There is a Tesla Roadster in the Tesla Motor booth at the Detroit Auto Show this year, but you've all seen that car a gazillion times by now. And, since it'll be awful hard to beat those gorgeous pics of the orange model, we decided to skip the shiny red model on display here. Instead, our green eyes were drawn to the powertrain chassis sitting on the display stand, the one thing we didn't mention in the flurry of Tesla posts yesterday. While we've discussed the Roadster's powertrain system in the past, we haven't seen this building block before. Ergo a gallery.

The only difference between the powertrain on the stand and the one that's in the cars - aside from the labels so you know what's what - is that the battery box in the powertrain example is empty. Tesla decided it didn't make much sense to ship a few hundred pounds of cells to Detroit for no real good reason. This year's Detroit Auto Show was the first that Tesla Motors has officially entered. They've displayed vehicles in partnership with other companies in the past, but this is the only time they've come to a show on their own. It was a last-minute decision - they only made the call three weeks ago - and was in part determined by the low, low booth prices at this year's NAIAS.