Quote:
Originally Posted by cujet
My friend has one on order. He is an electric vehicle nut, and is quite excited about it.
I will get the chance to drive it, and I'll report back.
He has a 2012 Zero DS electric motorcycle and I get to ride that any time I like. (yes, it's kind of cool, and performs quite well)
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My friend took delivery of his new Model S with the 85KWH battery pack and 415? HP electric motor.
He let me take it for a solo drive out of the airport, and on some really nice back roads and high speed roads. I'm in love.
In short, the car is stinking fast. I took an iPhone video of a 20 to 90 acceleration run. Four seconds flat. The 90MPH run took place on a 3000 foot strip private airport here in South Florida.
The car drives perfectly. The "tach" is really an energy use gauge. It hovers around 20KW at 50MPH. The cornering is world class for a sedan, and the low center of gravity works well with the high quality suspension components. The steering feel is perfect. The brake re-gen system is exactly as you would design it. Lift the go-pedal and the car goes into re-gen. Lift a bit more and you decelerate more, lift fully and the car slows rapidly, creating significant re-gen. It took all of 30 seconds to be fully comfortable with this system. I love it.
The car has instant response, no downshifting, no lag, no messin' around that is so common in today's 6, 7 and 8 speed automatic transmission cars.
Using cruise control clearly uses less energy for the same speed. As the human foot is unsteady, and shows up on the "tach-energy meter". And, of course, the energy use is easily tracked by the built in programs and the large display.