Tesla Model S
 

I have to admit, sometimes we get some nice metal in at work, this time it was a Tesla. Been seeing a few of these driving around recently. Very understated from the outside and easily missed of course I had to take a closer look...

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Have to say I'm impressed, although with what they cost it bloody well should be. Love the interior. Huge boot (front and rear).

Some niggles with typical American chrome plated plastics and the driver's door dropped so the panels don't align, but given this is such a new company and for them to make something without resorting to pilfering out of other manufacturer's parts bins (like Aston Martin used to do).

Underneath is like a lotus Exige; totally flat. Front suspension looks like the typical ZF-Lemförder affair as found on F10 BMWs, Mercs and Jags (why do all the big manuafcturers have identical suspension deisgns these days? :mad: ).

Ok I only drove it 50yards to park it up but wow, its weird. This is a car that can match my Golf's 0-60 and makes zero noise. the automation of the door locks and ignition is superb, no messing with buttons, handbrakes, keys etc - just open the door and put it in D and drive it! If they can make more electric cars like this that are affordable and go a bit further, then this is the future.

Meanwhile I serviced a Auris Hybrid and was quickly shown exactly what electric cars should NOT be. Horrible, dull to sit in, dull to look at, dull to drive, and pointless too. Can't plug it in, and it has a small boot.

Ban hybrids that can't be driven for more than 50miles without resorting to firing up the engine (or a few hundred yards for the Auris), or at least the tax incentives. Yesterday's tech.

They don't interest me from a motoring perspective in their current form. But from a business and technology perspective, it's absolutely amazing what Elon Musk has achieved.

He reminds me of another Steve Jobs type guy.

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P90d model s

My uncle has one.

Its the fastest thing i have ever driven.

Have a good vid of it launching on facebook.


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I'd have a Tesla Roadster at the drop of a hat.

That looks like a bit of a Ford Mundano to me though :-(

Brilliant technology.Just need to make them look nice.lol

Don't know if it was S model but had to take closer look at what thought maybe Jaguar or Maserati , turned out be a Tesla in black . This was on quayside in Dieppe

You must have a fast golf if it can hit 60 in the 2's :p

Was thinking that myself, I watched one of these make a new shape Audi RS3 look like he left the handbrake on, these are Supercar quick upto 100mph!!:thumb:

Thats one fast Golf :-O
the P90D, does 0-60 in 2.6 seconds in ludicrous mode ;)

I like Musk's vision of a whole city/country wide energy solution, where car manufacturers just generally focus on the car bit. The solarcity combined with his powerwall technologies makes electric cars feasible and importantly a genuine nod to reducing pollution when using cars (maybe not for production though). Hes one of the few to acknowledge that a electric car powered via the electricity grid, of which is partly fossil fueled is not only inefficient, but polluting in itself.

If we can generate and store our own power at home or work for when we need to use it would make arguments for building more power stations like Hinkley null and void.

His "gigafactories" are something we haven't seen on this scale in the western world for a long time, and its good as we need someone to out produce China, which if anyone noticed is hoarding precious metals used for battery production purely in order to capture the market and control prices. Musk has a fight on his hands with the Chinese, I hope he wins.

The one we had in was a 70D (which IIRC stands for a 70KWh battery pack and AWD) which is slower than SmurfyBhoy's P90D. Its 0-60 is 5.2 seconds. Golf "officially" is 6 seconds, its a tad quicker than that though, its not 5.2 though.

But he is just using Panasonic batteries built "in house"

How many cars in the real world is he going to produce percentage wise

They're pretty dear

And aren't the battery packs going to be fekked after five years, with a renewal at £10,000?

Do they really drop 40k in first year ownership

Honestly the fastest car I have been in, the instant acceleration has to be felt to be properly understood.

However from 90mph onwards i would say my 400bhp sti feels just as quick,

Couldn't get more than 130mph out it maybe 140 max.

Tesla recently announced P100d which is a better batterey that can be retrofitted for £10k ish,

http://www.pistonheads.com/news/ph-a...upgrades/34845

No it wouldn't. You'd never get the required uptake and even if you did, you'd never be able to store enough energy to do away with big powerstations.

I read if everyone used Teslas and went home and plugged in the national grid would sh1t it's pants

Well the RAC reckon there are 30 million drivers in the UK, so assuming everyone has a car you're looking at 330GW to charge them all with the internal charger on a model S. Given the current grid capacity stands at 80GW, **** itself is an understatement :lol1:

I don't really get the looks myself, almost look like a concept car from the 80's.

Looks really dated already.

The one they had on top gear was quite amusing, was a little car though.

Still, bit of an odd one for me. If you've got all that money and are a petrolhead and want a fast car, would you buy a car that looked like that? Then if you were a green tree hugger with loads of money, why would you want a car that does 0-60 in 2.6 secs? Surely that type of person caring about the planet would rather have a 500 mile battery range than performance? At the end of the day an electric car that goes like a scalded cat is going to need more charging.

What did people make of the Ford Model T in the day . . . . . . .

We are in the infancy of this era of Technology,
It will go that way, so we have to try and embrace.

Why do the two have to be mutually exclusive? Personally I quite like the idea of the model S, you won't find many luxury saloons that quick that can offer the same economy/green factor.

I suppose it probably makes more sense to build the image from the top down rather than bottom up . If it can match super car and take the family then why not

I think they look more Maserati than Ford. I pass a black one every day, it is a real looker.

I know someone who has just ordered the P100D. Delivery is due in Feb 17. I'm gonna grab the keys if I can and ram it down Santa Pod!!! :D

Anyone know what work needs done on a Tesla as a service? it has a very low number of moving parts compared with petrol or derv motors, presumably regenerative braking would mean even the pads and discs would last significantly longer than on a hydrocarbon fuelled equivalent.

Has anyone worked out the TCO comparison between the model S and an equivilant other marque?

Ehh? The Model S does have this new fangled thing must only be found on electric cars called an accelerator pedal. The p100D or even the p90d has 100 or 90kwh batteries. Say your getting 3 miles per kwh then that's 300 miles. Plus I don't have a tesla but ride in a leaf or a zoe. Nicer than an s class or 7series.

Don't ask :lol1:

https://www.tesla.com/en_GB/support/service-plans

No, just, no. :lol1:

Thought it sounded unlikely !

Absolutely


The new Mondeo looks like an Aston Mondeo :p

Seriously, if you haven't tried it you can't say no. Have you driven something electric before?