[Crinkly wrapper plastic sounds]
Tesla, the electric car company, has a fairly unique lineup of branding accessories.
Yeah, they have the normal hats, shirts, and mugs, but also this desktop supercharger for
cell phones.
Costing $45, I had to buy it so we could take a closer look.
Let's get started.
[Intro]
A supercharger is a place where electric cars can go to charge up really fast.
Tesla says this is an exact miniature replica of the life sized versions.
They use the same 3D CAD data file from the life sized superchargers to make the desktop
cellphone version, precisely replicating every detail, curve and surface.
Unfortunately there are no instructions or diagrams in the box, so we're just going to
have to wing this one.
Initially I thought that this $45 accessory had some tech inside of it, but judging by
the lightweight and lack of documentation, I'm starting to think I was mistaken.
The white and red surface are both made from plastic.
The red lettering is not inlay-ed over the surface like the Tesla key card.
The plastic is actually built deep into the charger, like we saw on the Nintendo Switch
buttons.
Each of the red lettering is it's own solid chunk of plastic – pretty quality stuff.
The silver side rails are made from metal.
[Scratching metal sounds.]
It's the same on both sides.
Down at the bottom of the supercharger we have a strip of double sided tape, probably
for mounting on a desk since this is a desktop charger.
But there's still no sign of technology.
The bottom gray plastic pops off after a brief struggle.
And then the top white slab of plastic is also able to come loose, revealing a whole
lot of nothing inside.
It turns out this whole thing is essentially just a model of a supercharger, and interestingly
enough, even at that $45 price point, it still makes you supply your own charging cable.
I have an extra braided cable lying around, so I'll wrap this inside the contraption.
It has a little indention up at the top where the tip of the cable can rest inside and keep
it from falling out.
In hindsight, a thinner non-braided cable would be easier to work with and probably
fit better inside the housing.
You can see how thick the red letters are that poke through the top outer white shell.
And the same thing goes for the other side with the red plastic resting inside for the
back lettering.
It's cool that Tesla went the extra mile for this plastic molding, and didn't just slap
some red vinyl stickers on top.
Thumbs up for the quality.
But that's also probably why this thing costs so much.
I'll wrap the cable around this plastic knob like we saw on the Nintendo Classic controllers,
and then run it through the metal side rails down to the bottom of the supercharger.
The metal rails have slits cut into the bottom that orient and hold it tight when the plastic
halves are in place.
The top of the white plastic slides in and clips down.
And the gray bottom piece of plastic has to slide over the whole charging cable and clips
on to the end, holding things tight...kind of like the cap on a stick of Old Spice.
They look almost the same.
It works though, as long as the other end of the charging cable is plugged into the
wall, it'll charge my phone.
It's a rather interesting decoration.
It's supercharging powers are homeopathic, maybe that's why it didn't come with any documentation.
But hey, it looks sweet and I'm down to support a company that I think is pretty cool, even
if it's only supercharging my quick charge with the placebo effect.
If you want one of these overpriced plastic models of your own, I'll leave a link for
them in the video description.
And also, Tesla just brought back their referral program, so if you end up buying an actual
Tesla with my link in the description, we both get 1,000 miles of free supercharging,
so thanks for that.
I'm probably going to take my charging cord out and just put this thing on a shelf for
decoration somewhere.
Come hang out with me on Twitter and Instagram.
And thanks a ton for watching.
I'll see you around.