The big reveal of Tesla’s electric pick-up went embarrassingly wrong when the supposedly impact-proof windows smashed, leaving a flustered Elon Musk to flounder through the rest of his presentation in front of a badly damaged vehicle.
The Tesla co-founder unveiled the all-electric battery-powered Tesla Cybertruck in California on Thursday, daring staff to hit the vehicle with sledgehammers and showing a video of it withstanding bullets shot from a 9mm gun.
But the demonstration of the vehicle’s indestructible windows didn’t appear to go entirely to plan after one assistant threw a steel ball bearing at the truck — only to see the armored glass smash.
An expletive could be heard at the Tesla Design Center and as his assistant laughed nervously, Musk said: “Well, maybe that was a little too hard.”
A second attempt fared little better, however, and another window was left badly damaged.
“It didn’t go through,” said a clearly uncomfortable Musk, who was forced to push on through the remainder of the chaotic launch with the two smashed windows in full view.
The industrial-looking Cybertruck is covered in the same steel alloy Musk plans to use for his SpaceX rocket and will be able to go from 0 to 100 kilometers (62 miles) per hour in about three seconds, the Tesla chief executive claimed.
He said the entry-level model will have a starting price of $39,900 and a 400-kilometer (250-mile) range, while a deluxe option will be able to travel twice the distance and will sell for $69,900.
Glass window: *Is made of glass*
Solid steel ball: “I’m about to end this mans whole career”#Cybertruck #Tesla pic.twitter.com/5cqj21yqek
— Mason (@masonmaelstrom) November 22, 2019
No date has been given for its release but analysts said it would not be ready before the end of 2021 at the earliest.
‘Room for growth’
Tesla dominates the global electric car market and has an especially firm grip on the United States, where pick-ups are particularly popular.
The California-based firm is hoping to edge in on domestic demand for larger car types such as pick-ups and sports utility vehicles, the margins for which have allowed manufacturers to cope with rising steel and aluminum costs.
A lack of models in the pick-up class left “plenty of room for growth and for automakers to carve out new niches”, said Jessica Caldwell, executive director of automotive website Edmunds.
Read rest at Yahoo News
The failure of the windows to perform as expected is not a climate change issue or even an electric vehicle issue. What it shows is sloppy engineering. I was an aerospace engineer for 26 years and have worked in high tech jobs for a total of 33 years. For their demonstration Tesla should have used a 9 mm handgun firing the bullet at a typical velocity which I assume they did. The engineering check in advance of the demonstration should have fired a round at a higher than standard velocity to give a margin of safety. What this says is that Tesla’s engineers are not the most competent in their test of the glass. For that test it doesn’t really matter, but what about the rest of the vehicle.
“He said the entry-level model will have a starting price of $39,900 and a 400-kilometer (250-mile) range, …”
With what sort of load and in what sort of terrain? My wife and I like to travel CA Hwy 395. There are three north-bound uphill grades between Bishop and Bridgeport – six percent grade or better. We tow a 27 foot 9,000 lb travel trailer.
How many RV parks have the electrical connections that can ‘re-fuel’ this vehicle? Will parks have to raise their prices to cover the extra electrical usage? (There’s a park in New Mexico on I-10 – as you drive in they count the number of air conditioners on the roof of the rig. More than one – the nightly price is increased.)
Does the bed of this ‘pick-up’ accept 4 x 8 sheets of plywood? I don’t need a vehicle that goes from 0 to 60mph in 3 seconds – I need something that can work for it’s living, and mine…..
Musk has pioneered a great car company and every designer builds the odd Edsel. The bulletproof glass shattered but would have protected the occupants nonetheless. Musk needs a more elegant design but no one should underestimate the attraction of EV’s like Tesla’s regardless of the AGW cult bullshit. They are fast, fun and quiet and will one day be the standard. It will take massive increases in generating capacity to support major fleets of EV’s and that capacity will need to be nuclear or fossil fuel based, but EV’s are the future of driving.
Yes… If Tesla can last that long into the future…
It seems to me that Elon [or Elron] is spinning too many plates………….
Plus, many are underestimating the huge coming competition from the majors.
Also, EV sales in China are down.
Huge debt load[China] and more borrowing needed for the German plant.
This is a message from the middle class. At prices from $39,900 to $69,900, the Tesla Cybertruck will not “one day be the standard.” It might be common in the upper class and higher income brackets, but not the middle or lower class.
Kind of reminds me of when Paris Glendening a big time gun control advocate tried to show how easy it was to use a Trigger lock and was not able to get it unlocked and had to get help looks like Musk has his own version of the Edsel
Forget about the armored glass at the pick up truck “launch.” What about some follow up in South Australia and his storage battery claims that would revolutionize the power grid? How’d that work out? Probably a result that was a bit below expectation, much like the chronicled “glass demonstration”…
That sure is one ugly vehicle. I remember another stainless steel vehicle that didn’t go over well. Perhaps that’s what Elon Musk was thinking while designing his Back to the Future truck.