On Sunday, October 11, 2020 at 7:37:45 PM UTC-4, JF Mezei wrote:
On 2020-10-10 18:41, Snidely wrote:

An update -- in the first Snate cryo stream, the Nasa SpaceFlight
reporters indicated that SN8 is a hybrid, per Elon's msgs [tweets?].
Strange. Also, strange that they started building SN8 with the new
material before SN7 was tested. By the time SN7 was tested to failure,
SN8 was already built. So improvements made with SN7.1 which did pass
the tests (apparently) couldn't have been given to already built SN8.
There is only so much retroactive welding you can do.


Also, they found leaks in SN8 which had to be fixed. Surprised that by
now, they haven't develop an ISO 9000 type of procedures to ensure welds
are strong and perfect from the start without having to test to see
where the leaks are and whether the thing will pop when filled.

I'll have to hunt for Elon's tweets to see what he said. (Most of his
traffic is responding to individuals, so following him doesn't show
those responses).
SN8 was started before SN7 was tested because that's how iterative development works. As far as leaks, you are assuming they are at welds. That is not necessarily so.