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Tesla Roadster

tesla.com

251–260 of 729 posts

Re: Tesla Roadster

#251

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would have to guess that they didn't decide to make a Roadster in the last month or two.

I think that that is the person's point. This is several years of development which amounts to wasted resources in light of the manufacturing setbacks of their truly disruptive product.

While I actually agree with Animats, I do feel the need to point out that I do not agree that the Model 3 is the "truly disruptive product" vs. this newly announced Roadster... this car has a 620 mile range... that is "truly disruptive"; the Model 3 only has at its best a 334 mile range: this is finally an electric car that can rival the long-range convenience of a gasoline vehicle (as no matter what the range, filling up your take with gas is essentially instantaneous vs. trying to charge a battery).

Re: Tesla Roadster

#252
post #161
post #19

I'm thinking what this means to gas car makers. Wave 1: "It's all about legacy and prestige, not speed/acceleration". Wave 2: "The track handling isn't all that good, how can drivers take that corner at full power without losing traction". Wave 3: "Alright, we will go electric too".

Gas will always have sound. The growl of an Aston Martin V12 on startup, or a Lexus LFA screaming through a tunnel, or the flat-plane V8 burble from a Mustang GT350. EM cars only have a dull whine the faster they go. Motorheads are secretly all musicians who happen to love driving. The best combination is ultimately both though, hybrid systems are already used quite frequently in everything from LMP1 WEC racers to mo…

The thing is that sound is associated with speed because a bigger/stronger engine is usually louder.

Electrics will break that association. Or it will create a new expectation about what a fast car sounds like. Because from now on, they will always be faster than ICE vehicles.

I think there will be a niche of people buying ICE cars for their loud sound, just as there are people who buy the loudest possible motorcycles even though they're not very fast. But I think this will be a niche, and they will probably be considered obnoxious people.

I think we'll also see more sound engineering in EVs. They'll perhaps get a more satisfying sound, but will still be quiet.

Re: Tesla Roadster

#253

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a Tesla Model S owner, you really don't need to fill your car in minutes. It's a totally different (but not bad) mindset. Every morning my car is full, because I plug it in in my garage. So if I don't go more than 260 miles that day, it's plugged in the next night. It doesn't matter that it takes a few hours. My gas car was just sitting in the garage each night anyway doing nothing. How many hours does your car si…

I've never had a private garage, much less a locked one I could rewire. If Tesla wants to go mainstream they need to handle apartment parking.

One of my neighbors runs an extension cord across the sidewalk to his plug-in Prius. Not sure if he has a surveillance cam trained on it or not.

Re: Tesla Roadster

#254
post #23

Does this mean that Tesla is pivoting from their attempt to produce a medium-priced car in quantity and going back to hand-building high-end cars? Tesla is good at high-end, low volume products. But the Model 3 production fiasco shows they don't know how to do what Detroit and Wolfsburg and Toyota City do. This is in a way a step backwards. Tesla is going back to targeting the 1%. There are lots of little supercar co…

> Does this mean that Tesla is pivoting from their attempt to produce a medium-priced car in quantity and going back to hand-building high-end cars? It's a halo car... Car companies build halo car to get consumers attention to their brand and to sell other models. Nissan didn't have to build the GT-R R35 but it did because it's a halo car. Another example is Toyota LFA.

But why does Tesla need a halo car? They already have the consumers’ attention. Lots of people would buy Teslas today but can’t because Tesla is unable to mass produce the Model 3.

Re: Tesla Roadster

#255
post #219
post #17

The Tesla roadster specs are insane! No exotic carmaker will be able to match it (taking price as a consideration). (no Ferrari, or Lambo, can get that close. This is Formula 1 acceleration speeds). Plus 620 miles of range, and it is a 4 seater. Expensive as hell, but this is exotic car territory. Base Specs Acceleration 0-60 mph1.9 sec Acceleration 0-100 mph4.2 sec Acceleration 1/4 mile8.8 sec Top SpeedOver 250 mph…

Paper stats are one thing but show me this beating even something like a GT3 in an actual circuit race, or posting a Nurburgring time worthy of the price tag. I’m sure in another 5 or 10 years they’ll get there but these figures are for headlines not the track.

I'd like to see motor trend test it on the track and against competitors

Re: Tesla Roadster

#256
post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> No exotic carmaker will be able to match it. Did you fact check that? Actually, Bugatti is pretty close and partially outperforms, although at a way higher price point. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bugatti_Chiron

I wouldn't call 1600Nm of torque over 2k rpm pretty close to 10000Nm flat...

1600Nm is the engine torque for the Chiron. The 10000Nm value Tesla gave is the wheel torque. You need to multiply the 1600Nm by the gear ratio to get the wheel torque.

Re: Tesla Roadster

#257
post #2

0-60 in 1.9 seconds is ABSURD

To be precise, 1.44 g. For comparison, a Falcon 9 v1.1 rocket -- without payload -- at takeoff mass has 1.19 g of thrust.

For those that are unaware, all rockets then rapidly increase their G. For example the Saturn V had 1.20 g at takeoff but climed up to 4-ish: http://www.braeunig.us/apollo/saturnV.htm

Someone on the Saturn V started experiencing more G than the Roadster about a minute into the launch.

When you move a building-sized fuel tank under its own thrust it's going to start off slow, but accelerate as more fuel is burned.

Re: Tesla Roadster

#258
post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m no Tesla defender, but how is anything “known” about a car that was first announced a couple of hours ago?

It’s physics, there’s no way around it. You expend a ton of energy——battery heats up. Without massive radiators there’s nowhere for that heat to go.

You get voted down by people who just want to believe stuff, physics be damned. Doesn't matter that the same exact thing happens to the existing S models which manage a more than decent 0-to-60 performance on paper (they're in the same league with the Lambos and the Ferraris), but because of those damned physics I don't think that any of them actually completed a Nurburgring lap (that's ~7 km driving the S model like a sports car).

Re: Tesla Roadster

#259
post #223
post #17

The Tesla roadster specs are insane! No exotic carmaker will be able to match it (taking price as a consideration). (no Ferrari, or Lambo, can get that close. This is Formula 1 acceleration speeds). Plus 620 miles of range, and it is a 4 seater. Expensive as hell, but this is exotic car territory. Base Specs Acceleration 0-60 mph1.9 sec Acceleration 0-100 mph4.2 sec Acceleration 1/4 mile8.8 sec Top SpeedOver 250 mph…

10,000 NM of torque. That's INSANE. I drive a car with 400NM torque and that thing scares the sh*t out of me when I accelerate. 10,000 NM? Isn't that something along the lines of a tram or a train (I'm not sure, I'm asking you guys). This is CRAZY. I'm getting one for sure.

For those of us in the US, and vaguely familiar with traditional hot rods, the Chevy big block engine generally came with ~500-700 lb-ft of torque, which in a lead sled, relatively speaking, such as a 60-70s era Camaro or Chevelle would throw your head back and shake your chest like a roller coaster as the car started to slightly drift sideways.

10,000nm in comparison is 7,375lb-ft, which sounds like Harry Potter land in comparison, if all of my conversions and memories serve me.

I'm kinda speechless, TBH.

Re: Tesla Roadster

#260
post #242

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Very unlikely. With power you weight beyond useful (this has basically been "solved" since the day someone built a cat around a ww2 military aircraft piston engine), acceleration is determined by aerodynamics (drag and downpressure), tires and the time spent shifting gears . It's pretty evident where Tesla has the advantage.

Shifting gears? Why does it have an advantage?

Teslas don't need gears since they use electric motors. So there is literally no time spent shifting gears.

See https://www.quora.com/Why-don%E2%80%99t-Tesla-cars-need-a-ge...

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