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Comment by DoingIsLearning | Hacker News Reader

As a concept the cybertruck looks really really cool. However, it's pretty scary if this is the final design.

> The body of the Cybertruck is a unibody shell

The profile is full of sharp edges at torso/head level for pedestrians. The shell concept sounds like it would have nothing in the way of planned deformations zones for outside pedestrians or crumple zones for inside passengers.

Again perhaps this is just marketing bad ass looks and they will sanitize the final release but pretty scary if not.

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Here in the US, we don’t care about pedestrian deaths from trucks.

Despite absurdly disproportionate deaths from trucks [1], our lawmakers and regulators are too busy jerking off with wads of cash from automotive lobbyists [2] to care about something lame like “dying bicyclists” or “crushed pedestrians.”

[1]: https://usa.streetsblog.org/2016/10/31/why-american-trucks-a...

[2]: https://www.caranddriver.com/features/a20879691/heres-how-mu...

In the US, you are de facto allowed to kill people with your vehicle, so long as you're sober.

If you shoot a kid you probably can't get away with "well I was duck hunting at the playground, it was an accident!", but run them down in your truck and you'll have a sympathetic judge telling you this shouldn't stop you from getting back behind the wheel, and how the kid shouldn't have been there.

This is a bad comparison. "Duck hunting at the playground" is more similar to driving your truck through a playground than it is to hitting a pedestrian who enters a roadway full of active traffic.

Why should it be the driver's fault if someone else puts them in a situation where a negative outcome is unavoidable?

Because playing in the street used to be normal - so normal it was taken as a given, and drivers stole that.

Because the vehicle driver raised the danger.

An adult man running carelessly through the playground is not a significant risk.

Run away / spooked carriage horses that trampled were treated in a similar way.

1/2 tons and 3/4 tons are not what's being addressed in [1]. These are delivery trucks to restaurants, bars, and retail. Dense urban cities like NYC and Boston should limit the number of roads trucks should be allowed to operate on anyway. Smaller, more energy efficient and more numerous delivery fleets should be deployed and the last mile should be done by hand trucks. Of course this is gonna add costs.

The first link is about large trucks and buses, not pickup trucks.

I'd be happy to compromise and keep the trucks if we put in protected (physically separated!) bike lanes everywhere.

Lobbyists don't bribe politicians, the effect more comes from politicians and staff picking up opinions from them because they're people they see a lot.

Anyway, you don't need to bribe an elite to support American car culture. Everyone is united in wanting to own an SUV or a lifted pickup and run over bicyclists.

lol the paper cuts!

I bet European regulators will never accept the current design. They'll probably have to design a safer version later, or skip the entire market.

Apparently Tesla would have to certify the Cybertruck "as a specialized armored vehicle" to meet German regulations.

https://www.autoblog.com/2019/12/16/tesla-cybertruck-europea...

Funnily enough, the concept that we've been shown also fails US regulations, although those are probably much easier to rectify for the final design.

US pick up truck sales are ~15x Europe. My guess is they skip it entirely.

I seriously doubt that the average American pick up truck driver is going to consider a Cybertruck.

Depends, for those who use them for work, which is a huge portion of the market, it can be very appealing. It will have higher torque than a diesel, so should be able to tow a lot more. I know many ranchers/farmers who are quite intrigued by the idea of them.

> those who use them for work, which is a huge portion of the market

I would disagree with this statement, which is why I don't think there's much intersection. More and more people are seeing pick up trucks as a form of self expression and a status symbol (which might seem like a baffling statement if you don't live in the American midwest or south).

There's a non-negligible segment that has a lot of identity tied up in their current way of life, to the point that they see electric vehicles as a threat to them.

In short, anyone that unironically owns a set of truck nuts is not going to by a Cybertruck.

I think that people who actually use trucks because a sedan doesn't have the capabilities will consider the cybertruck a viable option as it definitely has a ton of positives, although I would be very weary of sing them in remote locations as there's no way they're as maintainable as a regular truck and extra electricity is a lot harder to find or transport in an emergency than extra gas.

I have a feeling Musk's target market is the American police forces, they must have a hard-on for another road-tank. And if the cops want it, they'll just escalate up the chain of authorities to make it road-legal.

I'm an offroader and camper who has a preorder for the cybertruk. I am very curious how many of my types will get one but I'm pretty pumped with the approach angle, huge tires, and potential overlanding ability I'll have with the solar panels. Seems primo for a basecamp where it slowly charges over the week while you ATV, fish, etc. The only thing I'm worried about is the craftsmanship of the suspension. I really don't want an axle to snap in Moab.

Have you seen the reservation numbers?

I'm not doubting that there's a huge interest or market, just that the intersection of that market and the standard American truck driver is not large

Averages are not useful here. Is there a market or not?

I am not an average american at all, immigrant, not fat, not white, not rich, stable job. But, I would perhaps buy CyberTruck because, I love Elon, Tesla, SpaceX. I also do not want to buy any of the Tesla cars, because I would love to keep the gas car for daily commuter. Truck only for the sake of owning a tesla. Maybe its just a wish, & I would never be able to afford a own (& pay installments) two vehicles at same time, but I wish I would buy CyberTruck.

Tesla does take reservations in Europe. Will be interesting how that turns out :)

I thought that when Tesla removed all buttons except the hazard switch but the European regulators approved it.

Is the idea that the Cybertruck is particularly dangerous for pedestrians more than idle speculation?

I mean you're assuming there are no deformation or crumple zones for some reason, which seems ridiculous.

Is it enough to just look at the thing?

It's not enough to look at it, the issue is the shape + a unibody stainless steel outer shell.

Frame + Pane construction allows for crumple zones, I don't see how a unibody stainless steel will allow it.

Whatever you hit becomes the crumple zone, aka the other car.

(/s - it probably is going to be super unsafe and get bad safety scores).

The vehicle shell is sheets of structural steel. It’s not likely to deform usefully when it strikes a wayward meat sack. Combine that with the plethora of small-radius bends that can concentrate the damage quite effectively.

I’ve no doubt that Tesla can make it score well on crash tests though. Crumple zones don’t have to involve literal crumpling of a metal body—it could be achieved with other forms of deformation.

I don't know anything about car design, but always assaumed that crumple zones mostly protected passengers rather than pedestrians. Is that not the case?

The front end of your average modern car has a ton of flimsy plastic in the top of the front bodywork that's for pedestrian protection. It's basically a crumple zone but they don't call it that.

Also the hood / bonnet has softening. In a typical collision the pedestrian's head strikes it, so adding some padding under the surface makes it more survivable. I think you get more stars in crash tests.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bwp6HNa6PrI&t=73 shows this quite well visually. The bonnet is surprisingly flexible.

This describes some of the efforts to make frontal impacts less dangerous: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pedestrian_safety_through_vehi...

They bleed off energy, to the benefit of both.

I assume this is marketing; I have difficulty believing that it could be made road-legal in its current form, at least in Europe. Maybe it's a US-only model, but even in the US I would've thought it was a bit too... pointy.

SUVs and Trucks basically don't need to be safe for pedestrians or cyclists. It's really pretty fucked up & has def caused excess death.

Aren't most passenger cars a unibody design? Its probably just marketing to make that big a deal about a unibody truck.

most modern care yes,

Usually the frame of a car is also part of the body these days. (T-frames and H frames rarely exists these days.

I imagine if you asked Musk he'd say the cameras and automatic braking will stop it hitting people though dunno how well that will work in practice.

How much pedestrian safety design is in modern trucks?

Pedestrian safety completely dominates the front-end design of trucks. See the radical redesign of the Defender for example.

100% here in Australia the old Defenders have become a collectors items since the change to the new shape. I recall a lack of pedestrian safety stopped the original Defender entering the US market too

Any idea how Ineos' Grenadier gets away with a overtly OG Defender inspired design?

I don't think they really have. If you look at the profile it's been stretched out over the front, compromising the approach angle just like the new genuine Defender had to - I don't think there was any way around that.

This isn't on topic, but I think the Grenadier has gambled and lost badly, and they're going to look like fools long-term. The new Defender is massively more rugged and capable than they thought it would be.

They have these smug videos talking about how real Defender drivers want a non-electrically-managed simple vehicle, just in time for the Government to announce that internal combustion is going to be banned, so all vehicles will require electric control for a fuel cell or a battery and motor anyway. So what was the point?

They have smug videos talking about how they've got proper rugged coil suspension. Well I work with actual military rugged vehicles and guess what they have electric air suspension like the new Defender, because it's actually better for the job.

The Grenadier people are pitching in their adverts that the Defender has turned its back on rugged users like the game keepers of the highlands. Well guess what ask a game keeper and they've already bought the new Defender.

I think the universally positive reviews of the new Defender and its off-road capability, including from reviewers looking solely at its use for example on farms and estates, makes the Grenadier look very backward. Turns out the old ways aren't always the best.

(I have a new Defender at home, and still use a fleet of old Defenders at work. I wouldn't want a Grenadier.)

No responses here note the likely role of FSD actively avoiding pedestrians. If FSD can objectively & significantly decrease injuries, need for crumple zones is mitigated. “No impacts” is better than “softer impacts”.

1. Make perfect FSD

2. Do something that not suitable for drive by human, like racing style steering,

Combining both approaches to safety would make Tesla look smart.

Pedestrian concerns aside (this really can't be much worse than the other megalithic land yachts on the market), I like the idea of cars on the market that offer driver safety trade-offs in exchange for utility, aesthetics, or price. Insurance can price that into the premium. I'd gladly give up some physical security for certain benefits. Just put a 'do not resuscitate' flag on my card if the insurance won't clear or something.

The SUV market offers numerous driver safety trade-offs in exchange for safety to everyone else on the road. Getting your compact car mangled by a F350 tank is horrible.

Yes, I've been in that position. It ain't great.

I'd like to be able to trade on my own safety, not others (e.g. sacrificing crumplezones for a more compact cabin and greater carrying capacity).

How many F-350s do you see on a daily basis?

Move to the country and they are everywhere. Full size pickups are probably 30-40% of the vehicles on the road where I am, it’s pretty wild. Granted lots of farms around here and there are tax breaks for full sized trucks, so there are a ton around (lots on used market for this reason too).

F-150s are not F-350s.

I am taking full size not f-150. Everyone here drives a 2500 or 3500. Like I said, it’s different than the city.

I live in the country. F-150s are far more popular than F-250s. 350s/3500s are not common at all.

I’m in the Bay Area and see since F-150 every time we go on the 101. That being said I would guess some cheap Honda or Toyota is way more popular. Maybe they just have more different models.

Looking at the data is looks like gm sells most, with Toyota, Ford, and FCA battling for second.

If you are hit by a 6,000 lbs truck I doubt the shape of its edges makes much of a difference in determining your fate. Better driver assist features in the Tesla (compared to other trucks) have the potential to make things safer for pedestrians overall.

Well it matters in the EU at least as most (all?) countries tax cars based on things like EuroNCAP ratings etc. Sharp edges = higher registration tax basically.

> Well it matters in the EU at least as most (all?) countries tax cars based on things like EuroNCAP ratings etc.

Wow I didn’t know that. How does it work? Isn’t a EuroNCAP rating entirely voluntary?

I obviously don't know the exact rules in all countries but here in Denmark there're different deductions from the standard registration tax based on things like if the car has minimum 5 stars in EuroNCAP, the price of airbags are completely excluded from the tax, etc. so yes it is voluntary but without it the cars gets taxed higher than the competition that did get a test (or a better test). Since EuroNCAP ratings are based on the car with the least amount of security in a line of cars even a very secure car will be more expensive if the manufacturer also sells a poorly rated version in the EU as it is the one the tax deduction is based on.

From what I have heard the sharp edges/straight lines are what keeps costs down. It's kind of miracle they are talking a 45k price point, and this is one of the reasons they can accomplish that.

In my last few moments, my head struck by the Cybertruck's sharp edge and its contents spilling open onto the crosswalk, I will contemplate this great miracle which saved rich people a few thousand dollars.

Not to mention, the stainless steel exterior will be easy to clean, since your pesky shattered skull bone won’t find any paint to scratch! You can rest easy knowing that your viscera won’t be an inconvenience.

Check out the average price of a new truck, and then their annual US sales volume (Ford’s F150 specifically). Average America is who soaks up pickup trucks, not “the rich.”

Tesla needs to compete with legacy automaker trucks if they’re to drive down the petroleum used by those fossil fuel vehicles (hence the need to keep per unit costs down). The fault for failure to prioritize pedestrian and bicyclist safety falls on federal policy makers, who could enforce these safety requirements by statute but don’t. Tangentially, it should also be wildly illegal to lift your pickup for on road use.

“Don’t hate the player, hate the game.”

The F150 appears to start at 28k. Average price of a new truck in the US is 50k, but that's probably pushed up a lot by commercial purchasing. And realistically, if you think anything from Tesla is going to start at the price they claim it will start at in early marketing... well, that's optimistic.

This will be a car that at least _should_ be bought only by very well off people. I'm sure some people will take on silly debt and spend most of their annual take-home salary on a car, but that won't be the norm. Well, hopefully.

I'm just trying to help folks understand how it works outside the HN bubble. People buy trucks because it's what they feel they need (even if it isn't; that truck likely is going to be a garage queen and never leave pavement), for some it satisfies a part of their self image and ego, and a lot of folks buying them aren't fiscally responsible and buy them anyway (repo lots are a savvy way to find lightly used diesel pickups in good condition someone overspent on before a sophisticated broker/dealer acquires them and marks them up to the public).

https://hedgescompany.com/blog/2018/10/pickup-truck-owner-de...

> The Ford F-150 is the single most popular truck in America today and the most-popular vehicle in 44 states. It outsold the Ram pickup in 2019 by 78%.

> The average age of the new F-150 buyer is 55. It may not be too surprising that about 16% of new Ford F-150 owners are female/84% male. About three-quarters of all new Ford F-150s are purchased by white males, although Hispanic buyers account for 22% of total incremental growth of new F-150 sales from 2010 to 2017.

> Despite any TV ads you see with F-150s in a rural or country setting, the vast majority of these new trucks are in large and medium-sized cities.

> The average household income of a new Ford F-150 owner is about $82,000 per year. By comparison the median household income in the United States is $61,937.

> If that average household income sounds high, remember this! The F-150 has a base MSRP under $30,000. But, we priced a 2020 Ford F-150 Platinum Edition with all the bells & whistles and accessories for over $74,000!

All emphasis mine. This is the market environment Tesla is operating in and attempting to displace combustion pickup sales in.

Sales volume is ~1 million a year.

There's something like 50 million people that are very well off in the US.

Narrative this, narrative that.

So, contradicting my previous claims, it looks like, while the starting price is about 28k, the ASP is 47k(!), so if the average buyer earns 80k household income, yeah, they're _really_ overspending.

People with purchasing power want trucks. Sell them Cybertrucks.

So most non-fleet truck buyers are older males. They have the money and they want a truck. There is nothing wrong with that. A lot of internet commentary about the scourge of trucks is focused on them being "mall crawlers" and that few people that own trucks use them for their purpose, as if there was only one true purpose for trucks. This is, frankly, a meme that exists mostly in online auto discussion bubbles.

In terms of folks making 80k a year buying 50k trucks (the Platinum is an outlier), resale is high and interest rates are low. The larger issue on the latter point is how sustainable this is for Ford Motor Credit Company. That's a complex topic.

The biggest knock I can think of on trucks is their interior materials are not commensurate for their price. That said the F-150 Super Crew is about as comfortable an SUV as you can buy. They are very reliable. They weigh slightly more than a Toyota 4-Runner and have reasonable gas mileage. All cars are much larger than they were 15 years ago. The Super Crew is extremely safe. Trucks are much taller than previous generations, which makes them seem outlandish.

I'm not trying to refute you, just adding color as to why things are the way they are.

The automakers don’t manufacture many low end trucks for what it’s worth. Yes you can buy a fleet ready vehicle if you have a fleet, but no dealer is stocking anything in the last year except the luxury trim. Parts shortages and unprecedented demand (people buying camping trailer sand trucks due to Covid) have broken the market.

Source: myself having gone through process of buying a truck a few months ago. Looked at mid size trucks (I own acreage, making hobby farm), but only could find the 60k optioned vehicles. Ended up full-size luxury trim due to tax break possibilities plus only available stock. Pretty wild right now. Used market also hosed, almost price of new.

It’s obviously not about cost savings. Just look at the fucking thing. If they wanted costs down they would probably use lots of plastic on a smaller metal frame that didn’t require a brushed-steel finish.

It’s clearly designed the way it is for aesthetic reasons.

I doubt you'll be able to pay 45k for one of these for a while.

Based on their prior pricing history, if they're talking a 45k price point, they will _not_ be able to accomplish that.

I don't know, safety for the pedestrian is less of my concern when buying car.

Fine, but the registration tax is higher in most of the western world on cars with worse ratings so at least you got to pay more for the worse car.

Taxing by safety ratings looks good. Does it work to make car safer?

Considering the very top safest vehicles are all Teslas, I don't think they skipped safety on this one.

GP is talking about safety for pedestrians, not safety for passengers. Is Tesla the safest vehicle for pedestrians who are accidentally struck?

I'd imagine that would be something like the V40 with its pedestrian airbags that pop up under the hood.

There's not a single Tesla in the safest cars tested by EuroNCAP. There were, in 2019, but even the small Toyota Yaris scores higher today. Remember a score of X in 2019 is way less than a score of X in 2021. The tests are harder to pass now.

That's just bullshit. You can see all the tested vehicles from Euro NCAP website. They haven't tested Teslas in 2020 and 2021 because there hasn't been new models. Model Y hasn't been tested yet.

In fact, on the Euro NCAP website their latest 'safest cars' list is from 2019, and you see that Model 3 and Model X are the safest cars in their category. You really think that the safest cars in 2019 can't pass the tests in 2021?

https://www.euroncap.com/en/ratings-rewards/best-in-class-ca...

You don't seem to understand how the ratings work as it's not about not passing but that the 2019 Tesla's won't get five stars if they were tested today while other newer cars do get five stars. So no, the Tesla's are not safer than cars with five stars in 2020. They don't even have the required safety equipment to get the 5 stars. The safest car list is from 2019. All five star rating under the new tests are safer than the cars on that list. I'm sure newer Teslas will do fine but 2019 cars in 2020? No, they won't be in the top now.

Edit: This thread is about the cybertruck and its edges that won't get a good score in the Vulnerable Road Users test. The old Tesla's don't even score as high as new small cars do.

This is a bit confusing, it doesn't seem like there are any tests of Teslas at all after 2019. (https://www.euroncap.com/en/ratings-rewards/safest-family-ca...) and the Teslas are the best in 3 of 8 classes in the 2019 "Best in Class" cars list on their website, which is the most recent year available.

It does seem there were changes to the tests in 2020, but not 2021, and they say "2020 assessments differ significantly from previous years and star ratings should not be directly compared with those from earlier years."

So IDK, your comment seems misleading?

The test was changed in 2020 yes (it was made harder). The you link is the last list but lots of cars have been tested since then. I'm aware than no Tesla have been tested in 2020 but you can still compare numbers if you have an idea what to look for (just don't only do X = X). For example the Tesla doesn't have as many air bags as those scoring high in 2020-2021 (even the mentioned small Toyota Yaris have Centre Airbags between the seats to get five stars) and even if you do compare scores directly (even though the new scores are harder to get) the Tesla with the highest score in the Vulnerable Road Users test (which is what the cybertruck would fail) scores 74 while the Toyota scores 78. The Polestar 2 gets 80. Saying Tesla is the safest cars today is not true. Most 2020-2021 cars are safer, even small ones and that's not even counting the mess that is Tesla's "autopilot".

Meh, seems like a stretch. I’ll wait for the real numbers.

Gotta love the casual dismissal of his explanations, but you're a Musk fanboy, so it's understandable.

What he said makes sense. The tests get harder in order to ensure cars become safer. My car got the best safety rating when it came out, but that was 11 years ago. If Tesla hasn't changed its design for the 2020/21 models to improve safety, then my guess is it doesn't make sense for them to waste their resources testing it.

It's one year of change to the test, and I don't know enough about it other than the people doing the rating ask you not to compare them across years. So I'll wait to compare apples-to-apples. I'm sure there is some difference and the test becomes harder.

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