I shouldn’t have to tell you that this type of action is extremely dangerous and likely won’t work with the high power going through industrialized power lines. But in less organized parts of the world, smart people have to make due with what is available.

It appears s/he’s got some sort of transformer there at the end to step down the power to 240V but, again, obviously not for the newbies. Via Weibo

These were taken from the LATimes review of the P85D which found it similar to other reviews.

The car’s neck-snapping hole shot stuns passengers. Mashing the accelerator from a dead stop can induce dizziness, loss of breath and heart palpitations. One passenger briefly shed tears. Others giggled uncontrollably.

The story here are the high quality images including access to the rotor diagnostic room. The author does make a good point about Tesla’s growing inability to meet its own deadlines. I think this is probably Musk calibrating his reality distortion field.

In a new paper in the ACS journal Environmental Science & Technology, Tugce Yuksel and Jeremy Michalek at Carnegie Mellon University have shown the average energy usage per mile of electric cars across the US.  You’ll note that warm but temperate climates like the California Coast and the Deep South especially Florida fare the best. Very hot desert areas like Arizona don’t do well because of the energy required to cool off bith the batteries and cabin. The North does poorly because batteries lose power as weather gets cooler.  Below, a Nissan Leaf efficiency is graphed at different temperatures which illustrates this disparity more clearly. The optimum range for operation is between 45 and 82 degrees where the 300W/mile threshold is beaten.

This all translates to CO2 emissions obviously and with the West making their energy much cleaner, they produce about 1/3rd the CO2 emissions as the north Midwest which is basically one big coal plant. In fact, that area’s energy is so CO2 intensive that running an electric car there (assuming you don’t have your own solar/wind) rivals the CO2 emissions of a fuel efficient car like a Prius.

The big takeaway is that moving to electric cars isnt enough. The grid also needs to move to cleaner power like wind and solar.

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The main differentiator will be battery economies of scale exemplified by Tesla’s Gigafactory which is now under construction outside of Reno

Electric car Analysts are often wrong but since Deutsche Bank analyst Rod Lache’s thinking lines up with mine, I’m going to go ahead and post this from Quartz on the price gap between electric cars and internal combustion within a decade.

There are two factors that could close the cost gap: The first is that battery prices are expected to drop by more than half to $100 per kilowatt hour—not because of a scientific leap, but due to engineering improvements and economies of scale, particularly at Tesla’s “gigafactory.” The second factor is that combustion engines will get a lot more expensive, Lache says. US gasoline efficiency standards, which require that light vehicle fleets average 54.5 miles a gallon by 2025, will incur added costs of $2,000 to $2,600 per vehicle. That will raise the total cost of a typical drive train—an engine, transmission, and fuel and exhaust system—to $7,000 to $7,600 per vehicle in the United States, he writes.

By comparison, using the $100 per kilowatt hour cost that Deutsche Bank expects, a 47 kilowatt-hour battery pack capable of taking a car 200 miles on a charge only would cost about $5,400. When you add in the electric motor, the entire power train would rise to $6,100—a price advantage of almost $2,000 over a combustion car.

Keep in mind this is without the cost of fuel which Electric already is an order of magnitude better than petroleum  – it costs about $1 to let the huge Tesla Model S go 100 miles so “cheap gas” isn’t even close.

Also electrics are way faster, cleaner, quieter, take less space, don’t stink are less combustable, upgradable…I could go on and on. It is no wonder that smart companies like Apple and Google are jumping into this pool.

Where to begin? Top Gear, which is famous for sabotaging its Tesla Roadster review so badly it got sent to court, got its hands on a BMW i8 which is barely an electric car to begin with. It has about a 20 mile range on electric alone and electric horsepower similar to a Toyota Prius.

Our hero, the aging Clarkson, pulls up to an Electric charger and then begins fumbling with cables like he’s just come directly from the stone age. He then feigns a frustrated “stupid” scream. When he finally is able to plug in the female to the male charger cable he has difficulty getting the charger to turn on. Then when he gets back to the car, he realizes his battery, like his moral character is empty.

Good thing he has gas. A lot of it.

Some great news seemingly through Panasonic relayed by Nikkei. Tesla’s Gigafactory will open for business in a year and will start making batteries for the Model 3 in 2017. That’s an optimistic timetable for Tesla which is getting a reputation for missing its timetables.

Taken at face value, the Tesla Roadster 340-mile trip from San Jose to Santa Monica in California is a significant milestone. The direct drive in under 6 hours all without refueling will leave most EV owners’ mouths agape. There was even 40 minutes with the heater turned on and that huge climb (and subsequent decent) out of the Grapevine.

As we announced in December, the Roadster 3.0 upgrade will feature enhancements in battery cell technology, aerodynamics, and rolling resistance. These modifications should boost the Roadster’s range by 40 to 50%.

But I think this is bigger. This shows what the technologies Tesla has developed mean for the next generation of EVs. It means the Model X, even with its higher profile and expanded room, will be able to still handily be able to make it between Superchargers in the winter. Even more importantly, it shows that Tesla can make a BMW 3-series sized car go 200 miles with a lot less battery that previously expected.

If the new pack in the Roadster has 70kWh and goes 400 miles, doing a little math and guesswork, you only need about 45kWh to get a slightly bigger car to go 200 miles. (Assuming the car lies between the 35kWh and the 60kWh for the Model S with 200 mile range).

And that’s assuming technology stands still between now and then.

Tesla’s Blog entry on the Trip here and pasted below:
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The future:

(Bloomberg) — There are more electric-car charging points in Japan than there are gas stations.

That surprising discovery comes from Nissan Motor Co., which reported that the number of power points in Japan, including fast-chargers and those in homes, has surged to 40,000, surpassing the nation’s 34,000 gas stations.

The figure shows that in the relatively brief time since electric vehicles were introduced, the infrastructure to support them has become bigger than what the oil industry built over decades in the world’s third-biggest economy — at least by this one measure.

The stark reality however isn’t quite as bright.  Only quick DC chargers, which Japan does have many of (mostly the Chademo variety) really do the equivalent of what gas stations do. All of those level 1 and 2 chargers will put 5-30 miles of range ever HOUR which means they are more for parking all day or over night to get any effective range. Also, with most electric cars like Nissan’s Leaf only holding about 85 miles of charge in total, even those quick chargers have to be visited about once every hour of travel.

The future is clearly in the higher power 100+kW chargers and 200 mile batteries if you want to compare to the convenience of gas. But more charging points = better.

Looks like Tesla is rolling out some new Supercharger handles that don’t require a physical button. This one is at the Atascadero Supercharger in central California.

Would be nice if these made it to home chargers too.

OMG these are lovely. Plus? Supposedly that ‘gold trim’ below is actually just light reflection or maybe this Tron thing. Or, maybe Bieber is trading in his Fiskar?

One more below
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[tweet https://twitter.com/llsethj/status/565673970834628608 align=’center’]

[tweet https://twitter.com/llsethj/status/565683672645644289 align=’center’]

[tweet https://twitter.com/llsethj/status/565681464608833536 align=’center’]

Seeking Alpha provides a transcript of last night’s Earnings Call (embedded below).

[youtube=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wvB01EibT2g&start=900]

The 3 big notables: In the early part of the discussion CEO Elon Musk said:

We are going to spend staggering amounts of money on CapEx. I mean for a good reason and with the great ROI. And it’s important to not look at CapEx and isolation because like that CapEx obviously is being done for reason in order to capture substantial future revenue flow. But I think sort of backing on below it. Just if you see if you write to the assumptions I emphasize these are just certain assumptions. I’m not saying are true or that they will occur, but I just say that they do occur, personally, such as [indiscernible] I fell something, I mean if you take this year’s revenue around $6 billion where there are about – and if we are able to maintain [indiscernible] growth rate for ten years and achieve a 10% profitable number and have 20PE, our market cap would be basically the same as Apple’s today. Now that’s going to require a bit – a order $700 million. Obviously, getting the roll acquire some significant CapEx.

But I’m hopeful that we can do this without any significant dilution to the company. So maybe minor dilution, but nothing serious.

This means that Tesla is going to raise some capital to pay off some of this CapEx. Most importantly, Tesla’s CTO sees such a huge upside to the growth trajectory that he’s wiling to put huge things out there.

Next, JB Straubel talked about releasing a consumer battery project:

Yes, we’re going to do — we’re going to unveil some of the Tesla home battery consumer battery that will be for you using and people’s houses or businesses, fairly soon. We have to design and it should start going into production probably about six months or so. We’ll probably got to wait to have sort of product availing it’s probably in the next month or two. It’s really great. I’m really excited about it.

Solar City already sells Tesla batteries but these aren’t available direct to consumer and are only available as part of a Solar project in California. JB is talking about something much bigger which could be:

• an alternative to emergency generators
• a solar add on for all solar companies and consumers past, present and future
• a product for utilities that could alleviate spikes

Finally, the mystery. Elon Musk, when talking about demand laid this little tidbit out:

I think we’re going to be okay on the demand side for this year, and I mean, maybe something changes next year but I think we’ll be okay and I don’t think we’re going to have to do a bunch of advertising or [indiscernible] with the dealers or anything like that this year and or discount the cars or anything like that. So if I can do an emphasize that whenever you feel like this celebrity or some prominent person driving a car they all paid full retail. There was no discount. We didn’t give them a car they are buying a car and they are driving because they really believe in the car not because someone paid them or they tend to do. So regular credit [indiscernible] car. So yes, I think we do have a secret weapon on the demand side that will probably start to deploy later this year for the demand generation. While I don’t think it isn’t totally necessary, that I think and it could be pretty interesting, it could work against the dealers.

OMG. Rocket man has a secret weapon ready to deploy on car dealers. Can’t wait. 
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Tesla Motor Club Forums members are posting images from a Facebook account which followed a prototype Tesla Model S around the Fremont area. Supposedly the Model X design is done and only needs to be validated so we’re probably looking at near final design albeit camo’d with black to cover up final design aesthetics.

Noteworthy in the pictures is that this one has a trailer hitch which was promised by Tesla last year and a redesigned sportier front as you can see in the comparison picture below.

It will be interesting to see if the Model S also gets a redesigned nose.

One of the nice things about the Model X front end was that the Frunk was huge. With the smaller front end, it appears that it will be more the size of the Frunk in the Model S.

Full letter here. Webcast here.

Initial thoughts: Production was lower than expected which is pushing the stock price down.

[youtube=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W_UVU3uvBe4]

Even though the Porsche might beat the P85D to 60 and the quarter mile, it doesn’t even come close off the line or for the first 0-30mph.

Time to fire up the Bugatti Veyron and some superbikes?

Reuters:

Tesla Motors Inc Chief Executive Elon Musk is prepared to fire overseas executives, people with knowledge of the matter said, after weak Chinese sales of the company’s luxury electric cars cast doubt on his ambitious global expansion plans. Tesla sold about 120 cars in China last month, one of the sources told Reuters, well below the company’s aggressive targets. Musk has previously said he expected China sales could rival those in the United States as early as 2015.

I’ve been told that the email in question is old and being inaccurately reported though the sentiment is correct (albeit late and already reported). Tesla’s China Head Veronia Wu was excused in December as were other members of the group. Old news.

As for the 120 Tesla Model S sales in all of January, I’ve been told that Tesla has had a 120 car/WEEK run rate at the beginning of the year which is traditionally slow until the Chinese New Year.  That would put the January total closer to 500 units. That’s still not up to Tesla’s expectations. CEO Elon Musk said China could be Tesla’s biggest market by the end of the year.

Clearly Tesla isn’t there yet but statements last month by Musk seemed to indicate that Tesla knew what it had to do to improve the situation.

This has to be one of the most insanely biased,  anti-Tesla campaign I’ve ever seen.  The Connecticut Car Dealers are loading up the blood-stained non-Telsa logo above and ‘BS not a blog by indies’ blog aimed at convincing consumers and maybe lawmakers  that direct relationships with manufacturers isn’t only scary, it is down right dangerous.

Jalopnik takes issue with use of one of their articles to ‘prove’ the point

And, worst of all, they’re using one of our articles to try and convince people of the horror of buying a car from something other than an independent dealer franchise. The use of our article — and a number of others on the site — suggests that buying from a Tesla-owned car retailer will cause you to smash up your fancy new electro-car. Because without the calming, guiding influence of a car salesman, you’ll go batshit and the death-car will control your mind and make you destroy everything you love.

See more from GigaOm and below:

Nice gallery of the delivery process here from a happy new P85D owner.

[youtube=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C1uETD1rGJQ]

It’s hard to get my head around the size of this thing which seems unprecedented. Some comparisons from Reddit:

Via Reddit

On a slightly different subject, it would be cool as heck if someone invented a refrigerated compartment for the frunk for both groceries and tailgating. Yes I know the battery would take a hit but would be so sweeet…..

Ooooh what have we here? It appears Tesla uses the same test track as Mythbusters and what a great place to see the Model X being tested at some pretty high speeds.

I’ve heard the front end got a big redesign as well.

We’ll see if we can dig up some more.

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A post shared by Brandon Kiehne (@brandon_kiehne)

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AKBW90bMbHQ]

The Osborne effect is described as:

The Osborne effect is a term referring to the unintended consequences of a company pre-announcement made either unaware of the risks involved or when the timing is misjudged, which ends up having a negative impact on the sales of the current product. This is often the case when a product is announced too long before its actual availability. This has the immediate effect of customers canceling or deferring orders for the current product, knowing that it will soon be obsolete, and any unexpected delays often means the new product comes to be perceived as vaporware, damaging the company’s credibility and profitability.

The term was coined after the Osborne Computer Corporation, in which the company took more than a year to make its next product available and eventually ran out of cash and went bankrupt in 1985.

I think this is something that as a company with tech roots, Tesla, understands. They were pumping out Model Ses with driver assist hardware before the announcement was even made (and had a few leaks as a result). The same with the P85D. You could buy one as soon as it was announced and they shipped a few weeks after.

Chevy, on the other hand is advertising a far superior Volt 2016 at least 6 months ahead of when you can actually get one – without even a price. Who is going to buy the current Volt (without a very significant discount) when they know a better one is right around the proverbial corner?

Update: Elon Musk just tweeted that a Firmware update will improve the acceleration by.1 seconds.

[tweet https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/560898568748531712]

I’m not usually one to post rumors found in a forum but when I’ve heard similar claims and so have a lot of forum members, we start to see a pattern. Over at the Tesla Motor Club Forum, a number of Tesla Owners are reporting that a firmware update will push the P85D 0-60 time down near or below 2.8 seconds.

I’m happy to bring you a TMC exclusive rumor. According to my sources deep inside Tesla, a firmware update for the P85D will increase its 0-60 performance from 3.2s to 2.8s. I have not personally operated this P85D, but my sources have allegedly seen it in action and historically these sources have been accurate for Tesla rumors. Please take it with a grain of salt because I have not seen or operated this vehicle myself.

In my original pre-D event scoop, I noted that Tesla was testing the D at under 3 seconds.

What’s perhaps not expected is what Tesla has been able to squeeze out of this battery and Dual-motor beast.  My understanding is that the vehicle has been testing (unofficially) under 3 seconds on the 0-60. This is incredibly fast.

That is supercar land my friends and blows away all but the very high end supercars out there like the high end Bugattis, Lamborghinis, Mclarens, Ferraris and Porsches.

That was from a Tesla person and it turned out that Tesla’s marquee feature on the Model P85D was its 0-60 time, though the official time was 3.2 seconds and it has been verified at 3.1 seconds. How does Tesla get down to 2.8 seconds and why didn’t they show it off originally? Some hypotheses:

I heard this rumor on October 10th, when I ordered my P85D. Except the Tesla rep said that he saw long strings of 0-60 runs between 2.7 and 2.75 seconds. Based on the inverter readings from my current P85D, I think this has to be true. My inverter gauge has never made it all the way up to 480kW at full throttle, and the promised 691 hp cannot be achieved until the inverters are providing 515 kW.

There may be a number of reasons Tesla has been holding back the power, including collecting data for risk management purposes. I think it’s time to see what this beast can really do. Release the hounds!

And another:

Yes the 0-60 time can be decreased by optimizing the torque on the two axis. Actually I read on TMC that such a decrease was possible from the very beginning of the P85D life but that Tesla designers decided to get 3.2 secs because they didn’t manage to have a continuos acceleration by lowering such a number to 2.8 secs. In fact they had issue to harmonize the acceleration of the two motors.

Maybe that now in Tesla they managed to work out the issues between the two motors and get 2.8 secs.

But IMO the driver should enter a password to get 2.8 secs just to let him think twice before of using such an acceleration.

A firmware update knocks .4 secs off an already low 3.2 second 0-60 time? I can’t wait to see the reaction.