Tesla Cybertruck.... engineeers opinions?

[davidinindy]

I'm not an automotive engineer, but am a car guy... I think it's hideous, and impractical. Those flat panels won't resist dents and dings at all. May also cause reflective glare to other vehicles. Is there and type of crumple zones? Front headroom is probably good. What about rear?
Range is one thing... What about the range when pulling a camper or other trailer?

The laughable points?
The "bulletproof glass" breaking with a hand tossed steel ball.
The guy heaving the tailgate up and down.
Thinking that extendable tailgate will hold up to repeated loading and unloading of law tractors or that quad...
Would only take a few clumps of mud and gravel to lock it up probably.

David
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Quote: "If it ain't broke, I must not've fixed it good enough"

 

[dgallup]

I'm sure the morons on our roads would find a way to defeat them.

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[CWB1]

If North America would get with the program and allow adaptive headlights that automatically cut down glare to other drivers, that would sure help.

Adaptive headlights are a standard feature in many NA vehicles, they're just not a requirement. Adaptives still require aiming and maintenance so they don't really buy us anything in that regard, quite the contrary actually as the HID bulbs are more likely to blind others when the adaptive mechanism isn't maintained, and theres also the matter of morons installing HID bulbs into non-adaptive housings - blinding blue and illegal stateside.

 

[NormPeterson]

Low beams should be low on the front of the vehicle to cut down glare to other drivers

This ^^^

At 38" above grade, truck headlights are either going to be right in the mirrors of sedans ahead of them if the truck driver is to have much low-beam forward illumination, or the truck driver's low beams are going to mostly illuminate what he can't see because it's below the hood line if they're aimed low enough to get the hot spot far enough out of sedan mirrors. I can't bring myself to agree that sedan drivers should be thrown under the bus to satisfy pickup truck and SUV styling preferences.


Norm

 

[enginesrus]

First question I would ask is, will it carry a 3000lb diesel genset, so I can charge it up at the end of the road trip to the camp site. Oh and don't forget the camper and have seating for the whole family.

And for the lights discussion what ever happened to DOT regulations on maximum candle power of all the lights?
The modern laser diode brake lights are just too much. And none of it is good for eyes.

 

[gruntguru]

Its not a suitable vehicle for camping. Probably eliminates it from 4.25% of vehicle purchases.

EV's don't make sense for highway towing either. Link

je suis charlie

 

[GregLocock]

I suppose it would be beyond the wit of man to design an aerodynamic trailer.

hey, i just got spy photos of the next tesla truck

https://spinoff.nasa.gov/Spinoff2008/images/t-6.jpeg

Cheers

Greg Locock


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[gruntguru]

The towing thing is actually a real hurdle. As I typed on another forum:

Not surprising when you think about it. Very high conversion efficiency (onboard energy store -> wheels) is one of the big advantages of EVs and this efficiency stays high under all driving conditions.

However this becomes a chink in the EVs armour when it is used for heavily loaded operation because it suffers in comparison to combustion engine vehicles where conversion efficiency IMPROVES as load increases. For example:

In the video it is apparent that towing the horse trailer at highway speeds requires about three times the energy as the unladen Model X. For the BEV this means 1/3 the range.

For a gasoline vehicle, the conversion efficiency of the ICE would improve from say 25% to 35% comparing unloaded to loaded so the range would reduce to 1/3 x 0.35 x 0.25 = 0.466 ie 46% or about 1/2.

In addition, the video uses a sedan with low aerodynamic drag. This suffers dramatically with the huge frontal area and poor Cd of the trailer. Something like a large pickup truck would get poor highway mileage in the first place - the energy required might only double when adding the trailer. Furthermore the truck (due to its poor economy) will have a large fuel tank. This vehicle is designed to tow and is a good choice for towing.

The takeaway is - this is the wrong market for rolling out EV technology. The prime market for EVs - especially at the "emerging technology" stage, is inner city commuting.

Unfortunately the world's biggest economy has a huge market for SUV's and pickup trucks, so EV startups in the US are in many cases trying to penetrate that particular market - which is unfortunate.

je suis charlie