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An electric cable is plugged into a Tesla Roadster Sport

Quirky and Awkward Features of My Original Tesla Roadster

The original Tesla Roadster is the first of the electric car titans production vehicles, and even though it may not have the same Easter eggs and fun features of the newer models like the Tesla Model X and Model Y, but the original Roadster isn't without its own awkward and quirky features of its own

The original Tesla Roadster was far from the most popular electric car for sale when it first hit the market, with only a few thousand ever produced at a time where Tesla was not yet known as the electric car titan that it had become today. The Roadster was the first car official produced by the company, marking the start of what would become a fun and creative market for electric car owners looking to get the most futuristic experience from their vehicle. While the original Tesla Roadster doesn’t have the same Easter eggs and hidden features that the newer models, such as the Model X and Model Y, it does have some odd and awkward quirks of its own.

If you get locked out of the car, there is a key slot

As an electric car with a focus toward the future, the original Tesla Roadster featured electronic door handles and locks. In most cases, this isn’t really much different than having a door handle, except for the case when your vehicle battery is dead. If you get locked out of the car because the battery is dead, you aren’t completely out of luck — because there is a hidden slot for the driver’s door. The location is a bit awkward to get to, however, as it is underneath the door itself, meaning you pretty much have to get down onto the ground to find it unless you already know where it is at.

The entire trunk lid opens

Tesla Roadster 2.5 with rear hatch open
Tesla Roadster 2.5 | Andy Cross, The Denver Post, Getty Images

The body lines of the original Tesla Roadster are a bit odd, and that is slightly because of what the car is based on: a Lotus Elise. To accommodate for the size of the battery needed to power this car purely on an electric motor, it needed to be extended, and though it shares similar body lines with the Elise, the trunk is one major way that they are different. On the trunk of a Lotus Elise, the small hatch area on the top of the back end opens up to reveal an incredibly underwhelming cargo area and engine bay that isn’t exactly convenient to access. On the original Tesla Roadster, however, the entire rear hatch opens up, and not in a way you’d expect from just looking at the body lines themselves.

The original Tesla Roadster has open taillights with another key slot

While the original Tesla Roadster may have been based on the Lotus Elise, it shares very few of its external parts. Some of the most noticeably different features are the headlights and taillights, which are significantly different than what you see on the Elise. But, the Roadster taillights aren’t just different from the Elise, they are different from most cars in general because they don’t have a plastic lens covering the light housing. Not only is that odd, it makes the car look somewhat complete, but if you’re questioning whether this was intentional or not, a look at the driver’s side taillight reveal another awkwardly placed key slot that allows you to access the trunk — it just so happens that this key slot is a part of the taillight housing itself.

Even with these little quirks, that original Tesla Roadster is still one of the coolest modern pieces of electric car history, and with the release of the latest Tesla Roadster reported to break records and set new standards for performance, it is sure to come back into the spotlight.

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