We had to put together an exhaust system, wire up a
Haltech tuner to communicate with the motor, reupholster the
interior for the transmission hump, and add structural brac-
ing above the LS3. All the while we were waiting for at least 24
more parts to arrive, most being fitments for the fuel lines—
nonnegotiable for firing up the motor. Great. We could alter
or fabricate our way out of most problems, but not this one.
Normally we’re a chipper group of people, but two weeks
out, our garage felt like a funeral home. We were eating meals
in there, napping on-site in a Mercedes Sprinter van conver-
sion, and showers? Meh, no one was coming near us anyway.
The lack of sleep started to make us feel numb inside, but we
could see the finish line again. Then we got a call that the fit-
ments were delayed. There was no way our Tesla could drive
onto the trailer under its own power for the trip to Vegas.
There was one last option. We didn’t like it, but it gave us a
shot. We could buy three days by driving the Tesla ourselves
from the Electrified Garage in New Hampshire to SEMA.
Truckers are required by law to stop every eight hours, but as
a group of madmen we could drive around the clock and then
finish it with Geddy Getz, a local LS specialist.
After 2,733 mind-bending miles (seriously, check out
how weird it gets on our YouTube), we pulled into Geddy’s
driveway on Monday morning at 8 a.m. We had until 5 p.m.
to deliver the car 20 minutes down the road to the SEMA
f loor. Taking our box of fitments, Geddy tuned the motor
so that it didn’t run too lean and sound like
a clangorous mess of sputters and back-
fires, or too rich that it bogged itself down
and smelled like a BP tanker spill. Either
option would be as embarrassing as push-
ing the car to its booth. We had precious few
hours to find the balance, and then...the cyl-
inders started to align like the planets to an
astrologer. The sound was snappy, throaty,
and downright mean.
We drove into SEMA with two hours to
spare. It was time to scare and confuse peo-
ple with something they’d never seen or
heard before. Our work isn’t conventional,
but you have to respect it—we received praise
and admiration from a lot of our industry
heroes that week.
It’s funny, we’ve been looking at the Tesla
T on hoods of ever-so-quiet cars for the bet-
ter part of a decade. But when our eyes drift
to the side exhaust on our Model S, they
begin to moisten from the inky smoke of
376 cubic inches ready to lay down now-444
ponies. We’re brought back to the thing that
made us love automobiles in the first place:
the thunderous sound of power.▼
Taking our showstopper for a drive near Plum Island,
Massachusetts.◀
Stopping for a quick break and photo op at Zion
National Park en route to SEMA in Las Vegas.March/April 2022 69