Posted on 08/12/2006 12:36:57 PM PDT by tessalu
IT can keep up with a Ferrari, travel 400km on an empty fuel tank and is completely silent. The latest boys' toy for Silicon Valley multi-millionaires is a full-blooded American sportscar - only its blood is electricity, not oil.
The Tesla Roadster, which can go from zero to 100km/h in about four seconds, is named after Serbian electrical engineer Nikola Tesla, who invented alternating current.
The car is assembled in England and the electric motor is imported from Taiwan. The cars will be sold only in Los Angeles, San Francisco, Chicago, New York and Miami.
The first deliveries are expected to begin next northern summer, after the car passes rigorous federal safety tests.
Martin Eberhard, who founded Tesla Motors in 2003 with Marc Tarpenning, said: "This is what we hoped to achieve when we started the company: to build a car with zero emissions that people would love to drive.
"It didn't make sense to sell a car that only goes 90miles (145km) on a charge. You'd spend more time charging the old EVs (electric vehicles) than driving them. Lithium-ion technology ... has allowed us to achieve exactly what we thought it would in terms of power, range and efficiency."
Those who part with the $US100,000 ($130,000) for a Tesla will be given a home charging system, which, the company claims, will fully recharge the car in about three hours.
The Tesla marks a resurgence in electric car development in California, after the state quietly dropped a law that would require car companies to develop models with zero emissions. Infamously, this resulted in General Motors recalling and destroying its fleet of EV1s - a pioneering electric vehicle beloved by owners.
Other electric car companies operating in California today include Phoenix Motorcars and Universal Electric Vehicles, which also makes convertible sportscars.
Even petrolheads, however, may struggle to understand the specifications of the Tesla Roadster. Unlike a traditional V8 engine, with its eight pistons, eight connecting rods, crankshaft, valves, oil pumps and other mechanicals, the Tesla's engine has only one moving part. This gives it an efficiency rating of about 95 per cent, compared with the 20 per cent (or less) of an internal combustion engine.
As for torque, the sweet spot of power for an engine most loved by car enthusiasts, the Tesla's has been described as virtually instantaneous. The car is powered by a "3-phase, 4-pole AC induction motor" and a "two-speed electrically actuated manual transmission".
Instead of a fuel tank, there is an energy storage system, with 6831 non-moving parts all of them lithium-ion cells, regulated by a cooling system and a computer that shuts down the entire battery pack in emergencies.
Democrats might buy this concept.. Marketing to democrats might work.. i.e. less political donations to go around..
Not to mention that! Can you imagine, wonder what new government agency will be responsible for scheduling the rolling recharge times for EV's so as not to overwork the grid.
In a city, maybe
Several years back we lived in a house that had a natural gas air conditioner.
Well, the heat would obviously be free (from the waste energy you describe), and air conditioning...
Like the old Volkswaggens. By the time you got to where you were going you could, sort of, kind of, in a way, feel a little something from the 'heat' captured off the engine.
Funky concept ain't it.
The VW's did not lack for production of heat, but for efficiency of gettting it to the passengers.
If it wasn't for shameless environmentalist antics, our present form of transportation, might just be even more efficient than it is. Success, breeds more, whereas EV's cannot under any circumstances be considered a success.
It would be reliable, use existing technology, not require an improvement to the power grid or new fueling stations, and could be worked on by existing shops.
As a friend says, it's too godd an idea to ever be implemented.
I have a newer-model propane refrigerator in my RV. It works great.
Russ, has "Some Amazing Facts about Nuclear Power" ever been posted on FR?
I found the comparison to coal very interesting.
"The motor described is alternating current. That means a converter, to convert the d.c. to a.c. That's got to be %10."
Wrong. This is a very efficient conversion today with the correct electronics.
It may not work very well, but that picture shows that it's beautiful.
"Any vehicle that relies on the electric utility grid to recharge its batteries is in essence powered by coal."
Or natural gas, or nuclear, or hydroelectric, etc.
"Any vehicle that relies on the electric utility grid to recharge its batteries is in essence powered by coal."
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In my part of the country we get 70% of our electricity from nuclear power plants.
I wonder how much hauling capacity one of these things would have. We don't always drive alone in a little sportscar. There are packages to haul, trailers to pull, all sorts of things like that in the real world. Something tells me you might just be able to tow the boat to lake with an electric vehicle - maybe - but getting back home again might be a problem.
I think one of the big surprises in the racing world is the turbo charged or is it supercharged, can't remember which, Audi diesel race car that won Sebring 12 hour, and Lemans 24 hour races. Never knew a diesel could run like that. How about for airplane use in the small plane category. The uses are unlimited. Develop what makes sense and uses current technology not as in the case of enviro's who want technology before it's time. An oxymoron if ever there was one.
GREAT LINK! I'm a huge fan of nukes.
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