Pics Aplenty: Tesla finally drops real images of Roadster Sport
Tesla Roadster Sport - Click above for high-res image gallery
It's been seven months since Tesla first announced its intentions to build the Roadster Sport, a higher performing version of its electric sportscar. Seemingly many moons later, the Silicon Valley-based automaker has finally offered up some real high-res images of the EV along with more details explaining what makes the Sport extra special.
First and foremost, the Sport's hand-wound electric motor adds a bit more oomph to the already quick Roadster, taking off two-tenths of a second in the rush to 60 mph (it now checks in at just 3.7 seconds). Also included are bare carbon fiber hood louvers and rear spoiler, a push-button transmission selector to replace the aluminum shift knob and a central touch screen that displays estimated range along with the total number of oil barrels saved over a fossil-fueled automobile. That's worth the $20K price increase itself, don't 'cha think?
Gallery: Tesla Roadster Sport
[Source: Tesla]
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
imoore 10:08AM (8/20/2009)
"That's worth the $20K price increase itself, don't 'cha think?"
Uh, no.
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Mike 10:16AM (8/20/2009)
Succinctly put, yet brilliant.
DayShifter 10:19AM (8/20/2009)
So that brings the price to about $120,000....right??
Gosh, I love the way innovation works!
Len_A 2:08PM (8/20/2009)
$120,000 worth of fugly. Yeech!!!
Raz 10:19AM (8/20/2009)
The carbon fiber really did enhance its looks, but i am not too sure whether its worth the price increase. From what i know, many so call carbon fiber components in road cars are nothing more than fiber glass topped with two layers of carbon fiber. Two layers of carbon fiber doesn't worth too much when put into medium/ high production. Not sure how much it cost them to enhance the motor and batteries; the rest of the additions can pretty much be done with.... 3k, 4k at most
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J.Crew 10:28AM (8/20/2009)
All that $ for a rebadged battery powered Lotus. So many other cars I would buy for the same or less money. The "Musk" is wearing off on this ride as time goes on. They need their sedan launched and quick as you can only survive so long offering a 2 seat toy that sits as third or fourth choice in the garage.
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Dan 10:33AM (8/20/2009)
Half a billion dollars of federally subsidized loan at work.
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Andrew 11:53PM (8/21/2009)
Not! The federal money is for Model S production and their powertrain technology, and the government gets interest off the loan. If anything, that's a worthwhile investment instead of many full billions to big auto, who stopped truly innovating sometime ago. The name of the game isn't "incremental improvement on existing technology" anymore; it's full-on innovation.
wildjohn999 10:34AM (8/20/2009)
Needs a smoother roof line than the greenhouse one it has. Otherwise it's pretty nice looking.
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MajorGeek 10:42AM (8/20/2009)
Sorry, this design is tired and old. Time for a change.
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skablaw 10:44AM (8/20/2009)
I'm too lazy to go look up the post, but what tuner is it that's out there butchering Carrera GTs for hundreds of thousands of dollars with practically no appreciable gain in performance? Well, this seems like a bargain by comparison. Of course this is no Carrera GT.
I think it's amazing what this car can do, but over the last couple of years I've grown less and less enthralled by how it looks. Pretty "blah," actually. Maybe it's just the lipstick-red. White would contrast better with the carbon bits and blacked-out wheels. Or yellow, or blue, or silver.
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AntBee 10:53AM (8/20/2009)
"That's worth the $20K price increase itself, don't 'cha think?"
I'm gonna hafta say, no.
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Mike 11:14AM (8/20/2009)
I think the Chrysler styling on their Lotus skeleton looks much better.
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Tony 11:18AM (8/20/2009)
I am confused, is their actually a crank to wind the motor to give it some extra boost and if so, where is it located?
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Olivier Parent 12:09PM (8/20/2009)
'Hand-wound' means someone spun the copper coils in the electric motors manually during the production process, as opposed to spun by a robot. But I'm not really sure how this could actually increase power output. Probably just marketing-speak for a custom design of the electric motors.
Dan 12:45AM (8/21/2009)
"Hand-wound" motors are a marketing gimmick that I haven't seen in decades, but it was a common trick for R/C car motors. It's only a gimmick, since it's easier and cheaper to make a more powerful motor by simply going to bigger wire and fewer winds without "hand-winding" it.
Farmboy 12:38PM (8/20/2009)
I hate the roof lines, especially around the windows. Looks really retarded.
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AlittleCarLover 2:10PM (8/20/2009)
You could just paint your tesla red with black accents and have a little tuning job... ta da! 5k tesla roadster sport.
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Len_A 2:10PM (8/20/2009)
Ugly as sin. Put a bullet in it, and do the world a favor.
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AlittleCarLover 2:11PM (8/20/2009)
definitely not worth 20k
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