The Audi RS5, built between 2010 and 2015, was powered by a screaming, high-revving, V-8 engine and was widely acknowledged as being one of the best of its kind. However, what do you do when your car doesn’t have an engine or its engine is junk and you need to replace it with something else? How about you slot in a Tesla motor and battery pack to see how that transforms the car.

Tesla-Powered Audi RS5

That’s exactly what Sam, the owner of this Tesla-swapped RS5 did - he put the motor from a Model S under the hood of the RS5, in place of the old V-8, but he didn’t throw away its driveline, so the power is still sent to all four wheels through the car’s standard Quattro all-wheel drive.

The aim of this build was to keep the car looking as stock as possible, both inside and out, although outside you will notice it has no exhaust pipes sticking out of the back. Plus the obvious lack of engine rumble is also a dead giveaway. Inside, the standard dials have been swapped out for a full, detailed, digital dash and the standard gear selector has been replaced with some buttons, but that’s really pretty much it.

Oh, and the rear seat is no longer usable since that’s where the batteries now live - they managed to get all of a Model S battery pack inside the RS5, with most modules lying behind the front seats but a few are actually placed under the hood, in front of the motor.

The overall build is definitely clean and, even if it’s still not finished, you can see the goal is to have quite a high level of workmanship for all the modified bits and especially their integration with the car’s systems.

Further reading

Read our full review on the 2014 Audi RS5.

Read our full review on the 2012 Tesla Model S.