Tesla Plaid Event

Yesterday, Tesla held its delivery event at the Fremont Factory debuting the Tesla Model S Plaid. If you didn't watch the live stream (video), here's a recap:

The event started with Franz von Holzhausen, the chief designer, walking on stage with a sledgehammer, claiming: "we might be breaking a few records".

That they did.

Although I was secretly hoping to gain from the event more than just Plaid, I was still left in awe of Tesla's ability to be leading the pack when it comes to EV technology. Looks like Tesla is out trying to create the 'best of the best' with Plaid, and is succeeding to do so.

Here's how the Plaid is special:

• Fastest 0-60mph of any production car: 1.99s
• Fastest 1/4 mile of any production car: 9.23s
• Features a proprietary electric motor with a carbon over-wrapped rotor. They even had to design a new manufacturing machine to wind it under extremely high tension:

• Also new battery design along with it (no details).
• Lowest Drag Coefficient of any production car: 0.208
• New heat pump and thermal system, claiming it's 30% better in cold weather range, requiring 50% less energy for cabin heating. This should improve cold temperature range significantly:

• Bigger radiator in front so the car is able to sustain more high performance continuously.
• Charges 187 miles in 15 minutes.
• Expected to be found having 'lowest probability of injury of any car ever tested' (top 4 are Tesla's anyway).
• Interior upgrades with more legroom, new UI, improved cabin soundproofing with acoustic glass.
• Infotainment system 'as powerful as PS5', can play Cyberpunk. They even have their own gaming controller:

The attendees could ride the Plaid in the test track and first 25 new owners got their vehicles at the spot. Musk said Tesla is producing a few hundred Plaid's a week with 1k/week next quarter.

I assume some of these improvements (like the thermal system) will trickle down to the other Tesla models too.

This is how 0-60mph in 2 seconds looks like (click the tweet for video):

So this, the world's quickest and safest production car packed with a bunch of proprietary technology, which also happens to be a sexy four-door family sedan, is starting at around $80,000. The tri-motor version is ~$130k.

Here's the live stream if you want to see it again: