Tesla sues Top Gear over rigged race

I'm not a bog fan of TopGear. I do give a laugh sometimes when watching it, but many other times, I find it boring, because they are very biased, restricted, and why not saying so, a bit clowny for a reputed programme. And it is interesting to find that they do know something about technical aspects of the cars - so it is for some purpose, that deviated way.

 

+1.

They act like prats, but then expect to be taken seriously. That's the part that really bothers me. There is no method in their science.

Tom

 

They test the range using some EU standard test and get 211 miles. Great. Everyone knows that range is not some number set in stone. If you drive it hard, you use more energy. Range will drop.

Top Gear did a good job of pointing out that with the Tesla, this effect drops the range to 55 miles. They are, after all, selling it as a sports car. I, for one, was curious what happens if you actually drive it like a sports car, as advertised. Answer, 55 miles of range.

There is a statement in the owners manual that says taking the battery below 20% SOC can damage it, necessitating replacement. So, Top Gear stopped at 20% SOC. Now they say Top Gear is dishonest because it still had 20%. Who's being dishonest?

The brakes failed because of a blown fuse. True, that's relatively small failure, but who cares. The brakes failed. It may be a non-event for a development engineer, but for an average driver, a brake failure is a very big deal.

Maybe, Top Gear should have run it fully out of power at 70 miles, and really pushed it into the garage fully discharged...having damaged the battery. Then they could say...Run it out of juice at 70 miles (not 211), you destroy the multi-thousand pound battery, the brakes go out totally since the computers shut down, you spin off the track, and have to push it back to the dealer. Would they really have preferred that "more honest" report?

Top Gear's not alone either. Car and Driver also did an article where a driver tried to drive from Ann Arbor to Saginaw and back (total 181 miles) and it did not make it. He had to find a hotel and charge it back up to get home. Tesla got all bent out of shape over that one too. Tesla

I like my Prius because they said it'd get 50 MPG, and I drive it like a regular car and it gets 50 MPG. No excuses.

I'd love a practical electric car. But, building one with a 120-mile real-world usable range, and telling me it does 210+ is not what I have in mind.

They also abused a Mercedes C63, then said the tires only last 40 miles which would be inconvenient if you lived 45 miles from work. Mercedes didn't sue them. Pretty sad when the Germans can take a joke and we can't.

 

Top Gear is a BS entertainment show. You don't go there for facts.

 

What would the reaction be if Top Gear drove a Prius at top speed until it ran out of gas then drove it on battery as far as they could then dragged it the rest of the way to the garage then said, "We could only get 35mpg on the track and now the dealer has to recharge the battery which is probably damaged so this just won't work in the real world."?

 

A Prius won't let you damage the main battery. And it'll go a lot farther than 55 miles. That would be a boring segment. We drove a Prius very fast for 200 miles and it ran out of gas and stopped just like a regular car.

 

The Gen2 & the Gen 3 act differently when run out of gas. The Gen3 will become a paperweight. The traction battery in the Gen2 can be pushed to slowly move the car about a mile. If pushed again it may go a bit further. Push enough times & it won't go at all. After such a discharge it's going to need to be resussitated at a dealer & the traction battery may need to be replaced.

 

Top Gear and Rush Limbaugh are the same sort of bottom dwellers. They want to be heard and carry influence, but hide behind the "we just entertain" excuse when the BS is challenged.

Tesla will get publicity, and if they are real lucky one of the hosts will start a show by saying "we set up the Tesla as a joke. It was fuuuuny." I'll bet what really pissed off Tesla was agreeing to send them a car only to have it unfairly ridiculed. Other car companies should take note.

 

The vast majority of Americans don't get British humor. I would also bet that the majotity of complainers don't watch Top Gear on a regular basis.

The damaging part of the show was the unspoken fact that a Tesla can't run enough miles on a charge to complete a typical fun track day on a road course. 5 sessions of about 20 minutes and something over 100 miles.

The other damning bit was that it's handling looked pig like. The numbers weren't bad but it wouldn't be fun the herd it around a road course.

 

I am a citizen of "the rest of the world" and do not agree.
If they faked the test, if they twisted the facts or findings to fit some preset "conclusion" - they deserve a law suit, no matter if the fake was to create a climex to the show or for any other reason.

Giora.

 

Did the comment about the C63 limit it's sales? No.
Did the comment about the Roadster limit it's sales? Tesla believe so.

They have a case worth hearing, but i don't expect them to win.

 

Top Gear fires back at the Tesla crybabies.

The free publicity Tesla gets from this may not be the kind of free publicity they were looking for.

Transmission – BBC Top Gear Tesla vs Top Gear: Andy Wilman on our current legal action «

 

Nice defense, but didn't the Top Gear producer ignore the part where they pushed the Tesla into the garage instead of drive it to imply that the battery was depleted even though that was not the case ?

 

Grumpy, have you -seen- the Model S? I don't care how it drives, i want it's electric babies.

 

I watched the Top Gear episode where they basically ripped the Tesla a new one -

link in TonyP's post.

I wonder what kind of tires they had on it during the laps. Hmmm.

 

Wait a sec, did Tesla ever take a Roadster out to Laguna Seca, hammer it to get some idea what range it can get driven full out?

If not, that would be an oversight. Roadster is a sports car. People take sports cars to trackdays all the time. Motorcycles too.

I think it's a good thing to find out what the Roadster can do at the track. They will always be compared to fuel burning cars. There is no way around that. Tesla will have its strengths and weaknesses. There is no perfect car.

I wouldn't find it too difficult to imagine the car ran out of juice at 55 miles if driven to the max. But I don't know. The range must be less than 200 miles in that case.

Can't build an electric sports car and just talk about how far it will go when tiptoed through the tulips or even driven moderately.