Tesla CEO blogs explanations

In order to get its electric sports car to owners sooner, Tesla Motors plans to deliver cars with a temporary transmission that falls short of its originally promised performance.

The news was distributed to the wide world on Thursday in a blog post from Ze'ev Drori, Tesla's new president and CEO.

The post is a reprint of a letter that was sent to Tesla purchasers on December 21, as a follow-up to a town hall meeting for Tesla owners that took place on December 12. About 100 people, including those who called in, participated in the meeting, according to Drori.

The main goal is "to put the Tesla Roadster on the road as soon as possible," Drori said in the letter.

Tesla CEO Ze'ev Drori.

(Credit: Tesla Motors)

Drori's letter lays out in straightforward details the car's setbacks and how Tesla plans to deal with them. The company also posted an audio file of the town hall meeting on Tesla's Web site.

The transmission is the main source of the Tesla's delay. A durable transmission that can maintain the original claims of 0-60 mph in 4 seconds is just not ready. In the interest of getting cars into the hands of owners, the company has decided to deliver the Tesla with a transmission that enables the car to do 0-60 in 5.7 seconds. Once the company has perfected a higher performance transmission that enables the Tesla to achieve 0-60 mph in 4 seconds, it will then retrofit all the delivered cars with the new transmission at the company's expense.

Tesla also addressed questions about overstated EPA (Environmental Protection Agency) driving range figures. The independent lab that performed the EPA's tests miscalibrated one of its tools, resulting in an inflated range, according to Drori. Since then, the car has been retested and the EPA now puts the Tesla's driving range at a combined average of 221 miles per charge. Tesla, meanwhile, still stands by its "real world" driving figures of 267 miles per charge in the city and 165 miles per charge on the highway, said Drori. Tesla also plans to retest the car closer to production.

While Tesla hopes plans to be in full production by summer 2008, it expects "some number of cars to be delivered in early 2009."

(Credit: Michael Kanellos/CNET News.com)

[nebby74]

city vs highway

Interesting how many more miles it'll get in city, stop 'n go traffic.
Electric cars should have replaced gas 50 years ago.

[getwired]

Thanks to regenerative braking

Like most hybrids, it improves city mileage by regenerative braking
instead of wasting the energy just as heat.

To your point, electric or steam powered cars were strong
competitors around 100 years ago... tech never let them get ahead.
Perhaps they'll get there sometime soon (for now the economics
don't work - witness the price of the Tesla).

[TeacherKeith]

Tesla Anouncements etc.

Many of these press releases and announcements are not worth the time it takes to read them.
Many of them seem to be reworded announcements that were originally written by and or for Ballard fuel cell. I for one have lost all interest and confidence in these news releases, be them stories on batteries , electric cars , somebody is going to do something sometime in the near future , etc.
Show me something , don't tell me , action speak much more loudly than fancy words about plans to do something. Day dreams are just that , day dreams Vaporware or whatever you want to call them. I think we stand a much better chance of seeing something from Malcolm Bricklin before ever seeing something tangible from Tesla. The same thing for these battery companies that have developed these fantastic batteries. If their batteries are so great, then release them to the thousands of people who drive electric vehicles that are powered by lead acid batteries at cost or for free to show and prove that they have developed them as part of their R and D. Does the term put up or shut up mean anything anymore ?
Stop living in a fantasy world and live in reality with the rest of us.