The Tesla Roadster is an upcoming all-electric battery-powered four-seater sports car made by Tesla, Inc. Tesla has said it will be capable of 0 to 97 km/h (0 to 60 mph) in 1.9 seconds, quicker than any street legal production car to date at its announcement in November 2017. The Roadster is the successor to Tesla's first production car, which was the 2008 Roadster.
Tesla indicates that Roadster sales will begin in 2020, although not before the Tesla Model Y goes on sale. Tesla CEO Elon Musk has said that higher-performance trim levels will be available beyond the base specifications, including a model with about 10 cold gas thrusters.
In 2011, at the end of the production run of the original Tesla Roadster, Elon Musk suggested that a new version of the Roadster, without the Lotus chassis, would return to production by 2014. The new Roadster was first teased in 2014. At the time, it was also referred to as the Tesla Model R.
In 2015, Elon Musk suggested a new Roadster in 2019, capable of faster acceleration. A tweet by Elon Musk in December 2016 reconfirmed a second Roadster was in the works, but still "some years away". The second Roadster was designed by Franz von Holzhausen.
The 2020 version of the Roadster was shown in a surprise moment at the end of the Tesla Semi event on November 16, 2017—during which a Roadster was driven out of the back of one of the semi-truck trailers to the song "Sabotage". Musk explained the concept as: "The point of doing this is to give a hardcore smackdown to gasoline cars. Driving a gasoline sports car is going to feel like a steam engine with a side of quiche." The car will retail for upward of $200,000; test rides were given at the event for those who immediately paid the first $5,000 of a $50,000 deposit to pre-order the vehicle. Additional information followed after the teaser, such as the various world-record speeds Tesla said it will break.
In June 2018, Elon Musk revealed a potential feature called "SpaceX option package" for the Roadster. This would add around ten cold gas thrusters to the car to improve maneuverability; it would comprise an electric pump to recharge an air tank used to provide compressed air flowing through propelling nozzles to generate a cold jet thrust. The air tanks, based on "composite overwrapped pressure vessel" (COPV) also used in the Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy rockets, would replace the back seats. The thrusters would be used to improve cornering, acceleration, top speed, and braking. Working pressure would be 10,000 psi (700 bar).
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