This is the story of the Tesla Roadster — and thus, the beginnings of Tesla, which has grown to be the most valuable automaker in history. Tesla's promised new roadster is a very different thing — this Roadster went into production at a time when electric vehicles weren't just in their infancy, they were a joke, disregarded by enthusiasts and regular customers alike. The story begins with the Piontek Sportech, which was a home-built tube-frame sports car created by Ford Engineer Dave Piontek in his garage in Michigan. It used a 1300-cc Suzuki 4-cylinder motorcycle engine (with Nitrous injection) and could hit 60 mph in just 4.5 seconds, weighing only 1234 lb. A California-based startup called AC Propulsion bought one of the Sport-Techs and converted it to run on Optima Yellow-Top lead-acid batteries. They called it the tZero, and a prospective custome