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Tesla Model Y vs Model 3 casting comparison shows that legacy auto’s ‘soil-your-pants’ moment is at hand
Back in April 2018, automotive teardown expert Sandy Munro mentioned that if Tesla had contracted an experienced automaker to produce the early-production Model 3’s body, the electric car maker would have “wiped the floor with everybody.” This is because from the suspension down, the Model 3 was a stellar piece of engineering, despite its body having several issues.
Its electric motors were compact, powerful, and cost effective; its batteries are the best in the industry, and its driving dynamics give the impression that the vehicle was riding on rails. Munro noted that if Tesla had hit a home run with the Model 3’s “dinosaur technologies” like its welds and casts, even veteran auto giants like Toyota would appropriately be “crapping their pants.”
It has been nearly two years since Munro mentioned those words during an appearance at YouTube’s Autoline After Hours. Tesla has changed a lot since then, and the company has even released its latest vehicle, the Model Y crossover. Sharing 75% of the Model 3’s parts, the Model Y is designed as a mass-market electric vehicle, and one that can be even more disruptive as its sedan sibling.
Munro, for his part, has acquired and started a teardown of the all-electric crossover. And based on his findings thus far, it appears that Tesla’s “dinosaur technologies” have improved vastly since the Model 3. This is most evident in the rear casting utilized on the two vehicles.
One look at the Model Y and Model 3’s rear casts shows that the two vehicles are already worlds apart in terms of build quality and design. Munro noted that he did not like the Model 3’s rear casting at all, since it was also over-engineered, with about 100 parts utilized for its rear trunk.
In a way, the Model 3’s rear casting represented the hubris that Elon Musk has admitted to in the past, as it showed Tesla essentially trying to fix something that is not necessarily broken. The result of this was a lot of challenges for Tesla, and a lot of issues with the early-production Model 3’s rear casting.
The Model Y is an entirely different animal. The all-electric crossover features what could only be described as a giant rear casting that is the complete antithesis of the Model 3’s. It has few parts, its welds are consistent, and it features a trunk tub that is similar to those utilized by the world’s best automakers. It’s pretty much what the Model 3 could have been if Tesla was more experienced when they started building the all-electric sedan.
If the Model 3’s rear casting was an exercise in hubris, the Model Y’s rear cast is an exercise in humility. It showed that Tesla is flexible, and that it’s willing to learn, even if it meant abandoning its initial plans and starting from the ground up. Tesla evidently abandoned the early-production Model 3’s rear casting and trunk design. And it’s all the better for it.
A lot of this could be attributed to Elon Musk himself. Munro has noted in the past that he and the Tesla CEO had talked over the phone during his Model 3 teardown, where Musk explained the reasons behind some of the findings about the all-electric sedan. Munro’s firm later sent Tesla a pro bono list of over 200 suggestions that can improve the Model 3’s body.
These suggestions seem to have come to life in the Model Y. Granted, the teardown process for the all-electric crossover has only just begun. Still, several aspects of the vehicle, most notably its rear casting, shows that Tesla did learn from the Model 3, and it has become a much more mature automaker today. Other suggestions from the teardown expert were also applied to the Model Y’s other components, such as its wiring.
It should be noted that Tesla’s fast evolution is partly due to the company’s Silicon Valley startup roots. Startups are notorious for quick, drastic changes in direction, and workers at these companies are required to be tough and flexible. Tesla embodies this, making the company notoriously challenging to work for compared to conventional car companies like GM or Ford.
Yet despite this, Tesla has ranked consistently among the most attractive firms for engineering students. This is because in Tesla, conventional corporate bureaucracy is replaced with an open communication system that allows even interns to share their ideas with company executives. Some of the issues in the Model 3’s early production lines, for example, were addressed by interns, who were later hired full-time by Tesla.
The Model Y is a crossover, which means that it is competing in one of the fastest-growing segments in the auto industry today. With the Model Y, Tesla has the chance to make its biggest mark in the market yet. Fortunately, the electric car maker appears to have done its homework before it released its newest vehicle. One could even argue that Tesla released the Model Y at the perfect time. A mass-market all-electric vehicle that can disrupt the market of crossover SUVs requires a mature company, after all, and Tesla has only started to fit this bill recently.
Just two years ago, Munro mentioned that if the Model 3 had a properly-built body, veteran automakers like Toyota would be “crapping their pants” because of how outclassed they would be. With how the Model Y is turning out, it appears that legacy auto would be wise to keep some extra pairs of pants for the coming years, just in case.
Watch a deep dive into the Tesla Model 3 and Model Y’s rear casts in the video below.
Elon Musk
SpaceX just got pulled into the biggest Weapons Program in U.S. history
SpaceX joins the Golden Dome software group, deepening its role in America’s most expensive defense program.
SpaceX has joined a nine-company group developing the core operating software for the Golden Dome, America’s next-generation missile defense system. According to a Bloomberg report, SpaceX is focused on integrating satellite communications for military operations and is working alongside eight other defense and artificial intelligence companies, including Anduril Industries, Palantir Technologies, and Aalyria Technologies, to build software connecting missile defense capabilities.
The Golden Dome concept dates back to President Trump’s 2024 campaign, and on January 27, 2025, he signed an executive order directing the U.S. Armed Forces to construct the system before the end of his term. The system is planned to employ a constellation of thousands of satellites equipped with interceptors, with data centers in space providing automated control through an AI network.
FCC accepts SpaceX filing for 1 million orbital data center plan
Space Force Gen. Michael Guetlein, director of the Golden Dome initiative, has described the software layer as a “glue layer” that would enable officers to manage and control radars, sensors, and missile batteries across services. The consortium is aiming to test the platform this summer.
Trump selected a design in May 2025 with a $175 billion price tag, expected to be operational by the end of his term in 2029, though the Congressional Budget Office projected the cost could reach $831 billion over two decades.
The Golden Dome role is only the latest in a string of military wins for SpaceX. As Teslarati reported, the U.S. Space Force awarded SpaceX a $178.5 million task order on April 1, 2026 to launch missile tracking satellites for the Space Development Agency, covering two Falcon 9 launches beginning in Q3 2027. That came on top of more than $22 billion in government contracts held by SpaceX as of 2024, per CEO Gwynne Shotwell, spanning NASA resupply missions, classified intelligence satellites through its Starshield program, and military broadband.
The accumulation of defense contracts, now including a seat at the table on the most expensive weapons program in U.S. history, positions SpaceX as the dominant infrastructure provider for American national security in space. With a SpaceX IPO still on the horizon, each new contract adds weight to what is already one of the most consequential companies in aerospace history, raising real questions about how much of America’s defense architecture will depend on a single private operator before it ever trades publicly.
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Tesla pulls back the curtain on Cybercab mass production
Tesla’s Cybercab drives itself off the Gigafactory Texas line in a striking new production video.
Tesla has provided a first look from inside a production Cybercab as it drove itself off the assembly line at Gigafactory Texas. The video footage, posted on X, opens on the factory floor with robotic arms and assembly equipment visible through the Cybercab windshield, and follows the car through a branded tunnel marked “Cybercab”, before autonomously navigating itself to a holding lot.
The first Cybercab rolled off the Giga Texas production line on February 17, 2026, with Musk writing on X, “Congratulations to the Tesla team on making the first production Cybercab.” April marked the official shift to volume production. The Giga Texas line is being prepared to produce hundreds of units per week, with 60 units already spotted on the Gigafactory campus earlier this month.
Purpose-built for autonomy
Cybercab in production now at Giga Texas pic.twitter.com/Y9qG3KyWBa
— Tesla (@Tesla) April 23, 2026
The Cybercab was first revealed publicly at Tesla’s “We, Robot” event in October 2024 at Warner Bros. Studios in Burbank, California, where 20 pre-production units gave attendees rides around the studio lot. Musk said he believed the average operating cost would be around $0.20 per mile, and that buyers would be able to purchase one for under $30,000. The two-seat design is deliberate. Musk noted that 90 percent of miles driven involve one or two people, making a compact two-passenger vehicle the most efficient configuration for a fleet-scale robotaxi. Eliminating rear seats also removes complexity and cost, supporting that sub-$30,000 target.
Tesla’s annual production goal is 2 million Cybercabs per year once several factories reach full design capacity. The Cybercab has no steering wheel, no pedals, and relies entirely on Tesla’s vision-based FSD system. What the video shows is the first evidence of that system working not as a demo, but as a production reality, driving itself off the line and into the world.
🚗 Our first ride in Tesla Cybercab last October: pic.twitter.com/kGqIqgJPRn https://t.co/BITCXFhbVd
— TESLARATI (@Teslarati) April 22, 2025
Elon Musk
Elon Musk talks Tesla Roadster’s future
Elon Musk confirmed the Roadster as Tesla’s last manually driven car, with a debut coming soon.
During Tesla’s Q1 2026 earnings call on April 22, Elon Musk made a brief but notable comment about the long-awaited next generation Roadster while describing Tesla’s future vehicle lineup. “Long term, the only manually driven car will be the new Tesla Roadster,” he said. “Speaking of which, we may be able to debut that in a month or so. It requires a lot of testing and validation before we can actually have a demo and not have something go wrong with the demo.”
That single statement is the entire Roadster update from yesterday’s call, and while it represents another timeline shift, it comes as no surprise with Tesla heads-down-at-work on the mass rollout of its Robotaxi service across US cities, and the industrial scale production of the humanoid Optimus.
The fact that Musk specifically framed the Roadster as the last manually driven Tesla is significant on its own. As the rest of the lineup moves toward full autonomy, the Roadster becomes something rare in the Tesla-sphere by keeping the driver in control. Driving enthusiasts who buy a $200,000 supercar are not doing so to be passengers. They want the physical connection to the road, the feel of acceleration under their own input, and the experience of controlling something with that level of performance. FSD, however capable it becomes, removes that entirely. The Roadster signals that Tesla understands this distinction and is building a car specifically for the people who consider driving itself the point.
Tesla isn’t joking about building Optimus at an industrial scale: Here we go
The specs for the Roadster Musk has teased over the years are genuinely unlike anything in production. The base model targets 0 to 60 mph in 1.9 seconds, a top speed above 250 mph, and up to 620 miles of range from a 200 kWh battery. The optional SpaceX package takes it further, rumored to add roughly ten cold gas thrusters operating at 10,000 psi, borrowed directly from Falcon 9 rocket technology. With thrusters, Musk has claimed 0 to 60 mph in as little as 1.1 seconds. In a 2021 Joe Rogan interview he went further, stating “I want it to hover. We got to figure out how to make it hover without killing people.” Tesla filed a patent for ground effect technology in August 2025, suggesting the hover concept has not been abandoned. The starting price remains $200,000, with the Founders Series requiring a $250,000 full deposit. Some reservation holders placed those deposits in 2017 and are approaching a full decade of waiting.
With production now targeted for 2027 or 2028 at the earliest, the Roadster remains Tesla’s most audacious promise and its longest-running delay. But if what Musk is testing lives up to even half of what he has described, the demo alone should be worth waiting for.
Elon Musk says the Tesla Roadster unveiling could be done “maybe in a month or so.”
He said it should be an extraordinary unveiling event. pic.twitter.com/6V9P7zmvEm
— TESLARATI (@Teslarati) April 22, 2026
SpaceX just got pulled into the biggest Weapons Program in U.S. history
Tesla pulls back the curtain on Cybercab mass production
