Tesla Model S Owner Builds Bitcoin Mining Rig In Trunk Of Car

Bitcoin is a big deal right now as the value of the cryptocurrency has reached about $10,000. The rub for miners is that the process of mining the Bitcoin or other cryptocurrencies consumes lots of electricity. One miner has found an odd way to get free power for his mining rig. He built it in the trunk of his Tesla Model S EV.

Some have suggested that the Autopilot computer inside the Model S could be used to mine Bitcoin when not minding the commute. While access to that Autopilot computer might never happen, one owner found a way to get free power for his mining operations from Tesla.

The mining rig in the image here lacks GPUs and is probably not being used to mine Bitcoin, but it could be mining other cryptocurrencies. While there are no real benefits to processing speed or performance to having the mining rig in the back of the Tesla, free power is a big deal for some miners.

The owner of the car claims that he is using power from his Tesla to power the mining rig. Exactly how he is doing that isn't spelled out. It's possible the entire thing is bogus. The power would be free if the owner has a vehicle covered under the free Supercharging feature.

As his mining rig slurps the power from the battery, he could just hit the Supercharger for a free re-up. All that computer hardware is likely putting lots of heat inside the car. This seems like a lot of effort to save a few bucks on electricity. It's not clear how much power the mining rig might be consuming and how long the Tesla battery is able to run that mining rig per charge.

SOURCE: ELECTREK