I recently reported that Mr Musk intended for his next Tesla Roadster to arrive at 60mph in less than one second.
Mr Musk explained that to achieve this feat, he would fit the ‘SpaceX Option Pack’.
The Option Pack amounts to ten rocket thrusters producing the blistering acceleration.
If you blend a bit of Elon’s optimism with a small portion of fantasy, you may believe his prediction.
Well, a bunch of pretty clever students in Switzerland (where else?) have pipped Elon to the post.
They have a car, the Mythen, which, while only producing 322hp, weighs 396 pounds with its lady driver, Kate Maggeti, on board.
The Mythen accelerated to 62mph in 0.956 seconds.
Mate Rimac, whose car, the Revera, is the current holder of the fastest accelerating production car, 0-60mph in 1.74 seconds.
Mate Rimac is well-versed in hyper-performance EVs and believes Elon’s claim is possible.
However, the weight of the thrusters would cancel out the short-term acceleration.
The thrusters produce rapid acceleration and then dead weight.
Lightness is essential, but batteries and thrusters are heavy creating immense downforce on the tyres.
Sub one second is challenging to imagine, let alone the g-force on the driver.
For context, the ethanol-powered Dodge Challenger SRT Demon 170 (with a parachute) can go from 0 to 60 in 1.6 seconds.
I don’t wish to dampen Elon’s hyperbole, but I understand a Top Fuel dragster will hit 60 mph in around 0.4 seconds.
