Whats left after VP? Another prototype, or production?

Congratulations on reaching the VP stage of development!

I guess I’m going to have to start giving some serious thought to which color I want mine to be painted.

Will these validation prototypes have the new transmission yet, I wonder?

This is a great milestone! If this is what has been keeping you busy the past two weeks, then it was worth not having a blog update last week! Do you have a time line for the next nine VPs and planned time span from the last to VP the start of prodution? Also, what will happen to any EPs and VPs that are still in one piece after all the testing? Will anyone be able to get them at “Used Car” prices?

And for those in other countries who eventually will ask when they can expect the Roadster to be in their country, I suggest you click on the “More” tab above and then the “FAQs” sub-tab, then then find the “Purchasing Questions” for “Can I buy a Tesla Roadster if I live outside of California? ” It will be hard enough to get one in the U.S., and then only in certain areas - California, and the metropolitan areas of Chicago, New York City and Miami. Outside those areas you might be able to get one by paying a premium - an $8,000 out-of-service-area premium to cover costs for transportation of the vehicle to the nearest Tesla Motors Customer Care Center or any other related servicing expenses. But the biggest comment in that answer you need to see would be: “We currently have no plans to offer the Tesla Roadster outside of the continental US.” That is for the Roadster. I haven’t seen anything about how and where they will sell the “WhiteStar”. It will probably be in those same markets as the Roadster at first, and hopefully expanding out to the rest of the U.S., and maybe eventually outside this country in several years.

# Malcolm Powel wrote “Tesla Roadster Progress - From EP to VP”
Thanks for another great blog. Great to see you reaching another major milestone.
Is that a “tow hook” I now see in the middle of the validation prototype?
Do you have a front license plate holder design in mind?

Also, what will the fate be for the remaining Engineering Prototypes and leftover Validation Prototypes once you go into production. I imagine that there are regulations that restrict what you can do with them. Do you send them to museums, cannibalize them for parts, or what? You could probably sell them in some other country even if they didn’t remain street legal here.

Does improved performace on the ESS PEM an motor mean that ultimat performance will be BETTER than a 4 second 0-60? Also can we get a response as to whether there is any “future proofing” inherent in the design that will allow for better/lighter batteries when they become available?

Anatoly - I considered that might be a possibility, but I don’t believe that the globe works like that. Water vapor does not cover the entire globe equally based on temperature, or the tropics would be no more humid than the Sahara. Obviously, the world is not small enough for there to be an equalizing effect on all humidity. Furthermore, I have not done a scientific experiment on this, but I would wager that my theory would hold true if I covered 95% of a swimming pool - I would be beyond shocked if the evaporation would be just as fast as a fully uncovered pool. Finaly, although I have no direct proof, if you look at NASA’s atmospheric water vapor map - www.agu.org/sci_soc/mockler.html - you will see (obviously) that atmospheric water vapor is much higher along the equator (duh…) I for one would be shocked beyond belief if by covering the equatorial line of the ocean caused more evaporation from the poles… but I could be completely wrong - it certainly wont be the firs time.

Mr. Powell, thanks for a great and informative blog entry. It’s a big ouch to read about VP validation crash testing.

Question: When full production Roadsters are ready, how will they be transported from the Hethel facility? Air? Sea? What I’m getting at is if the battery packs are installed in San Carlos what procedure will be used to get Roadsters from a ship or plane to the facility? It would be cool to see a parade of Roadsters being driven off a ship or plane.

# Macolm Powerll wrote:
## “One bad thing about having so much intelligent control over the vehicle systems is that it allows us to program some trick behaviors relatively easily.
## Only kidding, it’s a pleasure to be working with my Silicon Valley colleagues. ”

Are you just going to tease us with that?

# Doug @ Stanford wrote on March 22nd, 2007 at 5:19 pm
## What are these “trick behaviors” of which you speak?

Yeah, there is a customer there asking now!

Let me guess:

#1: They have programmed in the simulated ICE sounds that can make the stereo play sounds like a Ferrari as the engine revs?
#2: When the stereo is tuned to an ‘oldies’ station the top speed is limited to 55mph?
#3: When a reporter tries to adjust the radio volume the car starts to accelerate rapidly?

It’s the same green as my EV1! Ooo, now it’s going to be a tough choice between this green and Radiant Red.

Thank you Malcom for such a generous blog entry. Many of your future competitors will held back such testing and developing details because of the “evil” competitor which tends to copy future-oriented technology. Keep on going in the front of the pack!
Patrik
Tesla Roadster Aficionado

I apalogize for mixing blogs since this post is really relevent to posts made on “The Media Need to Toughen Up on the Subject of EVs” blog. Hopefully this has value here too.

A lot of assumptions have to be made to do a resale analysis (quality, desirability, future market conditions. etc, etc). Don’t you think there is too much guesswork involved at this point to arrive at a meaningful residual value for the whitestar? One could do a cost analysis for the effect on risidual values of the car for replacing the battery. this, too, will have it’s assumptions but is much less of a WAG. It seems pretty clear batteries of the same capacity will cost significantly less 5 years from now, let alone 12 years. A pretty conservative assumption for 12 years would be 50% less. Also, would anyone disagree that gas would cost significantly more, 100% more would be conservative. Assuming ESS is $25,000 today and gas in $2.70/gallon, then they would be $12,500 and $5.40/gallon 12 years from now. Since a used ICE car does not come with 100K mile supply of gas, the cost of fuel should be considered when comparing resale value of a battery spent EV vs an ICE. The “cost” would actually be a benefit. To calculate how much of a benefit, let’s make assumptions for the average cost of gas and electricity for the subsequent 12 year period ($7.60/gallon and $0.025/mile). Also, let’s assume an average fuel economy of 25 miles/gallon for the ICE car. This means the EV would actually be worth $15,400 more because of the battery (ICE= 7.60/25 x 100,000= $30,400 EV = .025 x 100,000 + $12,500= $15,000). A more practical analysis would be for 6 years out since more people replace their cars in this timeframe. Using similar logic, I come up with a $2000 benefit. So, even if the battery is depleted after 6 years, you will have a resale benefit for owning an EV. I think the actual energy usage that the Whitestar will have versus what the Roadster’s is, will probably make this 6 year analysis more of a break even proposition. Even so, there would be the future benefit of fuel (energy and gas) usage costs that should affect resale not to mention the many other maintenance, longevity, and technology benefits that EV’s (plug in Hybrids too) will enjoy.

Technology will have a much larger say in the resale values of future vehicles once electric propulsed automobiles are readily available. First generation EV’s and PHEV’s will suffer some from this too, but not nearly the way ICE resale values will suffer. Think of the copier market. Analog copiers had a much longer life cycle and held some value after significant use. You cannot give away an analog copier today. There are certainly some major differences to the dynamics of the car market, but there will be some similarities too. ICE car values will suffer as electric drivetrains expand into more of the car market. Every area of the market that has significant electrics, the corresponding ICE vehicles will feel the affect.

The best part of any legitimate financial analysis of ICE vs Ev is that costs are in diverging directions.

The more you look at the more you see the advantages of electric propulsion vs ICE. This is why it is so frustrating that they are not readily available today and why the large automakers’ efforts to date are so dissapointing. Some see hope with announcements like GM’s Volt, but I just can’t see it yet. If GM really and truely is committed to making electric propulsion vehicles a mainstream production reality, would they make the Volt as a Chevy. Doesn’t it make a halibut of a lot more sense to make it a Caddy or start a new brand altogether. The market pricing of Cadillac and even the design of the Volt fit the caddy brand like a glove.

Enough rambling ranting, congrats Tesla on another big step towards production.

Here is a video of the new 64 MW concentrating solar power (CSP) plant Nevada Solar One.

CSP has an energy payback time of only 6 months compared to some 2 years for photovoltaic power plants in the south-west of US. The conversion efficiency of CSP with parabolic trough mirrors is 13% and waste heat can be used for sea water desalination. Excess solar power is easily stored during the day as heat in salt tanks for night time electricity production.

At a cost of 4 $/W one could build 100 GW of CSP with the $ 400 billion spent in the “2nd oil war”, or 300 GW if private investors inject $ 2 for every $ granted by the government. In a desert area of 100 x 100 km2 (2 % of the Great Basin) at 20 % capacity factor they would generate clean electricity of 0.2 x 300 GW x 24 h/d = 1440 GWh/day. This would allow driving 112 Million Tesla Roadsters an average of 100 km daily on solar energy for at least 30 years, the lifetime of the CSP plant, assuming a consumption of 110 Wh/km and 86% battery system efficiency (The 21st Century Electric Car).

Alas, the $ 400 billion were spent to prolong our dependency on oil…From January to June 2006 the US imported 385,221 thousand barrels of oil from the entire Persian Gulf, or 2.1 Million barrel per day. This would suffice to fuel only 64 Million Toyota Prius 100 km daily at 55 mpg and 81.7% well-to-station efficiency, and a still smaller number of average American cars…

Investing in solar energy and electric cars instead in wars for oil would not only make US independent from Iraq et al., but also save us and our children from climate disaster and radioactive waste as long as sun shines on earth. Big problems require big solutions, such as putting millions of mirrors in deserts. Each square meter of desert receives solar energy equivalent to 1.5 barrels of oil annually, a layer of oil 9 inch deep! The technology to tap this never ebbing well exists and is economically viable.

We have to act before the rising fever of mother Earth provoked by Homo sapiens renders life unpleasant. Man has conquered space and landed on the moon. Now we need clear leadership, something like an Apollo Program for earth, to save our spaceship before its climatisation runs out of control.

Congrats on your first validation prototype. Is this the same as a production prototype or somewhere between?
I also like the fact that you guys do not put cardboard over the body to hide the styling!

Here is something that is a bit off the subject of your EP to VP atricle, but it is motorcar related:

Here is an idea for an automotive related product: First of all, let me state that I freely submit this concept to be placed in the public domain with no patents applied for by me. I just want to be given credit for creating this device if anybody ever decides to manufacture it.

The “Silent Witness” is a miniature electronic device that records video movies of events (onto flash memory) that affect a motor vehicle.

I recently auditioned for the TV show “American Inventor” and I was eliminated with the statement “This is a good idea, but it is already being produced”. I did a full Google search and could not find a consumer version of this specific product anywhere. (The show is looking for consumer products that can be sold at retailers, not industry specific devices like Police dash cams. I realize that Police Dash Cams have been around for many years, but these are not inexpensive consumer products. I also realize that “Back-up cameras exist for RVs and other large trucks, but this device is a large improvement upon those devices; this product could ‘double’ as a back-up cam.). Prior to my audition for this TV show, I tried to submit the idea to automotive aftermarket companies such as Kraco, but they were not interested in hearing my idea pitch.

THE DEVICE: Take an IPOD device, insert a Miniature (Cell Phone) Camera, add a motion sensor, and install two of these in a vehicle (One pointing rear and the other pointing front). This device then runs (automatically) in real time during driving (A 2 Gig Flash Card Provides 2 hours of video) or time lapse when parked (8 hours of video). When the flash memory gets to the end, it automatically starts recording at the beginning, so you will always have the last 2 hours (8 hours) recorded. This device should be able to retail for about the same price as a music MP3 player. (These video movies are stored as MP3 files)

As an aftermarket device- This device can be mounted to rear view mirror (Front) or third taillight (rear). It would have a Lithium-Ion Battery and use solar cells to charge the battery. The device would only need a ‘Off-On” switch and nothing else for the basic version (Videos would be played back on a computer). A non-automotive variation of this product can be a simple “Spycam” that is disguised as an ordinary object (such as a book).

As an integrated device- (Preferred installation) advance functions can be added with a dashboard interface. This would give the ability to add features such as the “Back-up Camera mentioned above.

DEVICE FUNCTION: This device documents action surrounding the vehicle such as: Hit & Run Fender Bender- Lets say that you park your new car at the grocery store and when you come back from shopping, you discover that someone had backed into your car, smashing its taillight. No Note, No Witnesses.
Dishonest Traffic Cop- Lets say that officer Charley needs 7 tickets to meet his quota and today is the last day of the month. You know that you crossed on the Yellow, and then see the Motorcycle pulling you over.

Dishonest Motorist- You are driving along, obeying all traffic laws. Then suddenly- WHAM, someone on their cell phone changes lanes into you. He tells the traffic cop that you had changed lanes into him.

Insurance companies will LOVE it (perhaps lower rates), Courts will LOVE it, and Motorists will LOVE it!

In Conclusion, I would hope that Tesla Motors would incorporate this device into their motor vehicles as either an option or as standard equipment.

There it is- The Silent Witness by Jon S. Norris
[Contact details deleted]

The new Tesla question.

Is it a EP or VP?

www.easier.com/view/News/Motoring/article-105970.html

Great!!! Just one step closer to the Tesla Roadster racing on the roads of America!

Is there any difference in performence and specs with the VP and EP? (Range, Acceleration ect.)

Malcom, thanks for another great post. This kind of information is important to keep the skeptics at bay. Congratulations on achieving this significant milestone in the development process!

A little off topic. I just received a new article for any one interested. www.NewsTarget.com/021734.html

Editor! What is the count for reservations?

—-

Editor’s Answer: More than 350! 

Asked before but will ask again, will your automobiles be compatible with the new battery from Altair Nanothechnologies that promise 2 to 190 minute recharge, no temperature problems and 9000 recharges minimum?

—-

Editor’s Answer: This is asked and answered several times per week. Take a look at Martin’s answer here. 

Andreas, thin film solar actually holds a lot of promise, not only for residential settings, but as large scale power plants.

Nanosolar has not come on line yet, but First Solar is already making them, and they have a contract to provide a 40MW power plant in Germany. firstsolar.com/

Grid parity (the ability of solar to compete with existing power production costs) is becoming closer to reality.

” Hardy Hansen wrote on March 23rd, 2007 at 4:10 pm
When i was a kid in Denmark i remeber my byke had a dynamo to give the light on it pwer for night time driving.”

As you may recall it took extra effort to pedal your bike with the dynamo engaged. Addiing these to a car means that the car would be wasting energy trying to create energy. Even if the efficiency were 100% you wouldn’t gain anything. The best is what they have done, turn the motor into a generator when stopping or going down hill and you want to keep your speed constant.

David Nelson

If China doesn’t get a green energy national policy they could make U.S. look like global warming amatuer. Article in Mar.12 Time mag. says China is biggest world coal consumer-using almost 1/3 of world production, and deriving 70% of it’s energy from coal . Production has almost tripled in last 5 yrs. The govt. plans to open 35-40 coal plants annually in next few yrs. Article said coal powers China like it did England in 1800’s and U.S. later -said mine safety is big problem due to 17,000 small mines and thousands more illegal small mines. Operators of mines buy off local officials to ignore safety regulations. Offically 5000 chinese miners died in accidents last year, but real firgure thought to be as high as 20,000. Wait till the chinese start owing ICE cars like the rest of the developed world too.

DOH!

“Why is charging so slow?” What was I thinking!

“Why 3.5 hours to charge?”

Here in Texas we produce and burn a lot of coal and natural gas. However, there are positive trends I am happy to report. Texas recently surpassed California as the state producing most wind power. TXU have cancelled their plans for 8 new coal-fired plants, and they placed an order with Mitsubishi Heavy Industries for two of the biggest nuclear reactors they offer. That’s a step in the right direction IMO.

Malcolm wrote:

At the start of the Tesla Roadster development, Tesla Motors adopted a New Product Introduction (NPI) process.

Malcolm, any chance of a future blog about NPI? Maybe in relation to Whitestar? This could be written as a follow-up to Martin’s “One Brick at a Time”.

Or would you be able to tell us the story of just one tricky component; following it on its development from initial design, through EP and VP to production?

Read article in Time Mag. about private space ventures-like Virgin Galatic & Elon Musk’s Space X. Said Space X got contract to develop a delivery service to International Space Station. Quoted Musk as saying “I think we should establish life on another planet-Mars in particular-but we’re not making very good progress. Space X is intended to make that happen”. I want to know if Anatoly has any ideas about how to regenerate molten core on Mars so that moving lava can create magnetic field-so that if atmosphere can be made it won’t get bown away by solar wind-or: any way to generate magnetic field without molten core? Wonder how long would take to get breathable atmosphere - “absurdly out of the question long time frame” or not? ( considering Mars about half earth size).

I read where coal can be turned into aviation fuel . There’s a good use for coal. If solar tech. were really ramped up in this country in a big, big way, cost would one day be such that could maybe use “surplus” really cheap solar as energy source to make jet fuel from coal (?)-and fuel for other heavy transport: trucks, trains, ships ? U.S. uses 6.6 billion barrels of oil per yr., at $72 per barrel: we spend $475 billion per yr. on oil -almost $1600 for every person in the country. Imagine what putting That into everyone’s pocket would do for the economy. Those who say that turning the U.S. green re. energy “would cost too much” really mean (in their own inimitable, lying -as-usual style) that it would “cost the vested interests too much”. On ABC news was latest example of the cost of not going green: maple syrup production in New England is declining due to short, warm winters-said that one day, at this rate, production might only be really profitable in Canada. New England maple syrup industry earns $200 million per yr. Meanwhile, back in Dubai, things are going bananas re. building / infrastructure construction: hotels, condos, highways, ports , golf courses,museums (you name it)-providing a feeding frenzy for name architects the world over. It would be nice if Detroit could get a decent rehab-but noooo, their most important (dinosaur-like & ditto powered) product is causing trouble in Rivercity, and all across America.

Crash testing, that has got to be the most painful emotional part of engineering.

I am eagerly awaiting the Whitestar and other future Tesla products, perhaps a market for battery powered outboard motor systems may come across the horizion before too long. As a floor covering contractor and EV fan, I long for the day that I can be running a fleet of EV work vans that will handle all the tools and job materials that my crews have to have with them each day. Up here in the Northwest a pickup just won’t do the trick.
Hope you folks grow and diversify

I’d like to thank Tesla for relating in an earlier blog the fun & games with Customs (”Number of cylinders?, etc.) I immediately jumped on Customs website and realized I needed to obtain a Binding Ruling on my new product or face Importer’s Purgatory. I’m glad I started the process early, as I’m on round three and still fielding questions like, “Can it do arithmetic calculations?”

And “We need one of your two hand-made prototypes, so we can pry it apart if we feel like it.”

I hope to be on the early list for the White Star. Best of luck!

Congrats to Mr. Powell and the staff of Tesla Motors for this milestone. I’m looking forward to the news of the roadster assembly line starting up, almost as much as the first look at the forthcoming Whitestar.

Random thought on solar power: what if we could create cheap photovoltaic asphalt that uses nanotechnology of some sort that only requires one wire on each side of the street to collect the power? We have so many square miles of blacktop that already does little more than absorb sunlight. Or… perhaps the power would be collected in the middle of the lanes and scooped up inductively with coils on trucks and cars.

That’s great news. Thank you for the update Darryl. Wishing you every success with coordinating the media feeding frenzy

TJ, I recommend you read Zubrin’s book, “The Case for Mars”. I applaud Elon in his efforts to reduce launch costs. Mars is the new frontier and is vital to the survival of our species.

Tesla, Congratulations on the arrival of the VP’s. I’m very excited to see the roadsters on the road in the near future, and even more excited to see the White Star facility take form.

is tesla motors a publicly traded company

[kert wrote on March 25th, 2007 at 11:18 am
dont draw too much funny parallels between Tesla and software/chip industry .. otherwise at one point, you might just need to shut down the car, get everyone out, close all the *windows* and restart it, to get it to work again …]

LMAO! The Bill Gates solution: reboot and get used to the fact this is something “normal.”

Okay, this brings up the question: what OS is running on the car’s computer (if there is an OS)? I’m hoping it’s some form of FOSSware like GNU/Linux. While a software license isn’t much compared to the total cost of a finished car, it’s the principle of the thing.

[Eric H wrote on March 25th, 2007 at 8:48 pm
People, people, people … Please!

… Each post is not itself called a blog. When you talk about “future blogs”, it confuses the rests of us and makes us wonder, - is Tesla going to start an entirely new blog?]

That reminds me of times when people would call my website “A nice webpage!!” Heh heh.

Hey folks! This is a little off topic but I believe it shows the dedication of the staff at Tesla. Some folks have been complaining for over a week about getting a new post in this Blog. This week we received another great post detailing the progress of the Roadster. What many have failed to realize is that even though the new post was delayed a week the editor continued to moderate the new comments to the old post and kept the thread going. I realized that even this weekend on Saturday and Sunday the editor took time to moderate and update comments to the current post.

Thanks Editor!!!! and thanks for keeping us updated TM!

—-

Editor’s Thanks: The Editor is also addicted to the blog, hence the weekend moderating  

Slightly offtopic for this blog entry, but looks like the Tesla can’t come a moment too soon…

www.cnn.com/2007/TECH/03/26/bush.automakers.ap/index.html

Comments on the Tesla from The Truth About Cars

www.thetruthaboutcars.com/?p=3383

I’ve been following the comments over at TTAC this morning, and I think Darryl Siry has responded well to them. Incidentally, TTAC is not the first website to post a highly skeptical article about Tesla. They were beaten to it by The Register:

www.theregister.co.uk/2007/03/08/tesla_car_examined/

This kind of dustup doesn’t worry me, though. In many ways the Tesla Roadster’s purpose is to get exactly this kind of discussion going and educate people. It’ll take a while.

In my childhood, during the carbureted 1970’s, there hardly seemed a week that went by without my dad participating in an impromptu car klatch at some neighbor’s house — and often enough, our own. Those were the days when starting a car could be a Rube Goldberg process, with some number of prescribed pumps on the accelerator, a turn of the key, another pump, a thump on the steering wheel, and finally the engine might roar to life. If it didn’t, of course, you’d have that gathering of the neighborhood men — and they always seemed to be men — to decipher what might be keeping the Olds from getting its owner to work. “Well, thar’s yer problem…”

These days, though, cars start. And they start pretty much without fail. (I suppose one could make a case that the rise in car reliability has led to a decline in neighborliness, but I’ll let someone else do that.) Still, those early memories of frequent car troubles have followed me into my incipient middle age. I don’t take my fancy sedan into the dealer all that much, but every time I slide the electro-key into its socket, I wonder: will this be the morning it won’t work? I let the car idle upon startup to get it’s “juices” flowing. And, if I don’t need to, I won’t ask too much of the car, under the theory that every shift of the automatic, every quick bit of acceleration, every hard braking action, and every strain I put on the engine breaks it down that much faster.

Enter the electric car. Reliability, its proponents assure us, will be on an order of magnitude higher than any traditional engine. It has only one major moving part, a simple spindle around which a series of magnets do their work. Tesla Motor’s own FAQ on the subject promises that the expected routine maintenance will be limited to little more than tire rotation and brake inspection. The famous electric car movie featured a mechanic who waxed poetic on the ease of EV1 repair.

And frankly, that’s the car I want. The one that’s a bit like my refrigerator, now going on eleven years without a single failure.

I realize it’s still early in the process. It’s too early to know what it will mean to care and feed an electric car properly. But I wonder what we do know. Is it, for example, possible that even the single moving part could give way after too many four-second dashes to sixty miles-per-hour? What sort of driving behavior will the responsible owner know to avoid (or encourage)? Will the electric car have some equivalent of an ICE warm up? Will I need to run my hand over the ESS at the end of the day’s drive to assess the heat generation?

And it’s here that I’m grasping at straws, because I don’t know what it will mean, long term, to be an electric car driver who treats his or her car well. Perhaps the collective can help…

Sergio Riva, Tesal motors is a private company incorporated in California.

Wall Street Journal had a front page article by Mike Spector on plug-in’s as they called them. The city of Austin, TX is investigating using the car batterys for storage in a vehicle-to-grid mode you can read more about elsewhere on this site. They had a cutaway rendering of a Chevrolet Volt with that ridiculous gasoline motor. The city official studying all this enlisted interest from over 8,000 people. The article mentions “expensive lithium-ion batteries that haven’t been perfected.” They see production of the cars as “at least three to five years off.” Austin is definitely doing the right thing enlisting the utilities through the Electirc Power Research Institute. Large automakers unsuprisingly reacted to the project with silence.

My understanding is that it *does* freewheel, with a gentle pressure on the accelerator. More pressure and it accelerates, less and it kicks in the regen. Ya know, I’m always skeptical of *anything* that uses the word “truth” in its title. It suggests the author doesn’t have enough confidence in the material to let it stand on its own.

oops! WSJ article was by John J. Fialka w/ contributions by Mike Spector.

I don’t see the point of a vehicle-to-grid mode for an EV. The main drawback to EVs is getting them charged and keeping them charged enough to have sufficient range to go where you want, when you want. If you discharge them to the grid, then you will have a car with a dead battery when you want to use it.

In answer to:

“The wording on this press release is a bit vague - does that say that the absolute maximum is $4,000, or is the maximum $4,000 PLUS $250 per extra KWH between 4 and 50? i.e. for a Tesla Roadster, is the maximum credit $4,000, or is the maximum $15,500 ($4,000 +((50-4)*250)? Because $15,500 would go a long way toward making the roadster far more affordable (92,000-15500=$77,500) putting it in competition with (slightly) more mainstream cars like the Cadilac XLR and BMW 6-series rather than the more exotic Maserati and Panoz…. But much more striking than what it would do to the Roaster is how much of a kick it would give to the White Star - think of the difference in market size between 50K and 35K - it’s HUGE.”

The wording of the release states: “The credit would be the lesser of either 10% of the cost of the vehicle or $4,000 plus $250 for each additional kilowatt hour of battery capacity above 4 kWh up to 50 kWh.”

So, I’m thinking 10% of the car’s price would be the lesser of the two - still a nice discount, especially for the Roadster, but I’m more in the market for a Whitestar.

To Cliff, about vans:
See e.g . www.modec.co.uk/index.htm

An interesting sidenote: I’ve suggested before that Austin, TX should be considered as a possibility for the second wave of tesla motors dealers opening up in time for the WhiteStar. Other than Austin being Silicon Hills, here is another good (environmental) reason to make this happen:

blog.wired.com/cars/2007/03/austin_to_use_p.html

To JoeG:

Forget to answer about Tesla roadster mileage versus speed. Using data from the blog and Tesla site I once managed a simple Excel model for this. Because I am “random blogger” you should take my data with a grain of salt. They surely are not very reliable and Tesla Motors people could easily dismiss my numbers. Unfortunately to me personally they are not so great looking for Tesla Motors promotion but anyway I belive in my model enough so denying these numbers to me would require poof. Anybody else could choose what to believe.

My model data are as follows:

1. Maximum range is 370 miles but at velocity in 20 mph to 30 mph range.

2. Claimed 250 miles range comes for velocity around 50 mph.

3. At sustained velocity 65 mph range comes down to 190 miles

4. At sustained velocity 80 mph range reduces to 140 miles

5. At sustained velocity 130 mph range would be 60 miles (some race track ride I guess)

So apparently Tesla roadster is not a match for racing car. It is not very fit for people in love with power, engine sound, smell etc and outrageous speed on a race track (or illegally on a road). But Tesla roadster is extremely good fit for heavy traffic road with the need to fill gaps very fast. It would be also very pleasant low noise scenic drive for curly countryside roads (along the Pacific coast for example) with numerous of acceleration/braking cycles but average speed below 50 mph because of curves and speed limits.
I guess Tesla Motors have good enough sales already so they are not promoting their car in public using very specific and honest account of advantages and disadvanatages agains other rides available. They obviously do it individually for their customers as I noticed from customer blog posts.

WSJ at it again today with article by Jonathan Welsh on p. D1 about consumers desire for quiet cars. I was a little surprised to read that wind noise rather than engine noise is the leading decibel generator. It was also surprising to read that “Today most cars run reliably with little if any maintenance by the owner.” Now is this because the the increased complexity and sophistication required to get ICE’s to perform to all mandates has disenfranchised the backyard mechanic or because income from service keeps the big 2.whatever a little further from insolvency. They still need maintenance, just not by the owner. No mention of EV’s of course but an interesting bit mostly about fit and finish.

Hey,

Was hoping to subscribe to your RSS news feed, but couldn’t find one. : ( How am I supposed to keep up with the hundreds of amazing things I like if none of them give me a feed? Visit their website every day just to see if they change?

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Editor’s Answer: Take a look at the left column … 

I love the car and the concept. While riding my motorcycle towork I suddenly thought why not a Tesla Motorcycle? If the automobile motor only weighs 70 pounds the bike motor could be downsized accordingly. Or (evil grin), think of all that power curve on two wheels! Points to ponder. With over 800,000 miles on the seat of many different motorcyles I sure would love to test one. Good luck and bid the oil adieu.

Clarification on “Vehicle to Grid”: It should never drain the batteries completely, but only use a portion of capacity which could be set by the driver. Some drivers might reserve half the capacity for their use - no problem if they only drive 20 miles or so on an average day - and allow the other half to be used for V2G use. Drivers with longer commutes might reserve more for themselves, and others planning a longer trip and worried about range may choose to “opt out”.

Those that do participate could be paid back in free or reduced cost power, or maybe even cash. For the driver, it could mean more money in their pocket. For the power companies, it means better supply and demand management, fewer “brownouts”, and less “spinning reserve” for more efficiency.

My thought on Vehicle-to-Grid is that if a hurricane or other disaster were to happen, people would pull their cars off the grid to have as much power as possible–especially if they could see a hurricane coming.

>>While riding my motorcycle towork I suddenly thought why not a Tesla Motorcycle?

Its called Vectrix and just got done, finally. See
gwiz.myfastforum.org/ftopic493-10.php
for the first actual user test ride.

# I wrote on March 11th, 2007 at 11:01 pm
## Something I have come to appreciate now that I am driving an EV is just how much wind resistance slows the vehicle.
## Sure you can see it in a gasoline vehicle as you push towards top speed, but EVs can make it more noticeable because of the motor performance characteristics.
## A typical gasoline engine builds torque and HP as RPMs rise.
## So as you go faster and encounter more wind resistance, the engine starts to make more power and the perceived effect of the wind is somewhat minimized.
## Electric motors, on the other hand, have their best torque at 0rpm, and then it trails off as the RPMs rise.
## The net effect is powerful acceleration off the line but you get a linear sensation of reduced acceleration as the wind resistance overcomes the motor power.
## The fact that the Tesla roadster is very quick (0-60 under 4s), but isn’t supercar fast (~130mph top speed is more typical of an economy car) show this off.
## One reason why it makes sense for the Tesla to be USA only (for now) is that it ISN’T likely a great autobahn cruiser.
## If I had to find a car that was used often over 100mph, I wouldn’t pick the Tesla roadster. For darting around in city traffic, and constrained freeway stop-and-go it is probably a wonderful vehicle.

# Anatoly Moskalev wrote on March 27th, 2007 at 11:26 am
## … Tesla roadster mileage versus speed…
## …apparently Tesla roadster is not a match for racing car.
## But Tesla roadster is extremely good fit for heavy traffic road with the need to fill gaps very fast.

So, Anatoly, your speculation matches what I speculated earlier.

# Anatoly Moskalev wrote on March 27th, 2007 at 11:26 am
## It would be also very pleasant low noise scenic drive for curly countryside roads (along the Pacific coast for example) with numerous of acceleration/braking cycles but average speed below 50 mph because of curves and speed limits.

I suspect that this situation was the whole premise (originally) for the vehicle. Some of they key people behind the company relished the idea of a “green” vehicle for their pleasure jaunts from Silicon Valley over to the coast.
Highway 84 here (”Woodside Road”), and Highway 35 (”Skyline Drive”) are very popular enthusiast spots, and a perfect match for the Tesla roadster.
Those in Los Angeles area will probably appreciate cruising the PCH and Mulholland Drive.

www.walkinginla.com/2005/Oct08/10_08_05.html
www.chainreactionbicycles.com/tunitasloop.htm

Another advantage of the small, nimble Tesla roadster is that it can dart around all the bicycles and motorcycles that also frequent those roads.
Many Ferraris and Lamborghinis are so wide that they present a passing hazzard.

To Dean :

Range data via the reference you provided are based on interpolation models ( linear, square, cube ) with fairly arbitrary points to switch between interpolations. This is fairly far from how car uses energy. My model used forces and power considerations as follows:

1. Airodynamic efficiensy Cd = 0.39 (indicated by Martin Eberhard in one of early blog posts). Frontal area was calculated from Tesla roadster dimensions from the site.

2. Rolling resistance was calculated based on car weight from the site with rolling resistance factor of 0.015 (pretty typical for normal tires). This value also matched against claimed EPA mileage of 250 miles so I assumed it is close to reality.

3. I assumed useful driving energy for battery pack of 52.2 kWh using many data points from the site. Using battery capacity I get the idea that all the batteries correspond to 2C discharge making up sustained power 52.2 x 2 = 105 kW. This also matched torque/power curves from the site and based on resistance data from 1 and 2 it matched 130 mph top speed.

4. I assumed fixed 1 kW power for air conditioner etc appliances. This number is most arbitrary but it influences only fraction of range decrease at very low speed of 5 mph, 10 mph etc. The main effect is that range maximum shifts to 20 - 30 mph area as I think it would be in real life.

Altogether you get sum of power factors like: = A + B x + C x ^ 3

This is the simplified model of having fixed in car power factor A, rolling resistance losses factor B and airodynamic drag factor C. Major influence factor C is fixed by data from the site. These factor work together so instead of arbitrary interpolation far from physics you have oversimlified but physically correct picture based on actual forces factors. Engine efficiensy is fairly flat and accounted inside A, B, C values. Assumed value was 90%.

Such a model get range data with about 20% to 30% accuracy I think. This approximately matches the accuracy of input parameters I have used. Getting better precision is pointless because you start having specific for each car specimen, trip peculiarities, road peculiarities etc results. Car improvement evolution before production expected would also most likely fit under indicated 30% uncertainty. I would not be much sirprised if actual data from real car would be even slightly worse than my numbers at least above 80 mph.

I used model based on car energy disspation physics with just 2 adjustable parameters (A and B above). I used few data points (250 mile range EPA, 200 miles range for sort of highway driving, 130 mph top speed, 52 kWh per 6831 18650 batteries match against market, 0.4 MJ / km energy dissipation of Tesla roadster, 110 mpg efficiensy claim etc) to match adjustable parameters. Everything I learned from Tesla Motors site matched within 5% accuracy into my model with same single set of parameters in realistic range. So I assume that my data are more close to reality versus pure speculative interpolation model. But none of us has any definite proof and so far Tesla Motors people were reluctant to say anything much about range variations with speed. Because I am not the customer I have no rights to demand any data or insist on my conclusions. My numbers are my pure speculations made just for fun of scientific style investigation (my former scientist habits).

bytheway, on topic of electric two-wheelers, there are quite a few choices out there,
start with highend, the maxi-scooter Vectrix
youtube.com/watch?v=kEk2J85PXNg&mode=related

In the midrange, you have a bunch of regular-size scooters, for a good overview of available selection looky here
www.electricbikesales.co.uk/shop/index.php?act=viewCat&catId=130

And, if you want to be really on the edge, try one of the e-cross bikes,
www.electricross.com
( take a good look at their videos )

Anatoly:

I see your estimation is far superior to mine. I took the liberty of pasting it to teslamotorsclub.com forum.
It would be a big waste for them to disappear with next blog update.

I think each page in this blog has at least 1 entry that says “Have you heard of AltairNano batteries? They have very fast charge, discharge and last forever.” True on both accounts but … they are very expensive and have low power density. If the Tesla Roadster were fitted with the same weight then it would DOUBLE the price of the car and reduce the range to 200 miles!
Siri stated that Phoenix expects to make profit by selling CARB credits, and I am sure they will, how much remains to be seen. I just found out that these credits are only available for cars that can be recharged in 10 minutes (a clause surely put in to eliminate batteries and favor fuel cells). There has been a lot of debate about 10 minute charge time on this blog, and I am sure it can and will be done by Phoenix since they have to prove it to collect their CARB credits. When they do, it should end the debate about possibility, however I maintain that most EV drivers will never use that capability. Watch out Phoenix, CARB may re-write the rules and reduce the charge time to 2 minutes!

# CM wrote on March 28th, 2007 at 10:09 pm

# I know the PERFECT road for Teslaphiles! … It runs from Livermore
# to Stanislaus County, and it is called…. Drumroll, please… Tesla Road!

…with many excellent wineries along/near it, as well as alternative-energy researchers Lawrence Livermore Labs in the vicinity. My wife and I spent a most excellent weekend in that area this past February. As I drove between wineries on Tesla Road, of course my thoughts were, “someday, in the Roadster…”

CANADA………CANADA………CANADA……….CANADA……….CANADA……….

I plan on buying a Tesla in 2008 and recharge it off a solar installation from my home on Orcas Island, WA.

As an architect and designer I was really impressed with the overhead view preview shots of this new vehicle, but when I received the left front view of the actual vehicle I was taken back to the Miata, a vehicle which offers very little design flare and leaves the viewer with a lackluster impression of a small vehicle. I would never show this car in British Racing Green or any other dark color. This vehicle offers design interest through the contrast of louvers and body flare which are highlighted with light, bright colors. Dark colors conceal this exciting contrast of light intensities.

P.S. The front approach really needs the same aggressive design work which is demonstrated in the top views posted on your site. The front view is simply a soft rounded contour with a large hole, not at all what is expected from an Electric Shock Wave with Porche 911 performance.

Oh, some more ??s since my last post…
5) Has anyone thot about using the Solar Films on the cars? Not only would this increase range during day times, I can park this on the sundecks of most parking lots and partly recharge the ESS.
6) Since this will be a totally new concept car, I imagine its going to be very popular with theives. What kind of anti-theft system will this use? I would like to be warned via my Blackberry if my car was going somewhere without my permission.
7) Does anyone have a country wide listing of all public charging stations? Kinda goes along with my “vacation” question above.
8) My dream house will of course use the PV system tied to the grid. Will my charger be able to use this, or must I use the house batteries to feed the car?

Your patience and careful attention to materials, design , durability, & performance is most impressive. If Tesla Motors isn’t doing it right, then no one is! I’m currently in the market for a conventional car for my 16 year-old. Every time I pop to hood on a potential auto, I keep thinking how outmoded and overcomplicated the internal combustion engine has become. It makes me ill that the big auto companies think that hybirds or fuel cells are the future. It’s just more of the same old “keep-it-complex” thought that just won’t go away.

Tesla Motors has proven that an all-electric car can be much more mechanically simple and sleek, while out performing nearly everything else out on the road that still relies on outdated technology.

Reply to vfx on March 28th, 2007 at 11:03 am above :

In my model I assumed near perfect regenerative braking for simplicity - no energy loss. It actually makes my range prediction somewhat optimistic. For steady experienced driving style this assumption is close to reality. For temperamental driving style with fast accelerations and rapid stops I can say that this driving would be harder to analyse in numbers because it would be very driver specific.

Assuming 85% regenerative efficiensy (mentioned I think in some material on this site) for acceleration/deseleration 0 to 60 mph cycle car would be able to make ~ 2700 such cycles by its battery capacity assuming no other significant losses. In this case if every 500 feet you would make described acceleration/deseleration cycle the range of Tesla roadster likely would drop from 250 miles for full charge down to 100 - 120 miles at least. Such a drive would be close to always using maximum acceleration and deseleration. It would surely cut into battery life this way badly shortening it by a perceptible level even by single such charge / discharge excercise. The reason for this I think would be some battery discharge rate overdrive for this ride.

Surely I described absolutely unrelaistic limit case driving example of heavy car abuse. In realistic driving I believe even very temperamental driving style person would do it at least 10 times less frequent by a distance. So we could say that temperamental driving around 0 to 60 mph would likely drop range from 250 miles to 200 - 230 miles but with full acceleration / deseleration every mile on the road or very unsteady speed cycling between 30 mph and 60 mph few times per every mile. Speed cycling should also be closer to 12 sec for full 0 to 60 mph range cycle or 8 sec for 30 mph to 60 mph range cycle of acceleration and deseleration to make it less demanding for batteries to avoid much energy efficiensy reduction of regeneration.

In short frequent accelerations and deselerations would cut into range reduction about 3 to 5 times less prominent than for a normal ICE based car without hybrid drivetrain. For typical sport car driving I guess this is a significant feature.

It would be nice if Tesla Motors could comment on such things but I guess this is reserved for real customers.

Hi
Do keep going with the T car it has the sound of everything
Buck Rogers could have ever dreamed of in a car. Well that may date me,
its about time we cought up with our fiction writers of old mabe one day
even a Dr Who .
Thanks Wiley Bailey

Just when you think you have read about every idea worth thinking about in regards to what would be applicable as a feature on a Tesla ev someone comes up with doozy. The Indian electic vehicle co. Reva has developed a remote to start your air conditioner or your heater while your car is on the charger so you are all set to go upon entering your vehicle. “Works for me.” Ok next idea.

like the car…and may be some day i will take it ..

i’m summer from China ,working for a CO , design some new ID for mobile phone

sure ,i like the car too much ,,keeping the work and go ahead for u !!!

summer

I almost got creamed by a Lotus a few weeks back and immediately thought, “Dang! Someone got a Tesla on the road already?”

Just a little obsessed with your car, I think.

Very good news on the progress.

Yes, Mr. Bevington, I’d dispute those figures! The 45 Kw at a constant 70 mph is wildly exaggerated, probably based on the writers experience with petrol cars. 45 Kw is approx. 60 hp, perhaps the writer had a car with that size engine, and thought that’s what it took to cruise at 70. However, a car with a 60 hp engine is not running anywhere near “maximum 45 Kw power” while cruising at 70, the engine is loafing at far less power output. Keeping the accelerator floored (max power) could eventually result in a speed considerably above 70 mph even in a 60 hp car! Cars have much bigger engines than needed for constant speed cruising, because extra power is needed for acceleration, and the more extra power available, the faster the acceleration. Efficiency in IC engines drops with reduced power. Unlike IC engines, electric motors retain high efficiency over a very wide range of power outputs and speeds.

The amount of power needed to maintain a constant speed is dependent on total drag, including rolling resistance of tires on pavement and aerodynamic drag. In turn aerodynamic drag is determined by “coefficient of drag” (how streamlined the car is), the “frontal area”, and the speed.

The writers notion of a “135 Kwh” battery is wildily exaggerated, no electric car uses a battery nearly that big, that would be over a ton of high performance LiIon batteries! The Tesla Roadster has a mere 50 Kwh battery pack, which gives about a 250 mile range at 55 mph. That works out to 11 Kw of power cruising at 55. My rough calculaions indicate that at 70 mph, power consumption would increase to approx. 15 Kw, with a somewhat reduced 230 mile range.

To recharge 50 Kwh wiith a 6 Kw connection would take over 8 hours, however Tesla plans to install 240 volt 70 amp chargers producing 16.8 Kw, which would take about 3.5 hours to charge.

I happen to be 6′8″ tall and 300 lbs and I love the idea of the Tesla and I am actually am considering purchasing your car. but I have some questions…
I wonder can a man of supremely perfect stature such as myself expect to fit into one of your cars and when can I test drive one?…
What are the chances of a Tesla SUV? How much will my 300 lbs cut down on performance?

This is what the U.S. has been waiting for. However, the price range returns the auto to pre-Henry Ford when it was a toy for the wealthy. As a teacher in a private setting(and you thought your pay was low!) it would be great if a similar vehicle could be made available to the “Joe Average” consumer. Maybe a “Firebird” to “Sunfire” comparison? Would I love to have this car? In a heartbeat but the number of limbs i would have to sell on e-bay is prohibitive. The day the price for a similar vehicle is within even my extreme range…

Until then, thanks for the dreams

What a tremendous adventure which has resulted in a whole new mode of transportation! Congrats and thank you for following through on a dream car. Does the removable top fit in the trunk and how heavy is it? Also, is there trunk space in the front and rear? Let us know when and where you will be in Chicago!!

I’ve been reading and keeping up with Tesla Motors for several months now and happy to hear you are actually in production, Congratulation!!

This is REVOLUTIONARY !!! Think about it, an ELECTRIC CAR for crying out loud and it can get its power from the sun by solar. If Tesla can keep on track with their goals then they will the leading automotive manufactures in years to come. Just don’t let the other large auto companies buy you out and screw up the vision. We the people need ELECTRIC cars and not fuel or alternative fuel powered cars.

Question: would Tesla be willing to sale conversion kits? More ELECTRIC cars that are on the road the more popular ELECTRIC cars will become. You can wait until you start selling the cars or you can do a jump start by selling conversion kits. I would love to have a sticker on the back of my BMW that says “Electric Powered by TESLA MOTORS”.
Zoom Zoom

Nice blog. I almost want to move to US in order to be able to buy one of these cars. Please consider getting European Service Center ASAP.

About using solar energy for cars, I once calculated that for a teeny weeny bit of money (about 200$ / year) from all people in the world we can get rid of ALL gas, oil, coal and even nuclear power plants in next 100 years _in entire world_. It just needs some political will to do that and some central place to consentrate efforts (like UN). Unfortunately it seems that there is no such will, because oil gives so big income for some countries (and companies)

(simple calulation: 4$ / W, World power need 15TW, people in world 6Mrd, 100 years = 100$/year/person)

This kind of EV is something that might crumble some of that resistance for clean energy. And maybe we might see polluting power plants dissappear from the world in our lifetime. Or our childrens lifetime at least. Clean air in cities. All cities.

Whaooh. Good work! Following this up with highly efficient solar PV light panels that makes up the body of the car and utilizing batteries that charge up in minutes is all that remains. And those of us in Africa can then take to the road without fear of runing out of power or having to queue up at filling stations after a hard day’s job. All we ‘ll do is simply periodic maintenance. No more fuelling or recharging. I believe that its possible with similar innovative hard work and ingenuity to have PV modules that can generate more electricity that this car would consume for not more that car’s body coverage area. And then range would no longer be an issue! Any other start up looking at this at the moment? Progress pretty fast and get into high volume productions quickly to drop down the price of the expected Whitestar to better than today’s competitive price of

I would love to see Tesla in South Africa. Very Soon. I can’t wait to put my name down on the list for one of the first RIGHT HAND DRIVES on this continent. With our petrol controlled by the governments on this continent the price for petrol in controlled by greed not economic growth. As recent as last night the petrol price went up again with 38c making our petrol price around $3.10 per/ Galen. Please HELP.

$3.10 per/ Gallon? That’s cheap. In Finland one liter of 95 octane gasoline costs about 1,2 euros, which is rougly 6$ / Gallon.

Not very cheap. Electricity costs rougly 5 cents / kWh, so charging Tesla full costs about 2.75 euros. At that cost I could get whopping 2 liters of gasoline. How much does Lotus Elise consume? Do I get it out of garage before tank is empty with those figures?

The Tesla Sport Car is the most exciting automobile on the market today in my opinion.
My concern is the battery technology to product millions of cars in the future for the mass market.
I have been reading about Aluminum Battery technology on the internet and would like to know if the Tesla Company has had the opportunity to investigate the integrity of the data displayed on the Europositron web site: www.europositron.com/en/index.html. If the claims are true, Tesla should be investing in this company to be able to share in the technology for the White Star fleet. I would like to hear from anyone in the United State relative to these Aluminum Battery technology breakthroughs, that Eruopositron is talking about. Are they true or are they a pipe dream?
I am looking forward to the White Star design and hope to be able to acquire one in the future.
Keep up the good work.
Tony O’Neil
Huntsville, AL (Rocket City -USA)

solar panels are advancing all the time some can be walked on and shaped and bent. what is the surface area of the lotus made tesla car. what about a future bodywork as a solar panel .every inch of it.solar panels can be a nice purpley colour.and if todays best solar cells were used how much power would the surface area of the tesla produce it would just be top up power for the moment as with the regenerative braking. just an odd curiosity on my part

About range of the Roadster. It is true that this 200+ miles is still quite limited range, even that it is best around, but that is only because of current battery tehnology. There are new technologies coming.