Elon Musk wants Tesla’s new sports car to be proud of 007.
The billionaire electric car magnate said he was working to trick the future Tesla Roadster with rocket technology so he could place it above the ground.
“I’m trying to figure out how to make this float unknowingly, kill people,” Musk said in an episode of Joe Rogan’s podcast released Thursday.
“I thought maybe we can make it float, but not too high, so it can float like a meter above the ground or something,” he added. “If you escape, throw the suspension, but you won’t die.”
Tesla has been working for several years on an updated version of the Roadster – the company’s first mass-produced electric car.
The Silicon Valley company expects to complete the design of the model this year and hopes to begin delivering it in 2022, according to Musk.
The roadster could move through the air as it floated above the ground if Musk’s planned experiments were successful, he said. He claimed that Tesla would provide a “SpaceX package of options”, apparently named for the rocket company Musk, which would equip the car with a highly pressurized fuel tank and “a bunch of engines”.
If the plan doesn’t work, the Roadster could still have rear-wheel drive to make it “move like a bat in hell” on the road, Musk said.
“At least I’m confident we could make a throttle in which the license plate goes down, you know, James Bond style, and then the rocket propeller behind it, and that gives you three tons of thrust,” he said.
Tesla unveiled the new Roadster in 2017. The following year, SpaceX launched Musk’s personal Roadster into space. The car crossed Mars for the first time last fall.
Tesla shares fell 0.6 percent in premarket trading to $ 807.09 as of 7 a.m. Friday.