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Comment by jimnotgym | Hacker News Reader

The cyber truck is such a miss.

If they had built a normal truck, but electric, they could have tapped a huge market. Instead they went super niche with the sci fi truck. I hope for Tesla's sake that Tesla have enough fanboys.

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The number of cybertruck reservations say otherwise. It’s riskier, yes, but might payoff. I wouldn’t buy a normal truck, but a cybertruck is my dream vehicle. I’d rather own that than anything else, even if money was no object. And I’m far from a Tesla fanboy.

But... here's the thing... they have to build and deliver the cybertruck before they can recognize the revenue. That's the problem with building tangible assets. If he had only sold an NFT of a cybertruck with a vague promise you might get to exchange the NFT in the future for a physical truck, he would be rolling in the cash.

Not to mention... I think cybertruck owners only put down $100 as a deposit. They didn't pay the complete price for it. So Tesla has to actually make trucks before people will pay the majority of the sales price.

I'm with you that I believe it would sell well if they released it, but I do not accept the number of reservations as being firm proof of that. I don't think it's controversial to say there is a lot of hype around Tesla product announcements, especially that one. Hype can drive reservations without necessarily driving sales. It's something we'd just have to wait and see about.

>> I wouldn’t buy a normal truck, but a cybertruck is my dream vehicle.

Honest question.

What is it that makes it your dream vehicle?

Large, extremely safe, no paint to maintain, no body that gets easily dented, impact resistant glass, electric, high performance, long range, great torque and acceleration, can haul stuff, can fit a family, can be used in a pinch for power, and looks awesome.

And maybe the self driving stuff will turn out to be useful too. Too soon to say.

Electric vehicles are coming much more slowly where I am and they cost 1.5-2x what they do in the US. So I bought a ICE car this year. But I hope one day a cybertruck will be a practical option for me.

Let me start off by saying that it's silly to discuss the design of a vehicle that does not exist. All anyone has seen so far is a scale model. I'm not sure it's even developed enough to call a concept. We might as well discuss whether it's better to ride a unicorn or a griffon.

>Large, extremely safe

So engineered to kill everyone except the driver. Big, heavy cars are safe only because they flatten the other party in a crash. The Cybertruck will be even worse than your average murdermobile because, as an EV, it will be unusually heavy.

And it gets worse:

>no body that gets easily dented

Cars don't have squishy bodywork by accident. Flexible, easily-dented bodywork is a safety feature. The front end of a car is designed to crumple to minimize acceleration.

Well, everyone knows about crumple zones. Clearly cars need to crumple at highway speeds, but the driver is in no danger in a parking lot. However, it is crucial that this happen even for minor collisions. Any collision with a pedestrian is a minor collision from the perspective of the car but catastrophic from the perspective of the pedestrian. The hood, bumpers, and panels must flex and dent even in a fender bender if they are to protect a pedestrian at 20 miles an hour.

It's extremely unsafe. The design is illegal in at least the European Union, UK and Australia.

Unsafe to others, yes.

Maybe it makes me a bit of an asshole, but I’m ok with that tradeoff. I’ve never had a collision in my life, but my cars have been hit by others.

I’m principally concerned with safety for myself and my family. Concern for others on the road comes a lot further down the list. Sorry. I drive with great care and responsibility, but many others do not. I’m worried about protecting me from them, not the other way around.

I do not understand people like you. Everyone does the wrong thing sometimes, but I do not see how you can calmly and knowingly choose to do evil and not even be ashamed of it. How can you be so casual about hurting other people for your own selfish ends? It is completely alien to me.

Let he with no sin throw the first stone.

You forgot the end of that story:

"Go forth and sin no more."

All I ask is that you try to do the right thing. That's it. I can understand, accept, and forgive failure as long as you try.

You do realize that the Cybertruck literally has no airbags right?

I do not realize that, and I question your sources.

Technically not public info yet, whoops!

The reason that body panels are dentable is that denting helps absorb impact energy, and replacing a body panel or two is cheaper than totaling the entire car due to a dented frame creating a risk of structural failure. IOW, it's a feature, not a bug.

It's also safer for the other party in an accident, since the vehicle(s) will absorb crash energy that would otherwise be transferred to the occupants/pedestrian/cyclist. Given Tesla's abysmal self-driving record (literally, more self-driving accidents, injuries, and/or fatalities than the entire rest of the global automotive industry combined), that's a fundamental consideration.

Similarly, most cars have impact-resistant glass, but not shatterproof glass, for safety reasons. There are plenty of times when you want the glass to break.

I understand you are excited about this truck. I just want to highlight that aside from the paint thing most of this applies to a Rivian or a Ford F-150 lightning. I am not really sure the "no body that gets easily dented" is true - time will tell how durable the body is.

But I am not arguing with you about your preferences. I am saying that for the broad base of consumers, most of these needs (except no paint) can be met by existing vehicles. The Rivian for example is getting great reviews, and I think it has great looks. And the F-150 is already the highest selling vehicle in the USA, so an electric version will be a good choice for many of those consumers. Tesla coming out with such a unique vehicle means they're really going to have to prove its worth.

Yes, I’d be surprised if it outsells the electric F150. That being said, I would obviously rather have the cybertruck. Time will tell if it was a good business decision or not for Tesla. I think they’ll do alright though, and nothing stops them from bringing out a more traditional truck later as well.

Nothing stops them from coming out with a more traditional truck later except that it clearly takes them many years to ship a new model, and all the while customers who want a truck now or don't want a cybertruck are going to competitors.

Of course at this point they are committed to release. But I agree with others that releasing a more traditional truck would have been more savvy.

Why do you think they're committed to a release?

I don't know much about their status but other people in this thread suggest their factory is tooled up and they are close to release, so it might be a bad time to cancel everything and go back to the drawing board. Then they would have no truck for another 5 years.

But Mr. Musk is playing 11th dimensional chess that the rest of us are incapable of understanding. But more seriously, there are reasons they didn't start on it until now, maybe those reasons will persist and they'll get past the sunk cost fallacy and just decide to cancel it.

Even then, what's the chance that Tesla will remember who gave them a $99 deposit. SpaceX completely forgot about how I gave them $599 for a downlink terminal. I had to email them scans of my credit card bills to convince them to look for their records of the transaction so they could refund the charge on my credit card. (And even then, they only refunded $500 or the $599 I spent.)

But I'm grousing about SpaceX, I'm sure Tesla has a better AR/AP/CS system.

I've owned cars for almost 30 years and I have never once "maintained" my paint. Where do you live that this is a thing?

I envy you. My new car is only months old and I’m already having to pay to pop out dents and touch up paint. Careless people parking next to me.

I forgot, truck ownership didn't used to overlap with image-consciousness.

But we all saw the cannonball demo, didn't we? Do you really think the body is going to be invincible?

I, for one, look forward to testing cybertruck body panels when they park too close to me.

If you don’t at least touch up the paint it rusts. At least where I live.

It's the other people. It's always the other people.

I think you’re being sarcastic. But yes.

I probably should have noted it. It's a safe assumption that any comment I make about Tesla is at least somewhat sarcastic.

>extremely safe

Do you care about the safety of others, or only yourself? You listed safety second in your list of positives, but I'm curious if you're considering things like pedestrian safety or just driver/passenger safety.

> I'm curious if you're considering things like pedestrian safety or just driver/passenger safety.

I'm sure some people do hold this view, but I've never met someone who's buying a vehicle and looks into how well it deals with people outside of the vehicle as part of safety considerations. While pictures of lifted trucks and high-bumper vehicles are fairly common posts on Twitter, usually for dunks, people still buy SUVs and crossovers that are known to be unsafe to those outside of them. Often this is disguised as "but I need it to go skiing once a year" or "what if I need to drive the entire soccer team home?"

The mindset of drivers, and especially Tesla's corporate view of it, channels Lord Farquaad. "Some of you [pedestrians] may die and that's a sacrifice I'm willing to make."

We haven't met in person, but hi! Part of why I own a sedan rather than an SUV (although not the only reason) is safety of others. It's also part of why I avoided car ownership for many years!

I'd prefer that this safety consideration be handled via regulation, though. I'd love to see cars that recklessly endanger the lives of those outside the car banned, limited, or taxed.

Safety of others is the domain of the government or regulator. And that, unfortunately, relies on the government being competent, and free from corporate influence. Neither of which are really the case in the US (nor much of the world).

Um... the impact resistant glass was not especially impact resistant at the unveiling, but you just go on believing that it was. Life is too short to get bummed out by consensus reality.

There’s more to that story than meets the eye. The other tests and sledgehammer hits to the door may have weakened the glass. Either way it’s more than my car will handle now.

Both windows failed, not just the one hit by the hammer.

This kind of attitude is why car culture is killing so many and traffic deaths continue to rise.

All of those nifty features are replicable by any other manufacturer.

But haven’t been.

> impact resistant glass

Don't be suckered by Tesla's advertising drivel, and certainly don't repeat it.

Here's the glass of a VW Golf:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TWzUh53H_VU

Tesla's dog and pony show is for credulous rubes. You don't need to be one of those.

Unless I’m mistaken, there’s quite a difference between the cybertruck glass and regular auto glass. It doesn’t exist yet, so it’s possible that could change, but it’s also not marketing drivel.

You're mistaken.

Cybertruck glass is just premium auto glass.

It would have taken years to certify an entire different kind of glass for automotive purposes.

It remains to be seen what it ships with, but you can add films and coatings to the glass to make it much more resistant. I don’t think that would affect certification, although I could be wrong.

You're not wrong, you've been suckered by advertising. Watch the video.

The water is there, horse. Drink it.

Aggressive swipes will get your account banned here, so please don't post like this.

Edit: You've unfortunately been breaking the site guidelines repeatedly. If you'd please review https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and stick to the rules when posting here, we'd appreciate it.

I watched the video. It doesn’t prove what you think it does. Your attitude is obnoxious.

> Your attitude is obnoxious.

Aggressive swipes will get your account banned here, so please don't post like this, regardless of how provocative another comment is or you feel it is.

If you'd please review https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and stick to the rules when posting here, we'd appreciate it.

Um. So. They're going to invent new glass between now and the time they ship the Cybertruck?

Watch the video. And after that video watch this video:

https://youtu.be/8SsnkXH2mQY?t=200

It will help strengthen you against manipulation by advertising.

It’s just cool. Feel like nobody has any creativity or originality in the car market since the 60s and Tesla is the only one driving it.

Getting the government to subsidize their manufacturing operations is the oldest (and most un-original) move in the auto manufacturing game.

I reserved one because it looks different from anything else.

It might attract a new segment of the market that wouldn't otherwise buy a truck. e.g. My partner, she has no interest in a normal pickup truck, for some reason I still can't fathom wants one in bright orange.

... Huh, are they going to come in colours? I vaguely thought, in the event that any ever actually existed, that they'd be unpainted, a la DeLorean.

You're right they're stainless steel. There was some talk of factory wraps but don't think it's happening... would have to be aftermarket.

As someone who owns a truck (F150) and uses it for truck-like things (wood, rocks, concrete, towing, etc.), I would never be caught dead going to the local lumber yard or landscaping yard in a Cybertruck. The Rivian and Ford at least look like trucks.

I hauled off storm debris in a 1960s truck and definitely got some funny looks at the wood pulp place. Modern trucks were about twice as big and I was more or less the only guy without a trailer.

Who cares? I sure didn't. I needed a tree gone.

You care enough about what some random Joe down at the lumberyard might think of you to base your car purchase decision on that? What if the guys there will laugh at any electric vehicle? Better stick with gas, or better yet diesel, and be a real man. And don't even think of bringing anything with a bed less than 80" in there.

If you care about getting things done more than fitting in, the Cybertruck actually looks like a much better work truck than a relatively delicate F150.

Yeah, seems like it'll handle the accumulation of loading/unloading mishaps pretty well with the stainless body.

So I could buy one Cybertruck or two Ford Mavericks for the same money. I'm going with the two mavericks. When one of them wears out I'll start using the other one.

Other flaws aside, the "look" seems much more practical than the F150 et al.

It's got large flat surfaces made of stainless steel, you'll be able to weld or bolt modifications (e.g. toolboxes) directly to the body.

It was (is?) common in the days of steel bodied trucks to cut out and weld, bolt, or rivet things like tool boxes, extra gas tanks, etc. into the otherwise useless space. Many aftermarket options that matched body contours as well.

A lot of people, including me, would buy Cybertruck for advertised price $39,900.

Is there any indication that the Cybertruck is delayed for reasons related to its unique aesthetics? Why would a new truck that is normal looking be easier to build than the cybertruck?

I believe it is being delayed so the company's founder can spend more time getting high.

They didn't design it that way for giggles. They did it because it's much cheaper to build that way, which helps make up for batteries being so expensive.

Do you have a source for this? I don’t see the cost-savings in a stainless-steel paneled vehicle like this. Not to mention that if does dent, you’ll have a harder time popping it out.

Also since it’s Tesla, you’re gonna have to see a certified repair shop for it. Idk this just feels like an internet rumor, I’d love to read something substantial on how the manufacturing process is cheaper.

There was a lot of talk about that several years ago, but I couldn't find the specific article I was thinking of, which went into a lot of detail. But there were a lot of articles referencing analysis by Sandy Munro, which apparently is mostly on video. Here's one: https://www.cnet.com/roadshow/news/tesla-cybertruck-engineer...

Also found this: https://www.teslarati.com/tesla-cybertruck-secret-production...

> there is no need for Tesla to invest in casting machines for the vehicle. Its steel exoskeleton also means that Tesla will not be setting up expensive paint machinery for the all-electric pickup...even the Cybertruck’s glass, which are flat as opposed to the curved ones used in other Teslas like the Model 3, will likely give Tesla some savings as well.

And there's this, which describes how the shape of the truck adds strength and hence weight savings: https://medium.com/throughdesign/why-is-the-tesla-cybertruck...

And this looks like it covers similar material: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L2nSIDv29HE

Great stuff, thanks for putting it together

I believe there's a not so small crowd of people who want videogame like thing in real life. Now how many people in that crowd have the money for an EV truck.

Yeah if it didn’t already have a ridiculous number of reservations proving you wrong you might have a point.

The reservations were $99 and refundable, so I don’t think they prove that much.

InsideEVs just released an article this morning about how many people plan on following through with their reservations. According to the study done by Recurrent Auto, about 75% plan on sticking with their reservation. That's a lot of trucks to sell with the 1.5 million reservations.

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