[dsenette]

article
http://www.wired.com...l?tw=wn_index_2
pictures
http://blog.wired.com/teslacar/

By Joshua Davis, from Wired magazine 12:00 PM Jul, 19, 2006

Martin Eberhard holds the brake down with his left foot and presses on the accelerator with his right. The motor revs, the car strains against the brake. I hear ... almost nothing. Just a quiet whine like the sound of a jet preparing for takeoff 5 miles away. We're belted into a shimmering black sports car on a quiet, tree-lined street in San Carlos, California, 23 miles south of San Francisco. It has taken Eberhard three years to get this prototype ready for mass production, but with the backing of PayPal cofounder Elon Musk, Google's Larry Page and Sergey Brin, and ex-eBay chief Jeff Skoll, he has created Silicon Valley's first real auto company.

"You see any cops?" Eberhard asks, shooting me a mischievous look. The car is vibrating, ready to launch. I'm the first journalist to get a ride.

He releases the brake and my head snaps back. One-one-thousand: I get a floating feeling, like going over the falls in a roller coaster. Two-one-thousand: The world tunnels, the trees blur. Three-one-thousand: We hit 60 miles per hour. Eberhard brakes. We're at a standstill again -- elapsed time, nine seconds. When potential buyers get a look at the vehicle this summer, it will be among the quickest production cars in the world. And, compared to other supercars like the Bugatti Veyron, Ferrari Enzo, and Lamborghini Diablo, it's a bargain. More intriguing: It has no combustion engine.

The trick? The Tesla Roadster is powered by 6,831 rechargeable lithium-ion batteries -- the same cells that run a laptop computer. Range: 250 miles. Fuel efficiency: 1 to 2 cents per mile. Top speed: more than 130 mph. The first cars will be built at a factory in England and are slated to hit the market next summer. And Tesla Motors, Eberhard's company, is already gearing up for a four-door battery-powered sedan.

In an age when a car's electronics are worth more than its steel, it seems only natural that the tech sector would have its own car company. The question is, can Eberhard turn the digital era into horsepower, torque, and rpm?....

i want it

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I saw it on digg the other day looks a really cool car. Performance wise its not that surprising for years electric have been able to not only compete with but win against combustion engine vehicles, a japanese company made an amazing concept car a few years ago 200Mph from this people carrier like deal, they never made it in production but it was an amzing vehicle it had one of those pivoting control consoles and the whole front was glass(no engine) they were the first to mount the electric motors actually inside the wheels themselves, the batteries were ran along the floor so even it appeared as if it ws powered by nothing at all.

Was a cool car wish they had actually made it i would have bought one they are the kind of car that would be ideal for most people in the UK and Europe in general.

[warriorscot]

I saw it on digg the other day looks a really cool car. Performance wise its not that surprising for years electric have been able to not only compete with but win against combustion engine vehicles, a japanese company made an amazing concept car a few years ago 200Mph from this people carrier like deal, they never made it in production but it was an amzing vehicle it had one of those pivoting control consoles and the whole front was glass(no engine) they were the first to mount the electric motors actually inside the wheels themselves, the batteries were ran along the floor so even it appeared as if it ws powered by nothing at all.

Was a cool car wish they had actually made it i would have bought one they are the kind of car that would be ideal for most people in the UK and Europe in general.

[james_8970]

I'm in love
But seriously if this makes it to canada i'm buying me one. Just hope they stick with the afordable part of the deal......looks expensive though.
And it'd be ideal for other parts then just europe Warriorscot!
James

Edited by james_8970, 22 July 2006 - 03:44 PM.

[warriorscot]

Yes but Europe driving style and the distances people drive are more suited to it, we dont drive as far as most North Americans who tend to drive alot further more of the time than we do, because of the higher population densities and the fact that that its a smaller place it tends to be short journeys on smaller roads.

In America you can easily drive further distances as the roads while slower tend to go on forever in straight lines, alot of electric cars have ranges around 150miles at least the current ones thats an average i know when ive stayed in the US i can easily travel twice that some days whereas here i would be hard pressed to drive that in a week.

[james_8970]

ya survey was just realesed saying that the average north american drives to and from work on average 68 minutes a day. can't believe that.....
James

[admin]

Lithium-ion batteries in laptops blow up and catch on fire. You want to sit on 6,831 of them?!

[james_8970]

its the same as sitting on a tank of gas. There might be a greater change of something going wrong, but with new technologie comes greater solutions and new problems. It'll be fixed. And if its the serious of a theart it wouldn't make it to market.
James

[warriorscot]

There is also some new pretty revolutionary battery technologies that are starting to make there way into the public domain and they are something else, Nano and Tritium batteries look to be the next big things.