In-Tunnel approach the company has spent years building toward. An earlier version of a ZPIT liner truck was already tested at the company’s Bastrop, Texas research tunnels, and a factory tour released last month showed an employee flying a fully loaded liner truck with a PlayStation controller. Liner Truck 3 looks like the production version of that same idea, cleaned up and pushed into daily use.
The timing lines up with a company digging in more places than it ever has before. The Boring Company now has multiple Prufrock machines active or arriving in Nashville, where Music City Loop construction has been accelerating since February, and its Vegas Loop network keeps adding tunnel mileage on a near monthly basis. Every one of those projects depends on getting concrete segments to the cutting face fast enough to keep the boring machine from idling, which is exactly the bottleneck Liner Truck 3 is designed to remove.
It also reinforces something Tesla owners have watched happen gradually across Musk’s companies: passenger car hardware finding a second life in heavy equipment. Model 3 drive units already move people through the Vegas Loop, and now the same components are hauling concrete underground in Nashville and wherever The Boring Company digs next. Whether that kind of component reuse extends further into TBC’s equipment lineup, or into other Musk owned industrial hardware, is the next thing worth watching.
Elon Musk
Elon Musk and SpaceX shrugs off the trading day Wall Street feared most
SpaceX stock did the opposite of what most of Wall Street expected this week, when the day designed to be its most dangerous turned into a rally, and the rally kept going.
Thursday marked the first major lockup expiration since SpaceX’s June IPO, making roughly 911.5 million insider held shares eligible to trade for the first time, more than doubling the company’s public float. Analysts and short sellers had spent weeks bracing for a flood of selling, especially after the stock fell 13 percent following its first earnings report as a public company on Tuesday. Instead, shares rose 6.1 percent Thursday to close at $114.92, and by Friday they were trading near $129, up more than another 12 percent on the day.
SpaceX shorts get warned by Musk ally, echoing Tesla’s early struggles
The setup made the outcome notable. Short interest had climbed to roughly 34 percent of the float heading into earnings, among the highest of any large cap stock, with about 95 percent of available shares to borrow already on loan. CEO Elon Musk warned short sellers twice in the weeks before the lockup, writing on X that “the survival probability of firms who maintain a significant short position in SpaceX over time is very low,” then following up on the morning of earnings with “I try to warn them, but they just double down.”
When the newly unlocked shares hit the market and the selloff never showed up, some of that short position appears to have started unwinding. TipRanks reported that options activity shifted toward bullish strategies like put selling and risk reversals following the rally, with roughly $600 million in options premium trading Thursday alone. Retail buyers also stepped in during the earnings dip, according to Vanda Research.
The fundamentals behind the stock have not changed much in a week. SpaceX’s revenue nearly doubled year over year to $7.8 billion, with Starlink subscribers doubling to 12 million and the company’s AI segment growing 247 percent. What spooked investors on Tuesday was the spending side. Capital expenditures jumped to more than $18 billion for the quarter, up from $2.8 billion a year earlier, with AI investment alone rising from $749 million to $15.8 billion. Wall Street remains split on whether that spending is building infrastructure SpaceX needs or outrunning what the business can currently support, a debate Teslarati has tracked since shares first came under pressure.
None of that resolves the bigger question hanging over the stock. Thursday’s release was only the first of nine staggered lockup tranches, with roughly $800 billion worth of additional shares scheduled to become eligible through October, and Musk’s own stake stays locked until next June. If this week is any indication, the market is treating that supply as something it can absorb rather than something to fear, at least for now.
News
The Boring Company’s newest Vegas Station has a permit quietly waiting behind it
Sahara Las Vegas opened a new Vegas Loop station, joining an exclusive two resort transit club.
Sahara Las Vegas opened a new Vegas Loop station Thursday, giving The Boring Company’s underground transit system its northernmost stop yet on the Strip. The station sits at Sahara’s Paradise Road entrance, on the southeast corner of Las Vegas Boulevard and Sahara Avenue, and connects riders to the Las Vegas Convention Center, other Strip resorts on the network and, eventually, Harry Reid International Airport.
The addition makes Sahara the second resort, after Fontainebleau opened its own station in January, to get a stop built at street level rather than tucked into the property itself. Sahara now joins Westgate as the only two Strip resorts offering both a Vegas Loop station and a stop on the Las Vegas Monorail, giving guests two separate ways to get around without leaving the property.
The Boring Company just doubled its tunneling power in Nashville
The bigger news buried in Thursday’s announcement is what comes next. Boring Company has already secured its first permit to tunnel north of Sahara Avenue, extending the network beyond where it currently ends, even though permits to push the Loop toward downtown Las Vegas still haven’t been granted. Crews are also working on a two mile dual tunnel line running from Westgate to a planned station at 4744 Paradise Road, just north of Tropicana Avenue, that Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority CEO Steve Hill has said the company hopes to open in time for November’s Las Vegas Grand Prix.
Ridership has grown alongside the buildout. The Loop moved roughly 82,000 passengers during CONEXPO in early March, a total the company highlighted on its own X account at the time, and the system has now carried more than 4 million passengers through 11 open stations since it began running in 2021. The airport connector tunnels, meant to give the Loop a direct link to Harry Reid, have slipped past their original first quarter target and remain under construction, with Boring Company director Mike Baier saying that a full opening is still a few months out.
For Sahara, the calculation is straightforward. Convention traffic drives a large share of Loop ridership, and a station at the property’s front door gives conventiongoers one more reason to book rooms on the Strip’s north end instead of closer to the convention center itself.

![[Source: SiliconValleyTeslas via Instagram]](http://www.teslarati.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/Tesla-Model-X-Covered-5-08172015-1024x628.jpg)






















