7 ms·

Has the 8 second quarter mile been confirmed to be done in stock trim (i.e., no special tires or other modifications)? The reason I ask is because that is EXTR

Has the 8 second quarter mile been confirmed to be done in stock trim (i.e., no special tires or other modifications)? The reason I ask is because that is EXTREMELY impressive. I tune EFI systems on race cars as a hobby, and any car in the 8 second range usually needs to run slicks or drag radials to have enough traction. Even all wheel drive cars (GTRs, DSMs, EVOs, etc.) usually run 4 slicks once they get to that speed. It seems very hard to make a pass like that on regular street tires, even with AWD. EDIT: To add, I'm not knocking Tesla here, as there are very few cars that can actually run an 8 second pass off the showroom floor without any modifications at all. Even if they had to put slicks on the car to reach that time, that still puts it on par with 1000 HP dedicated drag cars.

Florin_Andrei 9y ago
> I tune EFI systems on race cars as a hobby, and any car in the 8 second range usually needs to run slicks or drag radials to have enough traction. Right, but you're comparing what is ultimately powered by the good old Karl Benz design from the 1880s, burning dinosaur juice, that has zero torque at zero RPM, needs to shift gears multiple times, and is about as responsive to control inputs as a cow munching on marijuana leaves - with a very different thing powered by something that has maximum torque at any RPM, has no gears, and responds to control inputs extremely quickly and with immense precision.
- rthomas6 9y ago
  Even if the difference was that drastic, none of that accounts for the fact that tires only have so much friction.
  - Florin_Andrei 9y ago
    Yeah. Nobody claimed that magic was at work here. Current tire technology has certain limits imposed by physics. But I suspect electric cars can get quite a bit closer to those limits, with a much faster traction control loop.
- Unklejoe 9y ago
  A couple of points: 1. A drag car does not start at zero RPM. The engine is probably over 4000 RPM and under load before the race even begins. In fact, many cars have to dial their launch RPM down because it ends up making enough power to lose traction from a dead stop. Look up "trans brake launch" to see what I'm talking about. 2. Your comment actually further confirms my skepticism of the Tesla not being able to maintain traction. If an unresponsive internal combustion engine powered car has trouble, imagine a car capable of shocking the tires even harder.
  - Florin_Andrei 9y ago
    > A drag car does not start at zero RPM. I own a modern sportbike and I've done enough of quarter mile attempts to understand how the process works in general, even though it's not a 4-wheel vehicle. The main point here is that the internal combustion engine has a primitive torque profile. You have to keep it in the sweet spot if you want maximum performance. Hence all the stupid tricks you need to play with gear shifts and the clutch and all that junk. This whole coordinated ballet is unnecessary with electric motors, that's the point that you've missed. At any RPM, including zero, the electric motor is near peak torque. A whole range of complex issues that would otherwise need to be mitigated simply vanish, so you can focus on defeating other obstacles. Understand the difference now? > If an unresponsive internal combustion engine powered car has trouble, imagine a car capable of shocking the tires even harder. You're missing the point again. A much more responsive engine such as the electric power plant allows traction control to work much, much more precisely and respond much faster. No inertia from crankshaft assembly and transmission. No clutch. Torque goes from any value to any other value in a small fraction of a second. The feedback loop can operate that much faster, and with greater precision. Internal combustion engines are not even in the same ballpark. Like I've said, I do own a racing vehicle powered by internal combustion. I am quite fond and proud of it, which is something I believe you understand. But it's game over for this technology. Electric engines are winning by all metrics and in all applications, either sports, or utility, or whatever. It's the end of an era.
    - bartvk 9y ago
      Thanks for your explanation mentioning "coordinated ballet", only at this point the realization hit home how big the differences are.
8draco8 9y ago
Yes but in those cars traction control is usually off. In Tesla extremely precise traction control may work in your favour giving only as much power as tires can handle effectively allowing to near zero time loss on regaining tracktion. In quarter mile cars you don't have option, either tire will handle all that power or slip causing time loss.
- Unklejoe 9y ago
  Modern high-end aftermarket EFI systems (such as MoTeC) do have traction control, but it's not as effective as one would expect. The main issue I found is that street tires often just don't have the traction required, even under ideal conditions. The result is that traction control has to cut power so much that it ends up hurting the quarter mile times. It does help tremendously on consistency and safety though. Things start to pucker when all four wheels start hazing in a 1000 HP AWD car. You seem familiar, but for others, here's what a typical 8 second car looks like leaving the line: http://www.speednik.com/files/2015/01/screen-shot-2015-01-26-at-9.51.04-am.jpg http://www.speednik.com/files/2015/01/screen-shot-2015-01-26... https://c.slashgear.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/11/cobra-jet-16-900x420.jpg https://c.slashgear.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/11/cobra-jet... http://cdn.dragzine.com/wp-content/blogs.dir/2/files/2011/11/mtsmall3.jpg http://cdn.dragzine.com/wp-content/blogs.dir/2/files/2011/11... Notice how massive the rear tires are. EDIT: Added picture of an 8 second all wheel drive car (GTR). The interesting thing here is the clear bias of traction towards the rear. When launching a car with that much power, the weight shifts towards the rear enough to render the front wheels almost useless (unless the suspension is extremely stiff). https://i.ytimg.com/vi/Nf4pJZaK7P4/maxresdefault.jpg https://i.ytimg.com/vi/Nf4pJZaK7P4/maxresdefault.jpg
  - killjoywashere 9y ago
    I suspect Tesla's advantage is in linear acceleration. Those internal combustion cars need a gearbox so the initial acceleration is very high in that first gear. This the same reason the Navy wants to go from steam to electric catapults: you get the plane to the same speed off the cat, but the acceleration curve is straight, so there's lower peak load on the airframe, so your planes last longer. Similarly, the Tesla can keep linear acceleration with gear shifts.
grecy 9y ago
> that still puts it on par with 1000 HP dedicated drag cars I think you'll find it's past those. Even 1200hp GTRs don't run eights.
- wallace_f 9y ago
  The OP is right that 8 sec 1/4 is extremely impressive, but he is wrong that there are few production cars that can run 8s. No production car runs anything close. The fastest 1/4 mile production cars are supercars such as the Veyron and 918, which are at or just under a 10seconds. Remember, an increase from 20->18 seconds is roughly a 10% increase in acceleration; 10->8 is roughly 20% increase over an already ludicrously fast million-dollar supercar. It's frankly ridiculously fast.
  - Unklejoe 9y ago
    You're right - I can't find any other car that can run 8's without modifications. There are some that can achieve those numbers with under $10,000 worth of modifications, but that's kind of irrelevant since we're talking about stock cars. That's also why I am skeptical of this Tesla running an 8 second pass in stock trim. Is there a video of the pass? Most of the 8 second cars I've seen are running slicks or drag radials, and usually weigh a lot less. I'd be curious to see how Tesla managed to make a car that probably weighs over 4000 pounds have enough traction for those numbers using regular tires. Even with all wheel drive, 8 second Nissan GTRs usually have to resort to slicks.
    - grecy 9y ago
      > There are some that can achieve those numbers with under $10,000 worth of modifications Can you provide links? I seriously doubt you can get anything into the 8s with only $10k.
      - Unklejoe 9y ago
        If we're talking about anything, you can build a turbo Gen 4 LSx swapped Foxbody Mustang for very cheap (check out the sloppy mechanics group). The same goes for an automatic AWD DSM. Both of those have the potential to get into the 8's with little money, but it does take some fine tuning. However, I'm assuming you are interested in brand new production cars. The cars I listed above are all old and do not compare to the Tesla in anything other than drag racing. If you're interested, let me know and I can go into a more detailed breakdown of the last car I tuned (LSx swapped Mustang). As for new cars, it depends on how much work you're willing to do yourself vs paying a shop. Here's a link to a newer 5.0 Mustang with a completely stock engine and a ~$8500 twin turbo kit. He does have other supporting mods (tires, suspension, torque converter) that likely put him over the $10k mark, but you can also save a few thousand on the turbo kit by piecing it together yourself. "He estimates the car makes over 900 horsepower at the tire, but what really matters is the stock Coyote engine paired with an off-the-shelf Hellion turbo kit added up to an 8.6-second e.t. at over 150 mph." https://www.svtperformance.com/2015/04/13/feature-quickest-stock-coyote/ https://www.svtperformance.com/2015/04/13/feature-quickest-s...
neom 9y ago
I'll be amazed, amazzzzed, if that car, stock, can create enough down force to keep itself on the road with stock tires, I don't care how good your TC is. Look at the size of the wing on the new Zr1 https://youtu.be/O_adY_b-aLQ?t=3m14s https://youtu.be/O_adY_b-aLQ?t=3m14s
- fhood 9y ago
  Wing shouldn't matter all that much in this case. Grip is most important in the initial moments of acceleration on the drag strip where having a wing isn't quite as important. This car[1] runs in the 7s without a wing at all. [1] http://st.hotrod.com/uploads/sites/21/2017/09/149-test-tune-burnout-launch-Drag-Week-2017.jpg?interpolation=lanczos-none&fit=around%7C660%3A440&fit=around%7C596%3A398 http://st.hotrod.com/uploads/sites/21/2017/09/149-test-tune-...
  - neom 9y ago
    Fair! That said, I do doubt those cars weigh close to the same. :)
    - fhood 9y ago
      Oh absolutely. That car is almost certainly a tube frame with a fiberglass shell.....was what I was going to say but then I looked into it and actually it's still sheet metal and weighs 3800 pounds. It has run a 6.987, and probably has north of 2,000 horsepower. Oh and it is street legal.
      - neom 9y ago
        I'm confused. :( You think the hotrod will weigh the same as or more or less than the new roadster? I looked around and I couldn't find the roadster weight anywhere.
  - snug 9y ago
    Does it have a willy bar? It's also gonna be pretty heavy with lots of torque when it hits off the line.
mcguire 9y ago
I was wondering that myself after seeing the 1.9s 0-60 time. My understanding was that anything under 2.5s was the domain of racing slicks and sticky compounds.
- fhood 9y ago
  The car in the image has some monster tires on it. Doesn't give you the compression (or whatever you use to describe the give in the tire) friction you get with serious drag tires, but with a good four wheel drive system?
- tomwilson 9y ago
  Looked like it had cup2s on it during the reveal. I have them on my car and they are amazing but still far from a drag radial.
deleted 9y ago
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dsfyu404ed 9y ago
I would say with 99% certainty it wasn't stock tires. Tesla specs special tires because one of their selling points is "look how quiet EVs are and how little maintenance they need". Said special tires have increased mass over normal tires. Tesla also needs to spec something that delivers a reasonable service life under a big heavy Tesla. You can't just hand wave and say "it's a 700hp rocket, of course it eats tires" because that doesn't fit their brand image. Then there's rolling resistance. They can't spec something that has a ton of rolling resistance because it would tank range. All of those design criteria require trade-offs from traction and each other.
igorgue 9y ago
Yep the tires... Unless this shit floats, I don't see how they could do 8 sec 1/4 mile.
deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
runeks 9y ago
> Even if they had to put slicks on the car to reach that time, that still puts it on par with 1000 HP dedicated drag cars. Horsepower is a misleading figure, because 1000 HP means a maximum of 1000 HP at some engine RPM. So, in other words, if a gasoline car delivers 100 HP @ 0-2000 RPM, and only delivers 1000 HP between 5500-6000 RPM, we call it 1000 HP. The Tesla delivers its power constantly, from 0 RPM and — more importantly — its torque is also constant and available from 0 RPM. Add to this the fact that an electronic drive train can adjust the power independently for each wheel 100 times per second, which is simply impossible for a combustion engine (mechanical parts transferring that much power can’t switch that fast).
- Unklejoe 9y ago
  > — its torque is also constant and available from 0 RPM I don't think torque is constant. The power is constant, and torque gradually decays as RPM increases as per the following equation: HP = Torque x RPM ÷ 5252 Most 1000 HP drag cars are in their power band from the time the driver lets go of the trans brake until the race is over (unless it's a stick shift, but most drag cars are automatic). Like any other conventional automatic, there is a torque converter between the engine and the transmission which allows the engine to spin faster than the transmission input shaft. At the starting line, the driver engages the transmission brake, which locks the transmission and allows him to floor the engine, which brings it up to the optimal RPM (and spools the turbos if so equipped). It's almost the same as if you were to hold the brake and floor the accelerator at a red light. The only difference is that the brakes on a drag car wouldn't be able to hold it back, so they use the transmission instead. Then, when it's time to start, he lets go of the trans brake and the power is instantly delivered to the wheels. There usually isn't an issue with not having enough power at the starting line. It's actually the opposite. High power cars usually have to limit their starting RPM to avoid doing a wheelie or losing traction.
  - nawitus 9y ago
    "I don't think torque is constant." The torque is constant for the first 40% of the RPM, something like this: http://image.motorcyclistonline.com/f/30634938/122_0910_03_z%2Btesla_roadster%2Bdyno_chart.jpg http://image.motorcyclistonline.com/f/30634938/122_0910_03_z... http://www.global-greenhouse-warming.com/images/TeslaTorquegraph_v2.gif http://www.global-greenhouse-warming.com/images/TeslaTorqueg... The horse power increases gradually as RPM increases.
sbko 9y ago
"I tune EFI systems on race cars as a hobby" How did you get into such hobby? I would be glad to do that as a hobby :)
- Unklejoe 9y ago
  Well, most of my friends happen to be "in to" cars, so I've spent a lot of time being around and talking about cars. Since I'm "good with computers", I would always help them with their electrical issues, which eventually evolved into me tuning their cars and dealing with any other EFI related issues. Most tuners charge around $500, but I do it all for free, so that helps. If you really want to get involved, seek out some car clubs in your area and check out some of the open source ECU projects (such as Speeduino). Usually, car hobbyist can be identified by a group of people standing in a parking lot staring at their cars. Most of them love to brag about their setup, so they're pretty receptive to people asking questions.
koreyb 9y ago
Here is a gutted Model S P100D (4460 lb, 2 motors, 100kWh battery) running a 10.4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dO8sXUGfjWQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dO8sXUGfjWQ Roadster will be lighter, have a better drag coefficient, 2x the power (1500hp), 3 motors, 200 kWh battery (?). According to Electrek's ride along the wheels are "fat" - 325mm rear/295mm front. Dodge Demon's are 315/40R18 Nitto NT05R. https://electrek.co/2017/11/17/new-tesla-roadster-halo/ https://electrek.co/2017/11/17/new-tesla-roadster-halo/ Should be close!

Florin_Andrei 9y ago

> I tune EFI systems on race cars as a hobby, and any car in the 8 second range usually needs to run slicks or drag radials to have enough traction. Right, but you're comparing what is ultimately powered by the good old Karl Benz design from the 1880s, burning dinosaur juice, that has zero torque at zero RPM, needs to shift gears multiple times, and is about as responsive to control inputs as a cow munching on marijuana leaves - with a very different thing powered by something that has maximum torque at any RPM, has no gears, and responds to control inputs extremely quickly and with immense precision.

rthomas6 9y ago
Even if the difference was that drastic, none of that accounts for the fact that tires only have so much friction.
- Florin_Andrei 9y ago
  Yeah. Nobody claimed that magic was at work here. Current tire technology has certain limits imposed by physics. But I suspect electric cars can get quite a bit closer to those limits, with a much faster traction control loop.
Unklejoe 9y ago
A couple of points: 1. A drag car does not start at zero RPM. The engine is probably over 4000 RPM and under load before the race even begins. In fact, many cars have to dial their launch RPM down because it ends up making enough power to lose traction from a dead stop. Look up "trans brake launch" to see what I'm talking about. 2. Your comment actually further confirms my skepticism of the Tesla not being able to maintain traction. If an unresponsive internal combustion engine powered car has trouble, imagine a car capable of shocking the tires even harder.
- Florin_Andrei 9y ago
  > A drag car does not start at zero RPM. I own a modern sportbike and I've done enough of quarter mile attempts to understand how the process works in general, even though it's not a 4-wheel vehicle. The main point here is that the internal combustion engine has a primitive torque profile. You have to keep it in the sweet spot if you want maximum performance. Hence all the stupid tricks you need to play with gear shifts and the clutch and all that junk. This whole coordinated ballet is unnecessary with electric motors, that's the point that you've missed. At any RPM, including zero, the electric motor is near peak torque. A whole range of complex issues that would otherwise need to be mitigated simply vanish, so you can focus on defeating other obstacles. Understand the difference now? > If an unresponsive internal combustion engine powered car has trouble, imagine a car capable of shocking the tires even harder. You're missing the point again. A much more responsive engine such as the electric power plant allows traction control to work much, much more precisely and respond much faster. No inertia from crankshaft assembly and transmission. No clutch. Torque goes from any value to any other value in a small fraction of a second. The feedback loop can operate that much faster, and with greater precision. Internal combustion engines are not even in the same ballpark. Like I've said, I do own a racing vehicle powered by internal combustion. I am quite fond and proud of it, which is something I believe you understand. But it's game over for this technology. Electric engines are winning by all metrics and in all applications, either sports, or utility, or whatever. It's the end of an era.
  - bartvk 9y ago
    Thanks for your explanation mentioning "coordinated ballet", only at this point the realization hit home how big the differences are.

8draco8 9y ago

Yes but in those cars traction control is usually off. In Tesla extremely precise traction control may work in your favour giving only as much power as tires can handle effectively allowing to near zero time loss on regaining tracktion. In quarter mile cars you don't have option, either tire will handle all that power or slip causing time loss.

Unklejoe 9y ago
Modern high-end aftermarket EFI systems (such as MoTeC) do have traction control, but it's not as effective as one would expect. The main issue I found is that street tires often just don't have the traction required, even under ideal conditions. The result is that traction control has to cut power so much that it ends up hurting the quarter mile times. It does help tremendously on consistency and safety though. Things start to pucker when all four wheels start hazing in a 1000 HP AWD car. You seem familiar, but for others, here's what a typical 8 second car looks like leaving the line: http://www.speednik.com/files/2015/01/screen-shot-2015-01-26-at-9.51.04-am.jpg http://www.speednik.com/files/2015/01/screen-shot-2015-01-26... https://c.slashgear.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/11/cobra-jet-16-900x420.jpg https://c.slashgear.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/11/cobra-jet... http://cdn.dragzine.com/wp-content/blogs.dir/2/files/2011/11/mtsmall3.jpg http://cdn.dragzine.com/wp-content/blogs.dir/2/files/2011/11... Notice how massive the rear tires are. EDIT: Added picture of an 8 second all wheel drive car (GTR). The interesting thing here is the clear bias of traction towards the rear. When launching a car with that much power, the weight shifts towards the rear enough to render the front wheels almost useless (unless the suspension is extremely stiff). https://i.ytimg.com/vi/Nf4pJZaK7P4/maxresdefault.jpg https://i.ytimg.com/vi/Nf4pJZaK7P4/maxresdefault.jpg
- killjoywashere 9y ago
  I suspect Tesla's advantage is in linear acceleration. Those internal combustion cars need a gearbox so the initial acceleration is very high in that first gear. This the same reason the Navy wants to go from steam to electric catapults: you get the plane to the same speed off the cat, but the acceleration curve is straight, so there's lower peak load on the airframe, so your planes last longer. Similarly, the Tesla can keep linear acceleration with gear shifts.

grecy 9y ago

> that still puts it on par with 1000 HP dedicated drag cars I think you'll find it's past those. Even 1200hp GTRs don't run eights.

wallace_f 9y ago
The OP is right that 8 sec 1/4 is extremely impressive, but he is wrong that there are few production cars that can run 8s. No production car runs anything close. The fastest 1/4 mile production cars are supercars such as the Veyron and 918, which are at or just under a 10seconds. Remember, an increase from 20->18 seconds is roughly a 10% increase in acceleration; 10->8 is roughly 20% increase over an already ludicrously fast million-dollar supercar. It's frankly ridiculously fast.
- Unklejoe 9y ago
  You're right - I can't find any other car that can run 8's without modifications. There are some that can achieve those numbers with under $10,000 worth of modifications, but that's kind of irrelevant since we're talking about stock cars. That's also why I am skeptical of this Tesla running an 8 second pass in stock trim. Is there a video of the pass? Most of the 8 second cars I've seen are running slicks or drag radials, and usually weigh a lot less. I'd be curious to see how Tesla managed to make a car that probably weighs over 4000 pounds have enough traction for those numbers using regular tires. Even with all wheel drive, 8 second Nissan GTRs usually have to resort to slicks.
  - grecy 9y ago
    > There are some that can achieve those numbers with under $10,000 worth of modifications Can you provide links? I seriously doubt you can get anything into the 8s with only $10k.
    - Unklejoe 9y ago
      If we're talking about anything, you can build a turbo Gen 4 LSx swapped Foxbody Mustang for very cheap (check out the sloppy mechanics group). The same goes for an automatic AWD DSM. Both of those have the potential to get into the 8's with little money, but it does take some fine tuning. However, I'm assuming you are interested in brand new production cars. The cars I listed above are all old and do not compare to the Tesla in anything other than drag racing. If you're interested, let me know and I can go into a more detailed breakdown of the last car I tuned (LSx swapped Mustang). As for new cars, it depends on how much work you're willing to do yourself vs paying a shop. Here's a link to a newer 5.0 Mustang with a completely stock engine and a ~$8500 twin turbo kit. He does have other supporting mods (tires, suspension, torque converter) that likely put him over the $10k mark, but you can also save a few thousand on the turbo kit by piecing it together yourself. "He estimates the car makes over 900 horsepower at the tire, but what really matters is the stock Coyote engine paired with an off-the-shelf Hellion turbo kit added up to an 8.6-second e.t. at over 150 mph." https://www.svtperformance.com/2015/04/13/feature-quickest-stock-coyote/ https://www.svtperformance.com/2015/04/13/feature-quickest-s...

neom 9y ago

I'll be amazed, amazzzzed, if that car, stock, can create enough down force to keep itself on the road with stock tires, I don't care how good your TC is. Look at the size of the wing on the new Zr1 https://youtu.be/O_adY_b-aLQ?t=3m14s https://youtu.be/O_adY_b-aLQ?t=3m14s

fhood 9y ago
Wing shouldn't matter all that much in this case. Grip is most important in the initial moments of acceleration on the drag strip where having a wing isn't quite as important. This car[1] runs in the 7s without a wing at all. [1] http://st.hotrod.com/uploads/sites/21/2017/09/149-test-tune-burnout-launch-Drag-Week-2017.jpg?interpolation=lanczos-none&fit=around%7C660%3A440&fit=around%7C596%3A398 http://st.hotrod.com/uploads/sites/21/2017/09/149-test-tune-...
- neom 9y ago
  Fair! That said, I do doubt those cars weigh close to the same. :)
  - fhood 9y ago
    Oh absolutely. That car is almost certainly a tube frame with a fiberglass shell.....was what I was going to say but then I looked into it and actually it's still sheet metal and weighs 3800 pounds. It has run a 6.987, and probably has north of 2,000 horsepower. Oh and it is street legal.
    - neom 9y ago
      I'm confused. :( You think the hotrod will weigh the same as or more or less than the new roadster? I looked around and I couldn't find the roadster weight anywhere.
- snug 9y ago
  Does it have a willy bar? It's also gonna be pretty heavy with lots of torque when it hits off the line.

mcguire 9y ago

I was wondering that myself after seeing the 1.9s 0-60 time. My understanding was that anything under 2.5s was the domain of racing slicks and sticky compounds.

fhood 9y ago
The car in the image has some monster tires on it. Doesn't give you the compression (or whatever you use to describe the give in the tire) friction you get with serious drag tires, but with a good four wheel drive system?
tomwilson 9y ago
Looked like it had cup2s on it during the reveal. I have them on my car and they are amazing but still far from a drag radial.

deleted 9y ago

[deleted]

dsfyu404ed 9y ago

I would say with 99% certainty it wasn't stock tires. Tesla specs special tires because one of their selling points is "look how quiet EVs are and how little maintenance they need". Said special tires have increased mass over normal tires. Tesla also needs to spec something that delivers a reasonable service life under a big heavy Tesla. You can't just hand wave and say "it's a 700hp rocket, of course it eats tires" because that doesn't fit their brand image. Then there's rolling resistance. They can't spec something that has a ton of rolling resistance because it would tank range. All of those design criteria require trade-offs from traction and each other.

igorgue 9y ago

Yep the tires... Unless this shit floats, I don't see how they could do 8 sec 1/4 mile.

deleted 9y ago

[deleted]

runeks 9y ago

> Even if they had to put slicks on the car to reach that time, that still puts it on par with 1000 HP dedicated drag cars. Horsepower is a misleading figure, because 1000 HP means a maximum of 1000 HP at some engine RPM. So, in other words, if a gasoline car delivers 100 HP @ 0-2000 RPM, and only delivers 1000 HP between 5500-6000 RPM, we call it 1000 HP. The Tesla delivers its power constantly, from 0 RPM and — more importantly — its torque is also constant and available from 0 RPM. Add to this the fact that an electronic drive train can adjust the power independently for each wheel 100 times per second, which is simply impossible for a combustion engine (mechanical parts transferring that much power can’t switch that fast).

Unklejoe 9y ago
> — its torque is also constant and available from 0 RPM I don't think torque is constant. The power is constant, and torque gradually decays as RPM increases as per the following equation: HP = Torque x RPM ÷ 5252 Most 1000 HP drag cars are in their power band from the time the driver lets go of the trans brake until the race is over (unless it's a stick shift, but most drag cars are automatic). Like any other conventional automatic, there is a torque converter between the engine and the transmission which allows the engine to spin faster than the transmission input shaft. At the starting line, the driver engages the transmission brake, which locks the transmission and allows him to floor the engine, which brings it up to the optimal RPM (and spools the turbos if so equipped). It's almost the same as if you were to hold the brake and floor the accelerator at a red light. The only difference is that the brakes on a drag car wouldn't be able to hold it back, so they use the transmission instead. Then, when it's time to start, he lets go of the trans brake and the power is instantly delivered to the wheels. There usually isn't an issue with not having enough power at the starting line. It's actually the opposite. High power cars usually have to limit their starting RPM to avoid doing a wheelie or losing traction.
- nawitus 9y ago
  "I don't think torque is constant." The torque is constant for the first 40% of the RPM, something like this: http://image.motorcyclistonline.com/f/30634938/122_0910_03_z%2Btesla_roadster%2Bdyno_chart.jpg http://image.motorcyclistonline.com/f/30634938/122_0910_03_z... http://www.global-greenhouse-warming.com/images/TeslaTorquegraph_v2.gif http://www.global-greenhouse-warming.com/images/TeslaTorqueg... The horse power increases gradually as RPM increases.

sbko 9y ago

"I tune EFI systems on race cars as a hobby" How did you get into such hobby? I would be glad to do that as a hobby :)

Unklejoe 9y ago
Well, most of my friends happen to be "in to" cars, so I've spent a lot of time being around and talking about cars. Since I'm "good with computers", I would always help them with their electrical issues, which eventually evolved into me tuning their cars and dealing with any other EFI related issues. Most tuners charge around $500, but I do it all for free, so that helps. If you really want to get involved, seek out some car clubs in your area and check out some of the open source ECU projects (such as Speeduino). Usually, car hobbyist can be identified by a group of people standing in a parking lot staring at their cars. Most of them love to brag about their setup, so they're pretty receptive to people asking questions.

koreyb 9y ago

Here is a gutted Model S P100D (4460 lb, 2 motors, 100kWh battery) running a 10.4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dO8sXUGfjWQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dO8sXUGfjWQ Roadster will be lighter, have a better drag coefficient, 2x the power (1500hp), 3 motors, 200 kWh battery (?). According to Electrek's ride along the wheels are "fat" - 325mm rear/295mm front. Dodge Demon's are 315/40R18 Nitto NT05R. https://electrek.co/2017/11/17/new-tesla-roadster-halo/ https://electrek.co/2017/11/17/new-tesla-roadster-halo/ Should be close!