After a brief period of
unofficial officialness this morning,
Tesla has rolled out the
Model S to a sea of eager photographers. The company's also revealed specs for the EV: this seven-seater can go from 0 to 60 MPH in 5.6 seconds, boasts a top speed of 120 MPH, features a dashboard display and a 17-inch main touchscreen monitor. It's fully 3G capable, sports HD and satellite radio, uses LED and neon exterior lights, smart-key power, and push button gear selector. While
that $49,900 base price will get you a battery that's good for 160 miles per charge, 230-mile and 300-mile range packs will be available. On a 220V outlet, the company says it'll charge in four hours with a 45 minute "QuickCharge" option, and you should be able to swap batteries if necessary in under 8 minutes. Excited? Find a way to control yourself, this baby isn't going into production in Q3 2011. Check out a brief glimpse of the interior after the break.
posted Mar 26th 2009 5:51PM
did ya see what top gear thought of the tesla?
not worth it. falls apart. dead batteries after 55 miles
So what? My car gets about 8-9mpg at the track. It'll be good for a whopping 108 miles on their track before it sputters and runs out of fuel.
In the real world, both my car and the Tesla will last much longer.
I saw it too. It was back from around Christmas since BBC America delays the showing here, but it's still a good review.
The better point made in that episode is that battery based cars will be obsolete anyway because of the production of the Honda's Clarity.
The Clarity is essentially a test case but definitely shows us the future. It'll allow us to continue to drive the way WE WANT TO DRIVE versus being extremely limited by battery range. The driving experience doesn't change. No long charge times or worrying that the car will just run out of juice.
Hydrogen technology has made it to the point of being able to make an everyday car. Once production costs go down and infrastructure gets into place, it'll be more prevalent.
Oh, and oil companies love hydrogen since easiest place to obtain hydrogen is from a fossil fuel. It's also why hydrogen cost about the same as gas.
God, not this again? Have you or your friends ever driven a car at the track? You easily get less than half your normal mileage. And did you miss the Top Gear show where the 11mpg Ferrari 599 got only 1.7mpg on the Top Gear track? The Lambo and Aston didn't do much better either.
I'm rooting for them to get this car out. They haven't gotten a penny of government money yet, but they are applying for a government loan right now (private capital is really hard to get right now) and I think they deserve to get it to get this car out.
Google it. Top Gear FAKED that test then admitted they had "done the math not an actual test". That whole review was fake to make the Tesla look bad
Yea, because instead of driving it like a normal person would in a daily routine, they drove it like madmen. If you drove it like you'd drive any other car, in the real world, you'll easily get a 200 mile range.
It doesn't take much to make a bad concept look bad.
Top Gear has turned into another paid-by-the-big-dogs show in the past 2 seasons, I can't stand how fake they would act just to satisfy some big cooperation paying them some money to glorify a normal car then make a car like Tesla sound like the worst car built ever. I watched that episode and I was so annoyed by the smart-a**es doing the review. If they like a car or are forced to like it, they do the best report in the world, they turn the episode into the best movie ever with so much drama and action you'd think it was Casablanca all over again! but if don't get paid high money, they open hell on everything about that car and make the episode so lame followed by the most unfunny and ridiculous jokes to look all cute and clumsy.
They didn't even explain to people the environment and types of tests they did! They will take the time to bring up reasons only "if" the company paid them big money.
http://www.reghardware.co.uk/2008/12/22/bbc_top_gear_tesla/
Brakes - True
Running out of juice - Bollocks
Top Gear may be lots of things, but the nature of the BBC means it is definitely not "paid-by-the-big-dogs". It is paid for by me :-)
TG would probably argue that it is an entertainment show, not a place for accurate car reviews. However, I do agree that some of the entertaining but unfair reviews can't be good for the manufacturer.
However, they say any publicity is good publicity.
At kjb434:
Hydrogen is a poor choice for future automobiles. Both battery and hydrogen vehicles harness energy from another source and store it until it is needed by the vehicle. The difference is that batteries are much more efficient at this (li-po) than hydrogen. It takes less work to store that energy. Also, H2 is one of the most reactive elements, ever notice the huge discharge plug at hydrogen gas stations? One single spark leads to the entire thing blowing up. I'll put my money towards a battery powered car, especially with all the new developments in battery technology, before ever using a hydrogen vehicle.
@kjb434
With all due respect, hydrogen is an stupid idea, it involves more steps in its production, consumes far more energy (possibly petrol) to be produced, and it is currently being pushed by you know who (hint hint CO2). I just can't understand how anyone can advocate for hydrogen (unless you are a petrol lobbyist).
i believe that as slow as our battery tech is being developed it will still easily overtake hydrogen within the next 40 years at least. We'll have battery powered cars that will be chargeable in minutes and maybe even last double the range they do now. If you think about it, it is inevitable really, it has been since the first electric cars were made. Heck, factor in solar development and combine an advanced solar power platform to the what i'm thinking about and you could have cars that could maybe be recharged in minutes by plug and recharged by solar in hours! Maybe even have solar panels like that capable of trickle charging the batt's while the car is active and combine that with all the regen braking and you could extend the doubled range to who knows what. I could see that kind of development happening in the next 40 years... maybe even 20 really. I'm more of an optimist, lol... it could all go horribly wrong and we might not have that kind of combined tech till 2073... that would suck... so um.... you guys get on all that. peace.
hydrogen will *never become prevalent as a fuel because even extracting it from fossil fuels (the easiest method) still uses too much energy relative to just using the fossil fuel itself, and/or eliminates the clean aspect. extracting H2 from water uses a bunch of electricity: you'd be better off storing that electricity in a battery and using it directly.
Hydrogen is the most abundant element but FREE (H2) hydrogen does not exist on the Earth in any meaningful quantity.
* If we ever manage to develop fusion technology, then maybe production of H2 as a fuel will be cheap and efficient.
My money is on super capacitor technology. 20% of the energy density of gasoline it the magic number at which electricity storage can effectively replace gasoline one for one. I say 20% because only 15% to 20% of the energy in a given quantity of gasoline goes to actually generating motion. The other 80%+ is waste heat.
You have to watch the segment from beginning to end, they leave it up to the viewer to decide.
For someone that hasn't bothered to read through the Tesla website, it didn't seem to prove or disprove anything about the Tesla Roadster, and the video said it was a calculated amount, but I suppose people would be distracted by the imagery.
In 2 years and I should be able to afford both of them, here's betting on Tesla to survive.
Top Gear Lied: They faked the running out of juice part.
All of this done WITHOUT tax payers money.
Hear-hear.
Totally.
If only they had done this car first, and not the roadster. They would've been in a much better position financially.
they do get some money though, the stimulus package gives money for electric vehicle development
The original plan was that the Roadster would have a high enough profit margin to fund their sedan R&D. A lot more work will go into the sedan, and Roadster owners will probably be more tolerant of bugs than people who have a family sedan.
Not sure if this is still true tho.
This car is pure win. Plus the infrastructure they are developing for batteries swaps in under 5 minutes makes this car all the more real and sustainable.
I will buy one when it comes out! Good job Tesla. Now get the price about $10K lower and you WILL be the next FORD or GM.
for me, the amazing part is the swappable batteries
;-)
maybe an apple engineer will take note. or not.
Tesla will receive a 350 million dollar Federal loan to build the S.
http://www.boston.com/cars/news/articles/2009/02/22/federal_loans_will_help_jump_start_tesla_sedan/
The "free market" would have sold them off for scrap by now.
Good point ChillyCat.
YES!!!
This is amazing.
Tesla's name is being put to good use here.
Wow i am loving the design and everything...Imagine such a small company can build something like this at a decent price point. But of course with years and billions of dollars Chevy gives us the VOLT? LOL amazing..
Either way its a great investment in a new US car company doing something that Detroit has failed to do for 30 years
SOLD! Where do I send the money?
so you think.
Actually, they're close to securing 350mil from the government.
If that thing really does sell for $50k, Chevy is going to have an awfully difficult time convincing anyone who could stretch their budget another 10k to buy a $40k Volt. That is one nice looking vehicle.
The thing is that this won't be available for over two months.
In my country Vehicle Registration Tax makes up as much as 60% of the purchase price.
Electric Vehicles are tax exempt. This car is going to be cheaper than my toyota.
Sorry, I meant two years :\
@Noel
Your country must be run by a brilliant man.
I'm just doing some maths now... in the Netherlands where I live there is a 40% tax on all new consumer cars (excluding VAT), and a yearly tax to drive on the road. If you drive electric both of those taxes are gone (the VAT is still there)... so with 60% it must be a country where they tax cars even more... is it Denmark? They got a 180% tax on consumer cars there :-P. http://www.skovgaard.org/europe/denmark.htm
Uhg, what looked great from the back and side looks terrible from the front. Please give the nose a redesign.
Totally - it looks like an Oldsmobile from the front. Lucky for them, its not coming out for TWO YEARS, so they have some time to fix it.
well IMO it looks sleek vs the volt which seems bulky looking
Looks a bit like the Maserati Quattroporte...Still looks great though
Looks a little bit like the offspring of a Quattroporte and a Prius.
Probably goes a bit like the offspring of a Quattroporte and a Prius :-P
Just to be clear- the 40k volt is going to be eligible for the same tax credit as the Telsa. So to compare apples to apples- the 40k volt is really 32,500 vs. the telsa for 50k.
This car definetly has 18K worth of extras, and then some, that makes it more than worth the price premium over the Volt.
Besides, we all already paid a few thousand towards the volt via tax money already, so you have to factor that.
Seven seater? I didn't notice the rumble seats in the back.
This is exactly what I thought when I read seven. How do you fit seven in a sedan, especially one that seems to lack headroom in the back?
I agree. Seven little sparrow people? I could MAYBE believe it seated 5.
Word is that that it has 2 child size seats in the back that face backwards, stay-wag style. that thing is a fricken tardis.
Where better to put your kids, than the most frequently-impaced zone in auto accidents.
Can't WAIT for the news story "300 children die this month from otherwise-minor rear-end collisions in Tesla Model S vehicles"
Like strapping your kids to the cowcatcher on a train.
Or like storing your perishable keepsakes in a box next to the leaky shaking ominous pipe in the basement that floods once a year.
It does not have a $50K base price. It costs $57,500, and there is a tax credit. And that's for 160 mile range. This is a very expensive car.