Technology Icon meets Luxury Icon
Rolls Royce motor cars of the late 20th Century are recognised the world over as a symbol of luxury and craftsmanship, and, well looked after, they are a delight to own and to drive.
But, as anyone who has tried to maintain one of the Silver Shadow or Silver Spirit series of cars quickly learns, their reliability and cost of ownership is far from world beating by modern standards, which makes running one of these iconic cars in the 21st century increasingly challenging.
Additionally, and with good reason, more and more people are uncomfortable with a vehicle that consumes fuel as if it is 1971, and then proceeds to spew its toxic waste into the environment.
The TeslaRR project was created to address these issues and help keep many thousands of these beautiful, historic vehicles enjoyed and used, hopefully well into the 22nd century.
Genesis
This project was born out of the frustration and cost associated with maintaining and fuelling the 'SY' and 'SZ' series cars, and was enabled by the availability of Tesla electric drive systems capable of providing the performance appropriate for these powerful but graceful vehicles.
Combining world beating Tesla drivetrain technology with legendary Rolls Royce craftsmanship was an idea inspired by Sir Henry Royce himself:
"Take the best that exists and make it better"
Aims
The goal was to develop a complete EV conversion solution for Rolls Royce and Bentley cars produced from 1965 to 1999, using widely available but best in class technology. The solution had to be installable without requiring any non-reversible changes to the vehicle structure, and also had to achieve Rolls Royce quality, performance, comfort, and feel.
Cleaner, more reliable, quieter, and faster!
Performance
After extensive simulation, it became clear that with thoughtful design, a large heavy vehicle actually lends itself to EV conversion better than a smaller lighter vehicle, which is 'delightfully counter intuitive'.
TeslaRR 'Performance Edition', based on the SZ platform, accelerates from 0-60mph in under 5s reaching a top speed of over 140mph. This is comparable to the original Bentley TurboRT, one of the triumphs of 20th century Crewe engineering,
