Tesla is GO in Australia, Showroom Open, Cars delivered and Supercharger Network announced

After months, or perhaps years of speculation, what for many was the dream of Tesla Motors opening in Australia is finally a reality.  Their Sydney showroom location has been confirmed, their first cars delivered and the supercharger network announced.  EFTM has all the details.

Confirming the details we broke some months ago, Artarmon will be the main showroom and service location for Telsa in Sydney.  This will also be one of two supercharger locations in Sydney.

The showroom is big, in fact when compared to many US showrooms it’s enormous.  The front showroom area itself is as big as the Flagship San Jose store, however with the addition of delivery bays, offices, and service facilities, there’s also the need for a customer lounge so it all starts to add up, and look a like like any other car-dealer you might have visited – just a lot more fancy and with a lot less cars taking up space.

Just two cars are in the showroom, plus a “skateboard” chassis of a Tesla – this is an important feature of any Tesla showroom because the question of “where is the engine” is hard to explain this makes it a whole lot easier.

EFTM took a look inside the showroom today, ahead of it’s opening to the public tomorrow (December 10) – so if you want to see what all the fuss is about, check it out – on the corner of Herbert and Frederick St’s in Artarmon.

This evening at a gala event at The Star in Sydney, Tesla also delivered cars to their first customers in Australia.  Nine cars were delivered to some very happy customers.

Which begs the question, where are you going to charge it?

When you buy your Tesla, you are supplied with a home wall-charging unit.  The cost of installation is for the home-owner to cover, and while 40amp charging is “possible” – in reality most Aussie homes can’t handle that capacity, so slower charging will be the result.  That’s ok for daily drives and daily charges, but put some K’s on the clock and you’ve got some battery anxiety ahead of you.

If you’re like me and work near the Tesla showroom, no fear – they’ve added Superchargers to the forecourt.

These Superchargers will give you 50% charge in 20 mins, or a full charge in about an hour.  A second set of Superchargers will be permanently located at The Star in Sydney also.

Telsa’s plans are for a national supercharger network – but in reality if you’re outside of the eastern states, it’s a long, long wait.

Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane will be covered by the end of 2016 – Tesla’s own Supercharger maps can finally be revealed:

In 2014:

By the end of 2015:

By the end of 2016:

Tesla are not releasing the actual locations of the Supercharger stations – however EFTM has taken a hard look at the Maps supplied, and having spent a lot of our lives on the roads between these cities, we’ve taken a stab at the locations.

We reckon given the desire to space them around 200km apart for range, and based on the maps, these are the most likely locations of the Superchargers when it’s all rolled out by 2016:

• Gympie
• Brisbane
• Gold Coast
• Grafton
• Kempsey
• Wallsend
• Newcastle
• Sydney (Artarmon)
  Sydney (Star)
• Batemans Bay
• Goulburn
• Canberra
• Holbrook
• Albury/Wodonga
• Seymour
• Melbourne

Now remember, Tesla doesn’t need to build on-ramps and off-ramps to the freeways, they just need the space of around 5-8 parking bays at a fast food restaurant to make it work.  Of course in other places it helps them to build a spectacular looking “station” – only time will tell what each will be.

Stay tuned for our full review of the Tesla Model S later this week.