Tesla Car anyone?

[damienengland]

I'm thinking about one of these. The Tesla Model S. This is a whole new world...

Tesla Small.jpg

[Alien DNA]

Would be interesting to try it out

[Robbo]

There is one getting around here. I haven't yet been able to have a look at it, from what I have read they are pretty good.

[SLR_dave]

That video is pretty eye opening! lol. Their Australian site is saying 3.4 seconds to 100kph for the fastest model with dual motor and biggest battery ($140,000) and.... 6.2 seconds to 100 for the slowest model single motor smaller battery ($95,000) plus on road costs. Battery service life of 8 years... hmn wonder what that costs to replace, However, they are offering an inovative deal for a guaranteed 43% -50% of sale price trade in/buy back at 3 years (providing you dont bend it and buy it via approved credit) I wonder if battery/ motor life may play a role in this in this.
0-100 in 3.4 secs in a passenger car and you get boot spaces front and rear. Insane mode is well named!

[Kiwivan]

Went to an info night on these,Charging is stiil the problem.If you have 3 phase it is a bit better.

Kiwivan

[wbute]

10 hours to charge on single phase. 1 hour at one of their supercharge stations. It still uses fossil fuel to power it. What's the point?

[HK1837]

You are sending the carbon emissions to Bayswater and Eraring rather than local to you! Ideally you'd solar charge them but there isn't any sun at night - best bet is a battery storage system at home where you capture solar power and also charge at off-peak times and use that bank to charge the car. Doesn't help if you are away though, and it still uses carbon to build the panel, batteries , converter and inverter and it still uses carbon generated power for the off-peak battery charging plus none of it is cheap. Pretty impressive car though.

[mauser]

and.... 6.2 seconds to 100 for the slowest model single motor smaller battery ($95,000) plus on road costs. Battery service life of 8 years... hmn wonder what that costs to replace, However, they are offering an inovative deal for a guaranteed 43% -50% of sale price trade in/buy back at 3 years (providing you dont bend it and buy it via

haha It will be just like the remote controlled car market for the kids. you will be able to pimp every part and end up with nothing original.

I am in favour of them especially for the commuter/shopping trolley market. I don't buy the argument that because they use electricity that we burn fossil fuels like brown coal to produce that they are not better for the environment. We just need to find better ways of generating and storing electricity.

The more that we move in this direction the more funding will go into finding solutions for those problems.

I like the Zero bikes.... now if they were zero to register why not get one for short commutes.



Mauser

[HK1837]

That is the problem Mauser, there is minimal to none economical and reliable bulk power generation alternatives at the moment to replace coal, other than nuclear which has its own issues. Solar is getting better but still needs a base level backup. Wind has major issues as you need a big power grid and base power generation for it to work and it only works when the wind blows and where it blows so you have to get power to where it is needed.
So whilstever we are charging electric cars using power generated elsewhere we are both shifting the carbon emissions elsewhere plus creating losses getting the power to the car. Technology to use and store electric power economically in a car have outstripped the technology to economically produce power in an alternative method. Funnily enough if you read the Aussie author Matthew Reilly, he has a pseudo-kid's book called Hovercar Racer. In it he imagines dams built out from the Aussie coast that catch the tidal rise and fall and use it to generate power - need some left field thinking like this.

[wbute]

Until that magical alternative is found, they are just as much a user as internal combustion.
Perhaps if people learnt to shop for a couple of weeks supplies they would reduce traffic in cities a lot. Everyone in rural areas manages to. There are hundreds of ways people could reduce emissions way more effectively than producing a billion more batteries to power electric cars.
We are extravagent people. Use way more than we need and want everything now. The costs are wasted resources. Too many people. To short sighted.