Elon Musk, the owner of Tesla, recently made an ambitious new promise that the new Roadster car his company is planning will reach 0-60 miles per hour (about 100 kmph) in less than one second. He also said that there will never be another car like this. These claims have raised many eyebrows, including Bugatti CEO Mate Rimac's. He said that the eye-popping numbers are technically feasible, but there is a catch. Bugatti's own electric sports car, the Nevera, set the current 0 to 60 mph acceleration record - 1.71 seconds - last year.
When asked on his Facebook page if he thought the under-one-second claim was believable, Mr Rimac responded in the affirmative. "It is possible with thrusters. We did the simulation," he said in the comment section.
However, he did add a caveat along with that confirmation.
"Problem is, you release the air in two to three seconds and then you have a lot of dead weight that you are carrying around (tanks, compressor, valves, nozzles etc.)," said Mr Rimac.
"Same with fans - they just give you more grip but you need something like 30,000 newton-meters on the wheels to accelerate below one sec 0-100 km/h, which means you need massive motors, inverters, gearboxes, driveshafts, etc," he added.
He then talked about the weight of the car, saying it has to be "super light", which won't be the standard for battery-powered cars. The Nevera hypercar weighs over 5,000 pounds.
"So thrusters are really the only way to go. But they bring a lot of downsides as well," he said.
Mr Musk, meanwhile, said the speed claim is the "least interesting part" about the new Roadster, with a 2025 production debut as a 2026 model-year car.
