It's okay to disagree with me. But, the Elio will be much simpler to manufacture and assemble than the Tesla. There won't be a bottleneck due to battery cell manufacturing for example. All the processes are straight forward except they are MUCH more simplified than the Hummers or S-10s. We had 27 different cross-body harnesses, for goodness sakes! The Elio will have one. All the components will be lighter and easier to handle than the S-10 and Hombres were. The Hombre had a hood that came in giant wooden boxes! The cross-body harness station required 5-6 people to run just because everything was hard to reach and one person was designated soley to find the next harness to install. That station won't require that many people for sure. The lack of any really autonomous processes means that there won't be the same kind of problems that you have when a highly automated system has when it enounters something out of the ordinary. Now, you'll get all-new problems. Will it be simple? No. But, from my time as an engineer there, I can tell you that once the line is set up for the differences that Elio presents, it will be pretty smooth production. There's just ample space to be able to spread processes out enough so that you don't have to complicate a station just to get it to fit in a tight space. They'll be able to out produce demand (and shipping capability) very quickly after the process verification run. Just watch.
Since you are a GM engineer then you understand that they plant you were at in Shreveport was not the cream of the crop and they did have lots of things thrown at them. I was there a few times (maybe we even met) and it was not run the way most other manufacturers do things. Too many differences along the line. As for Tesla, that line makes one car. The model 3. Every one of them is a 4 door sedan. Every one has the same rear axle and battery footprint. From under the car, there's only one real difference, the front axle. It's either driven or not. Tesla does not have to deal with exhaust, fuel systems and emission controls. The motor package is really simplistic as opposed to anything a gas car has. This is why you know that Tesla has a really big profit margin on their cars because the simplicity and standardization of their cars. Even the dash is so much more simple than anything out there. Even though Tesla has been through manufacturing hell, they have done quite well with the car. As for Elio, all of that GM knowledge, left the plant in 2012. They will need to hire engineers like you back to get everything up and running like the old days. At this point, the talent in that area when it comes to car manufacturing has left long ago or got other jobs. Elio has a massive hill ahead of them for the next 60 weeks because that's when they at targeting to have the first ones in customer hands.
Of course everybody left, they closed the plant! If they build it, they will come! (Field of Dreams) They've been targeting all kind of things and yet to hit the bullseye. Funding, funding, funding.........funding.
I was just an industrial engineer in Shreveport and THAT wasn't for very long. There are, of course, similarities to any production facility. The Elio line will be simple though. They may have a powertrain assembly line in-plant but since they only offer two configurations, I would be very surprised if Elio didn't receive the engine, tranny, radiator, and associated engine hardware already assembled. That GM plant was expanded in 2002 to include the stamping operation. It was not, by any stretch, an old plant.
I'm just getting a bit worried because it's 60 weeks to get the target 2019 targeted release date and it looks like Elio has lots of work to do (HR, supply chain, testing, engineering changes, plant outfit) to reach that milestone. It won't be long and we will be in the holiday season and as we all know, there's not much that gets done come just over two weeks from now until the end of the year.
It's only a matter of time before we start reading "targeting production kickoff and first customer deliveries in 2020". Certainly if substantive progress were being made toward final production readiness, Paul Elio would be screaming it from rooftops. The lack of news and transparency is frustrating. The small investment by Overstock generated buzz, then the ElioCoin STO launch has been left open-ended. Did it close? Did they comply with an SEC cease-and-desist? Is the offering still ongoing? Was there any interest? Has Patrick Byrne pulled out or is he still supporting the project? The new powertrain announcement was released during the ElioCoin STO launch window with much fanfare and no subsequent follow-up. I'll admit the one factoid that gives me hope at this point is this photographic evidence of an alleged supplier meeting that took place on 05/03/2018 in Troy, MI with a cameo by the E1c: https://www.eliomotors.com/elio-supplier-meeting/. It came totally unannounced and seemingly out of nowhere following months of apparent inactivity in the public eye. It's the only thing I cling to as I try not to be pessimistic about 2019 delivery prospects.
