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Number of Roadsters built by year

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Tesla2.5

New Member
Jun 2, 2011
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Hi, I have been a fan of Tesla and their roadster for a while now and I am curious if anybody knows how many roadsters were built by model year and how many Sports were built by model year also? Thanks in advance.
 
For model year 2008, VINs 1-500 were built, plus about 27 founders' series cars. Model year 2010 encompasses VIN 500-1169, which includes a couple dozen Canadian market versions. Model year 2011 picks up at VIN 1170, and is rumored to end at 1400 or so. These numbers are for U.S./Canadian cars. I believe EU cars are being numbered on their own VIN sequence.
 
The 2008s were all "drivetrain 1.5"... No Sports.

2010 Introduced "Drivetrain 2.0", and the option for Sport.

There are over 600 North American 2010&2011 Roadsters.
Almost half of those are the Sport model.
 
Primarily for North America, since Carfax doesn't work in Europe, the totals are something like this:

2008: ~520
2010: ~600
2011: ~60 (so far)
Those numbers are probably a little on the low side.
 
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Thanks for all of the responses. So there wasn`t a 2009 model year? So in 2010 they made almost 300 Sport models? I would have thought they would have made less of them. Thanks again.
 
The 2008s were so delayed they were all delivered in 2009. Next year they just jumped to 2010 to get back on track.

They really pushed the Sports Models as they are a higher profit item for Tesla. If you wanted a stripped down version back then you pretty much had special order it.
 
And North American 2011s may only be around 100 total because they have said that remaining production will go elsewhere. Base price is less in the USA, plus the dollar is very weak right now, so I can see why they would want to do that.
 
Along with that, there are probably 500+ Roadsters in Europe by now. I don't think there were very many 2008s to Europe. Europe sales didn't really get moving full speed until 2010.
 
And North American 2011s may only be around 100 total because they have said that remaining production will go elsewhere. Base price is less in the USA, plus the dollar is very weak right now, so I can see why they would want to do that.

They didn't change the model year to 2011 when they changed to the 2.5 model?
 
They're not ascribing to the model year designation (current year +1) and instead the "year" is the production year. My 2.5 was built/sold in November, 2010 and on the title it's a 2010 model. W/ any other manufacturer it would be a 2011 model.
 
They're not ascribing to the model year designation (current year +1) and instead the "year" is the production year. My 2.5 was built/sold in November, 2010 and on the title it's a 2010 model. W/ any other manufacturer it would be a 2011 model.

There's a pretty common misconception that there is a hard and fast rule about when a new model year begins. There is no specified requirement for this. But keep in mind that in the U.S. regulations do require that a vehicle have a designated model year. But a certain model year car cannot be delivered more than one New Year's day ahead of it's calendar year. This is how you get 2012 Lexus LFA's delivered in March 2011, 2010 Camaros delivered in March 2009, and 1997 Ford F150's deilvered on Jan. 2, 1996. But as far as the opposite scenario, I'm not really sure how long a manufacturer can continue to use a model year. However I beileve there were 2008 Roadsters delivered well into 2009? (I saw a 2008 Koenigsegg turn up here in early 2010!)

In the U.S. the model year indicates the regulations that a car was built to comply with. I don't think the NHTSA would look very kindly at a manufacturer stretching a model year in the hopes of getting around newer regulations, but it has happened before. For another example some of the 1999 Shelby Series 1's weren't completed until 2001, drawing some ire from the NHTSA regarding their airbag exemption. I think Tesla has some type of "advanced airgbag" exemption also, so that could explain their funky model years too?

In any case, whether Tesla calls the Roadster a 1.5 or a 2.5 or whatever, the NHTSA doesn't really care, as long as the 10th digit of the VIN indicates the model year. In your example Strider, yes, another manufacturer may likely have designated your car a 2011, but if Tesla wants to call it a 2010, that's fine; it was built in 2010 after all.
 
In any case, whether Tesla calls the Roadster a 1.5 or a 2.5 or whatever, the NHTSA doesn't really care, as long as the 10th digit of the VIN indicates the model year. In your example Strider, yes, another manufacturer may likely have designated your car a 2011, but if Tesla wants to call it a 2010, that's fine; it was built in 2010 after all.
Thanks Matt. I was responding to tennis_trs's post about 2010 2.5's. The current auto world is used to going by model years so 2.0's could have been 2010's and 2.5's 2011's and so on. Doesn't really matter to me - just another Tesla oddity.