Last week Tesla CEO Elon Musk informed Twitter users that he was going to “unveil the D”, setting off the Internet on the speculation about Elon’s new “D” and the unknown “something else” that was going to debut alongside it. Well, here it is: it may not be any bigger but it is quite a bit faster and a lot more intelligent.
The new model of Tesla is the Model S P85D. The “D” stands for dual motor, which are now available as an option on the lesser-models 60D and 85D, where they use the smaller 188hp motor on both ends of the Model S. The P85D, on the other hand, combines a slightly bigger 221hp front motor with the 470hp version out back to create a family sedan that can hit 0-60 in 3.2 seconds and trip the quarter mile in 11.8 seconds. The P85D is packing 691 combined horsepower and 687 lbs/ft of combined torque; that’s getting close to Hellcat territory, and it’s all electric. There’s a 291 lb. weight penalty for the second motor, and the range takes a 10-mile loss in the P85D, but the lower models gain range, with the 85D maxing out at 291 miles.
Other changes for the Model S line include the introduction of an electromechanical brake system, which is only the second production application of the system (the Porsche 918 is the first) and Tesla’s auto-pilot system, which is semi-autonomous and can handle lane changes, road signage, speed adjustment and traffic avoidance.
This car is awesome and were I a wealthy man, I would drive one.
That said – zero emissions is a bit of a falsehood.
There are emissions, they just come from the electric power station instead of the car.
Still much, much cleaner overall than gas burners.