Once again, Tesla is coming under fire for alleged issues with its Cybertruck, and some customers are reporting the company has temporarily halted deliveries of the vehicle.
Automotive site CarBuzz reported that several Cybertruck customers were contacted by Tesla over the weekend and told that their electric truck deliveries would be postponed. Multiple posts on a Cybertruck owners forum, called Cybertruck Owners Club, backed up the claim, describing phone calls that said their deliveries would be delayed for an unknown length of time.
“Hi, we have just been informed of an unexpected delay regarding the preparation of your vehicle. We need to cancel your delivery appointment for tomorrow and we will reach out again when we’re able to get you back on the schedule,” the notification read, according to one of the forum users.
The reports come as the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) in the U.S. confirmed to NBC News that it has contacted Tesla after reports the truck’s accelerator pedal is prone to getting stuck while driving.
One Cybertruck owner on TikTok shared video of his experience with an allegedly faulty accelerator pedal, explaining that excessive lubricant on the pedal can cause the cover panel to loosen and slide forward, becoming jammed in a gap in the floorboard.
@el.chepito1985 serious problem with my Cybertruck and potential all Cybertrucks #tesla #cyberbeast #cybertruck #stopsale #recall
The owner, Josh Martinez, explained that it caused the car’s accelerator to fully engage, creating a dangerous situation — especially if a driver panics and can’t bring the car under control.
“The moment I let go of the brake, it would lurch forward at full throttle again,” Martinez told NBC News. “I had space where I could figure out what was going on. It wasn’t a situation where there were cars in front of me, or a building or a tree.”
Martinez said he had the car for six days before the problem occurred, putting it to the test on a 3,200-kilometre road trip.
Tesla did not reply to Global News’ request for comment, nor did it confirm any delay or official recall.
Meanwhile, Martinez’s video had been viewed almost four million times on TikTok since he posted it on Sunday and almost seven million times on X (formerly Twitter), the social media platform now owned by Tesla CEO Elon Musk.
Cybertruck’s woes from the beginning
The Cybertruck is arguably one of the most polarizing vehicles on the road right now — most people either love it, or love to hate it.
It’s been plagued by bad press since the beginning.
When Elon Musk first unveiled the electric pickup truck in Los Angeles in November 2019, the demonstration didn’t go according to plan; in fact, it broke almost immediately, when Musk’s head of design Franz von Holzhausen was attempting to show off the truck’s durability.
The supposedly “bulletproof” vehicle’s body held up to a blow from a sledgehammer, but two of its “armoured” windows erupted into spidery cracks when they were struck with metal balls.
“It didn’t go through, so that’s a plus side,” Musk said at the time. “Room for improvement.”
There’s been much talk about the truck’s appearance since Musk unveiled the design in 2019. At least one person said that he likely designed the truck to look “ugly on purpose.”
getting secondhand embarrassment looking at the cybertruck
— julian from loveless (@juliancomeau) January 3, 2023
The pickup truck looks like something plucked straight from a science-fiction movie with its minimalist and angular design. If you didn’t know any better, you might assume it was a prop created for a Minecraft live-action movie. Or maybe a version of “The Homer” car from The Simpsons.
Tesla also upset thousands of buyers who preordered the vehicle, delaying the truck’s production timeline several times, before announcing it would be ready for shipment in 2023.
Customer complaints
Now that the Cybertruck is out in the world, being driven on real roads by real people, there’s been no shortage of press coverage about alleged functional defects, bad design and navigation issues.
While Musk initially promised in 2019 a range of more than 800 kilometres and a price tag of US$69,900, the actual range of the vehicle is closer to 500 kilometres and the price is US$99,990.
Cybertruck presentation was wildly lacking in details. Final specs well below promised in almost every category:
2019: 500+ miles of range for $69,900
2023: 320 miles of range for $99,9902019: windows can withstand a steel ball (almost)
2023: windows can withstand a baseball pic.twitter.com/PLidvZtwZb— Tom Randall (@tsrandall) November 30, 2023
YouTube tech authority Marques Brownlee shared a video last December, highlighting a number of his top areas of concern, the largest being the construction of the Cybertruck’s body. In his video, he explains that Tesla engineers told him how difficult it is to construct the truck’s large body panels with the type of stainless steel chosen for the vehicle.
“They have these huge presses that are stamping the stainless steel, but steel has this sort of a ‘spring back effect,’ so you have to use a lot of force to stamp it in place, but then it springs back very quickly,” Brownlee explained. “So you have to stamp further than you need to go to get it to ‘unspring’ back to the part you want it to be at.”
And, speaking of stainless steel, now that Cybertrucks have been on the road for a number of months in a range on climates, some customers say the panels on their trucks are already beginning to rust and corrode.
After just a couple of months, owners began posting images to social media, showing orange rust spots, often after driving in the rain.
“The Cybertruck has 381 miles on it, and has spent much of the 11 days in my custody parked in front of my house. Cold weather, rain and some direct sunlight later, I attached a few photos of the corrosion spots and a video,” Cybertruck Owners Club user vertigo3pb wrote in a forum earlier this year.
A Wired article points out that the Cybertruck does not ship with clear coat, the layer of transparent paint that comes standard with almost every new vehicle. Instead, purchasers have the option to add a wrap of clear paint film to the tune of US$5,000.
Other issues that plagued the Cybertruck since it reached the market late last year were reports that some early deliveries came without aero wheel covers, and there was also a voluntary recall in early 2024 to make the font size on touchscreens more readable.
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