Tesla pulled the covers off an all-new Roadster that it claims will be the quickest-accelerating car to make production. The surprise reveal took place alongside the Tesla Semi truck's world debut, where CEO Elon Musk said the open-top model could accelerate from zero to 60mph.100kph in 1.9sec.
Musk said the successor to Tesla’s first production car, which went out of production five years ago, can sprint from zero to 160kph in 4.2sec and complete a quarter-mile sprint in 8.9sec.
"This will the first time that any production car has broken nine seconds in the quarter-mile," he said.
It is also claimed that the Roadster, which has a removable glass lid and wraparound rear section to give it a look similar to the Mazda MX-5 RF, will have a top speed of more than 250mph/400kph.
Musk revealed that the car’s 200kWh battery pack enables it to have a 620-mile/992-kilometre range, which is another new record for production electric vehicles. The previous highest-capacity battery produced by Tesla was 100kWh.
"The point of doing this is to give a hardcore smackdown to gasoline cars,” continued Musk (pictured below). “Driving a gasoline sports car is going to feel like a steam engine with a side of quiche.”
The Tesla Roadster is pegged to arrive on roads in 2020, priced from $200,000 (Rs 1.26 crore at today’s exchange rate). $50,000 (Rs 31.58 lakh) deposits are being taken now.
The Roadster's reveal comes at a time Tesla has been working to clear a production bottleneck for its Model 3. More than 400,000 examples of the car have been ordered, but production slowed when a parts supply issues arose. Musk recently described the scenario as "production hell" and Model 3 deliveries have so far fallen well short of the company's stated goals.
Also read: Tesla Semi truck revealed
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