Pack Analysis: BYD Blade vs CATL Qilin vs Tesla 4680 Structural

Which next generation battery pack is best and are there any advantages to each design? That's the topic for today: A pack level analysis of the BYD Blade vs CATL Qilin vs Tesla 4680 Structural batteries. In short, they're all awesome packs that just happen to take different approaches based on the strategies of the companies that designed them.

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*Timeline*
00:00 Intro
02:05 Why am I Leaving out GM and Ford?
04:25 Basic Design Analysis: Blade / Qilin / 4680
05:49 Caveats and Why I didn’t Include Charge Speed
07:58 Rigidity Analysis
09:32 Energy Density
11:02 Cooling Analysis
11:42 What do I Mean by Safety?
14:20 Safety Analysis
17:27 Cost Analysis
19:43 Initial Summary Table
20:30 Full Table with Commentary
24:16 Final Table: Tesla’s Perspective
26:37 Summary

Intro Music by Dyalla: Homer Said

[gridcoregilry]

Simply incredible work, as always, Jordan! Really makes me understand, and I have no professional background in any of the subject matters you talked about

[justinmallaiz]

My favorite episode Jordan! It really shows and draws from all your research you've done over the last couple of years, Thanks for the great overview!

[paulcummings]

Excellent video that not only compares the different structual batteries, but makes the important note that ALL of them are better than anything before, and that CATL and BYD are Tesla suppliers, not competitors, at least for many years to come.

[kevtheobald]

So many mainstream media outlets need to watch this. Another great video.

[eamonstack]

Clear evidence based analysis. Three (5) outstanding battery packs using significantly different engineering approaches. Actual rather than theoretical units. Excellent relevant and valuable video. Thanks

[Do.Not.Believe.The.Narrative]

As an all in Tesla investor, your battery comparison presentation is a great anti-anxiety catalyst😅 Thanks!

[keithritter]

Jordan - great analysis. One item you should double-check. Why the 4680 cell can is thicker than the 2170 cell can. The thicker 4680 cell can MAY help with the pack's structural aspects, but it is likely the primary reason for thickening it up is to prevent the cell can from rupturing in a thermal runaway event.

The cell cans are essentially "pressure vessels" that must contain the cell's internal pressure during a thermal runaway event and allow the cell's gasses to vent through the end-cap vent port and not rupture the can's sidewall due to excessive "hoop stress" in the can (picture how a pipe ruptures when it has been over-pressured or freezes). The "hoop stress" for any cylinder is proportional to the internal pressure, cylinder diameter, and cylinder wall thickness. So, for a constant internal pressure, a cylindrical cell that has twice the diameter will require a can with twice the wall thickness to handle the same hoop stress. Note the 4680 vs 2170 cell diameter ratio is 46/21 = 2.19. Now note the 4680 cell can vs 2170 cell can thickness ratio is an average 0.55 mm/0.25 mm = 2.20. Coincidence? Perhaps you should check with any cell engineer contacts you might have about my hypothesis.

[kwatt-engineer]

Bravo! I find your videos to be both compact and comprehensive with the added bonus of being brutally coherent with zero fluff.

[neutronpcxt]

Another advantage of using smaller cells are yield rates: like with computer ships, the smaller the cell, the higher the yield rates.

[thelimitingfactor]

There's a lot of comments coming up in this video about the repairability of 4680 Structural Packs:

1) Repair was always a minimally viable proposition for automotive packs. It creates cell balancing issues because you can't just drop a fresh cell into a pack full of disimilar cells. You'd have to find a cell that's identical to others in the pack, which were matched at the factory. It can be done, but it's more of a bandaid for out of production packs.

2) What about if it's not the cell that's the issue? That's part of the the point of entombing the busbars, wiring, and cooling lines in polyurethane foam rather than bolting everything down: There's not much to break loose. If there is a failure, it would show up pretty quickly and covered by warranty.

3) EV OEMs don't cater to the <.1% of people who want the right to risk frying themselves on the high voltage system to replace one cell that will likely cause a sub-optimal outcome. They cater to great mass of people who want a lower cost vehicle with less noise, vibration, and harshness that has greater reliability and costs less.*

That is, the right-to-repair argument for automotive battery packs is hackneyed.

*Currently, supply can't keep up with demand for EVs. Tesla won't price vehicles so low that customers start "flipping" them. Cheaper Tesla vehicles will come in the next couple of years, along with Chinese EVs.

[Dykaer]

You ROCK. Love your work, and you are always on point.
Thanks.

[NickoSwimmer]

Excellent comparison and breakdown of the contendors for next gen packs vs legacy systems. I'm glad to see that there are multiple companies pushing the overall pack performance forward, and look forward to seeing real world results! Great video as always buddy!

By the way we recently accepted delivery of our 2023 MYLR! So stoked to finally be part of the Tesla owners club!

[thomasoneill]

Jordan
This details within this video Is beyond incredible. I have no superlatives to do this justice.👍👍

[ryudozz]

Thank you, your videos are always the best!

[reggiebald]

Wow, Gordon! Your research and breakdown of information is fantastic! I owe you so much even to my limited knowledge. Hopefully, someday soon, I will begin to repay ~

[paulmiddleton]

I've been waiting for this! Thanks Jordan!

Absolutely awesome analysis. The internet at its best

[Legola]

Best video of the EV scene so far. Your stuff keeps getting better and better.

[satoshimanabe]

Very interesting, thank you. One additional advantage in Tesla's technique is that multiple pack sizes are possible without changing the pack voltage. Tesla can shrink or grow the pack size by changing the number of cells in parallel, while keeping the same number in series. With BYD, it appears all cells are connected in series, so they may only be able to change the pack size by changing the number of cells in series, which changes the pack voltage...which in turn changes powertrain voltage. They could double each cell in parallel, but that grows the pack size by 100%, which is a completely different vehicle.

[govindnram]

Your analysis is very exhaustive and specific as far as I have read. Thanks