Reading the script in the complaint (http://www.teslamotors.com/sites/default/files/tesla_-_claim...) it looks like Top Gear staged pushing the car into the hanger as part of a fictional story about running out of charge after 55 miles of driving. That fictional story is based on their calculation that on the track it would have run out after 50 miles.
Top Gear's show seems to be saying this: if you actually tried to drove this car for 55 miles at high speed on our track, it would run out of power and you would need to push it into the hanger to recharge. Because you would have intentionally driven it until it ran out of charge. They do NOT make the claim that it suddenly and surprisingly ran out of charge. But I can see how it might appear that way to the viewer.
I don't know if this counts as libel. The actual lie here is that Top Gear didn't go through the exercise of actually running the battery down.
Not sure what to make of the claim that the brakes didn't die. That seems more like a he-said-she-said deal at this point.
In this video (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8DfHyGD7_pM&t=4m45s), the narration is heard as they "worked it out" that the car would fully discharge at around 55 miles, but the visual portrayed is that of Clarkson actually being surprised by a dead battery followed by the hanger scene. While they could claim that the narration never says they ran out of charge, I would describe the scene as extremely deceptive at best.
The 55 miles is still at odds with Tesla though. On their website (http://www.teslamotors.com/blog/roadster-efficiency-and-rang...), at the bottom of the article they display a chart that claims a range of 75 miles even if the vehicle is topped out at 125mph for the entire charge.
I'm not very familiar with British libel law, but from what I've heard, the defendent tends to be at a disadvantage which might put Tesla on very good footing going into this case.
Edit: After another viewing, I would say that the narration would also go very well with the actual experience of running out of power. So it might not be an out for BBC after all. With a little more careful wording, they could have probably avoided this whole fiasco.
but the visual portrayed is that of Clarkson actually being
surprised by a dead battery followed by the hanger scene.
My guess is that was live footage-- not a staged shot. He appeared to still be moving under power, and had power steering. When the Roadster's battery runs low, it drops into a low power mode, with a dramatically lower top speed and crippled acceleration. You'd have to endure "limp home" mode for a couple dozen miles before the cell-protection circuits kick in and shut everything down.
Which would be bad.
Lithium ion cells are twitchy, excitable beasts at the best of times, and like to burst into flames when abused. The Roadster's battery is liquid cooled, and if the pack is completely discharged, then the coolant pump will stop running, which could result in the entire thing going Fukushima. Just completely discharging a pack will dramatically shorten its lifespan, (The Roadster's is only rated to 100k miles) which isn't something Tesla wants to be done to US$109,000 worth of car which the BBC did not, in fact, own.
So it dropped into low power mode, and they switched cars, and they had a nice dramatic shot of it being rolled into a garage, something that would be unpleasant enough for a gasoline car, but would almost certainly be a multi-thousand dollar maintenance catastrophe for an electric one.
That's all fine and good - but watching the show segment, it very clearly gives that they suddenly ran out of power and had to push it into the garage.
One can argue the details of what really happened - but even knowing how those things work, that segment very strongly makes it look like the Tesla Roadster will simply DIE without warning, requiring you to push it into the garage.
> The 55 miles is still at odds with Tesla though. On their website (http://www.teslamotors.com/blog/roadster-efficiency-and-rang...), at the bottom of the article they display a chart that claims a range of 75 miles even if the vehicle is topped out at 125mph for the entire charge.
You have to remember though, it would probably spend more energy braking and speeding up again than it would going top speed steadily.
Exactly. An interesting feature of electric motors is that they use very little electricity at high RPMs. Thus, the only energy spent would be that lost to mechanical friction, and that used to overcome air/tire resistance (which gets significant at higher speeds). So, whereas a Bugatti Veyron could be emptied in 15 minutes at full throttle, the fastest way to empty the charge on an electric vehicle is rapid and extreme changes in velocity (like those seen on a track), where juice-hungry torque is in high demand.
For a more familiar example, a cordless drill will die far faster by driving screws into hardwood than by drilling holes in softwood at high speed. The same is not true of internal combustion engines.
Top Gear's show seems to be saying this: if you actually tried to drove this car for 55 miles at high speed on our track, it would run out of power and you would need to push it into the hanger to recharge. Because you would have intentionally driven it until it ran out of charge. They do NOT make the claim that it suddenly and surprisingly ran out of charge. But I can see how it might appear that way to the viewer.
I don't know if this counts as libel. The actual lie here is that Top Gear didn't go through the exercise of actually running the battery down.
Not sure what to make of the claim that the brakes didn't die. That seems more like a he-said-she-said deal at this point.