Why you can't buy the Tesla Model S P85+ anymore

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Gianluca Colla

Alas, brown and green Model S cars, we hardly knew ye.

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Eric Van Susteren

Digital Producer- Silicon Valley Business Journal

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Tesla Motors will discontinue the Model S P85+, the version of the luxury electric sedan that formerly topped the company's ranges for price and battery mileage.

The company will instead offer only the P85D, the dual-engine all-wheel-drive car that was named the fastest-accelerating sedan in the world. Furthermore, Tesla's lower-priced model with a 60-kilowatt battery won't be available in the dual-engine format. That leaves the single-engine versions of the Model 60 and 85 and the dual-engine versions: the Model S 85D and the P85D.

CEO Elon Musk did say during the third-quarter earnings call that some of the models would be discontinued to increase efficiency at the company's Fremont factory. A scheduled production pause to retool the factory took longer than anticipated and affected the production rate, causing Tesla to amend its annual production target to 33,000 from 35,000.

Whether or not the changes were made to make up for that shortfall, Tesla is probably betting that anyone willing to shell out $100,000 for a sedan would probably be willing to spend the extra $4,000 to get an all-wheel-drive vehicle that can reach 0-60 miles per hour in 3.1 seconds. There were some grumblings from customers who had pre-ordered the Model S 60D, only to find out it wasn't going to be produced, though.

Oh, and if you absolutely loved the Model S painted in green and brown, we've got bad news — those colors were discontinued along with the P85+.

Eric Van Susteren is the Digital Producer at the Silicon Valley Business Journal.