Elon Musk unveiling Tesla’s new electric Semi truck and Roadster

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Elon Musk unveiling Tesla’s new electric Semi truck and Roadster

November 18th, 2017

Awake Goy

It’s a delicate moment for Tesla, with both fans and investors watching the rollout of its first mass-market car intensely. Now they are tuning in to see a truck, because it’s Tesla. The usual audience for freight innovation is far more niche. But when Elon Musk talks trucks, his fans whistle and shout.

The reveal event was held in the shadow of two of Musk’s other pet projects: SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket and a mile-long hyperloop tunnel. Both served as reminders that this was no ordinary company, and no ordinary truck.

Musk appeared Thursday night in Hawthorne, California, to show off his company’s newest vehicle, promising a range in the neighborhood of 500 miles for the Class 8 heavy-duty vehicle. Earlier reports pegged the range between 200 and 300 miles, but Musk delighted in besting those numbers in his remarks, including his claim that the truck has a 400-mile range with 30 minutes of charging. Musk had also promised self-driving abilities, and Tesla says this delivers at least semi-autonomous capability.

In the hours before the official reveal, Tesla showed not one, but two trucks to journalists ahead of the unveiling: a standard model and another with an aerodynamics package. There were tense moments leading up to the reveal, with Tesla employees buzzing around nervously.

The vehicles were parked in a studio facing up to competing diesel-powered trucks from Freightliner and International. Compared to the internal combustion engine models, the Tesla Semi has smoothed-off sides covering its electric parts, including the grille up front. Yes, there’s a “frunk” up there, with some storage and access points for some service repairs. The door handles are flush-mounted, too, because they come off a Model 3.

The streamlined look of the Tesla Semi truck is made possible by the battery pack mounted under the floor of the cab, and the driver’s seat mounted significantly more forward than of those the Freightliner or International trucks. Behind the cab, the two rear axles have electric motors attached on either side, for four in total. They also come off of existing Tesla models. The design gives the Tesla Semi truck a lower center of gravity than diesel-powered models, something the company has said about its cars relative to rivals with internal combustion engines. While this is unlikely to make a semi truck handle like a sports car, it may go some way toward increasing high-speed stability.

Inside, a driver’s seat is centrally mounted with a passenger’s behind and to the right of it. This contrasts with the conventional trucks that have two seats mounted side by side, but with little room left in the cab for other storage. Tesla designers say they maximized the space left over from the battery pack’s positioning to create more space to walk around inside, as well as creating more storage — something decided after the company spoke to commercial truck drivers. There isn’t a version with sleeping accommodations, however, but it sounded like a future model change might include this feature.