Building the curved body and simulation…
This is a fully 3D, procedural Roadster-inspired vehicle in a scrubbable illustrative physics simulation. It is not Tesla CAD, flight telemetry, or a verified reconstruction of the demonstration.
The car approaches the ramp, then leaves at an assumed 14.5 m/s and 20°. Its center of mass follows a ballistic arc until the jet pulse. The wheels cannot provide road traction while airborne.
The car starts with a nose-down pitch rate of 50°/s. A bounded proportional–derivative controller begins correcting attitude 0.55 s after takeoff. An assumed upward pulse of 1.6 times weight fires from 1.00 to 1.60 s after takeoff. The car becomes nearly level while it is still descending. These are model choices, not known Tesla specifications.
A downward exhaust produces an upward reaction. The separate opposed attitude jets generate a force couple: front-up/rear-down for positive torque, and the reverse for negative torque. Their equal opposing forces cancel in translation. Teal arrows represent force on the vehicle, not exhaust direction. The animated particles represent exhaust. The four main nozzles are illustratively gimballed to keep their net thrust vertical while the body pitches. The arrow lengths are normalized for readability, and the rendered nozzle locations are illustrative.
Tesla describes the multi-mode fans and ground-sealing system as producing suction downforce, pulling air from beneath the car. This scene shows four illustrative underfloor fans, a sealed plenum, and intake flow. This simplified model assumes 6 kN of suction downforce during road contact and zero in the airborne segment; it does not solve a ground-clearance pressure field. It is not used as upward lift.
Drag to orbit, scroll to zoom, right-drag to pan. The underside preset is easiest to use while airborne. Cutaway reveals a conceptual pressure vessel, valve manifold, plumbing, battery pack, and fan rotors. Toggle forces to inspect gravity, thrust, road reaction, ground-suction downforce, and pitch torque. Hardware toggles affect visualization, not the integrated trajectory.
Walk-through: drag to look, W/A/S/D to move, Q/E to descend/ascend, Shift for speed. Space plays or pauses. Left/right arrows scrub by 0.05 s. Press H or Clean view to hide panels; use the same button to restore them.
Mass 1,850 kg; gravity 9.81 m/s²; pitch inertia 4,200 kg·m²; torque bound 28 kN·m. The physics is planar, though the car and camera are genuinely 3D. Air drag, gas depletion, changing nozzle output, wind, roll/yaw dynamics, and suspension deformation are omitted. Landing is clamped to a road-contact state; it is not a tire-impact solver. No claim of sustained hover is implied.
Sources: Tesla Roadster · NASA thrust equation
Offline: this HTML embeds Three.js and all model assets. A modern WebGL2-capable browser is required. No network is needed except when opening source links.
This interactive 3D physics simulation requires JavaScript and WebGL2. Enable JavaScript in a modern browser to explore the car, thrusters, fan system, camera controls, and force diagram.
The model is illustrative, not official Tesla CAD or flight telemetry.