The stainless steel body of Tesla's Cybertruck is reportedly leading to issues with gaps in between the panels

https://lemmy.world/post/8851855

The stainless steel body of Tesla's Cybertruck is reportedly leading to issues with gaps in between the panels - Lemmy.World

The stainless steel body of Tesla’s Cybertruck is reportedly leading to issues with gaps in between the panels::The Cybertruck’s steel is made in “coils that resemble giant rolls of toilet paper,” WSJ reported.

Well, if Sandy Munro said to not worry about it we’re good. Oh who tf is Sandy Munro?
Flat panels suck for resistance to bending, the compound curves and folds pressed into most car panels give them more rigidity
You mean the thing everyone said was going to happen actually happened. Lmao
Well, Duh. Everything is over promise, delay, underdeliver. All Teslas have crappy panel gaps. Why would anyone expect anything better?

I saw one of the “RC” release candidates in the wild in San Francisco two weeks ago. It looked like shit in person. Marker lights weren’t aligned, the stainless already had fucked up scuffs and discoloration, etc. Water spots showed up just like my stainless kitchen sink.

You can see the stainless smudges and water spots here. I wish I got the tail lights when the brakes were off.

Also, the brakes flashed at you. Super annoying.

Similar to the one I saw in Oregon a few weeks ago. It had fingerprint smudges all over the body. Seems like it’d be a huge pain to keep clean and probably need a sealant or clear wrap over the top.

QC issues aside, the design is pure ass
Right? It’s not even a truck, but is somehow even worse.
I thought it might grow on me but the flat tailgate looks absolutely atrocious like a shitty shed door or something.
I think I’d be more into it if it had a more distinct bed like a big El Camino
It’s one of the biggest pieces of evidence (besides X…) of Musk’s growing mental illness and bubble of sycophants. I’m sure many very respected people in the field told him this would be a Very Bad Idea. I doubt any still work at Tesla. This should’ve been the first EV truck to market.
That thing is hideous.
The lights look so shit. Never noticed before
Cybertruck would be the time machine in a Back to the Future shitty remake if they would make one.
Starring Jared Leto as Marty McFly
Don’t you put that shit in my head 🤮
And Gary Busey as Dr. Emmett Brown
At this point Tesla customers deserve this crap

The Cybertruck’s steel is made in “coils that resemble giant rolls of toilet paper,”

All steel is shipped from the stewl mill in coils just like that.

There’s a lot of legitimate things to criticize, why make stupid comparisons like this?

Seems like tesla has an answer too:

sell the poorly made trucks to rubes while you crank out more as cheaply as possible.

Other manufacturers of all manner of stainless products seem to have figured out a solution to the problem.

Two design choices together probably make the problem multiplicatively worse:

  • Flat panels are not anywhere as stiff as curved panels.
  • Mechanical parameters of the stainless alloy they’re using (eg it might retain the coiled shape more than some other plain steel alloys).
  • I can’t get over the flatness… those panels surely rattle too? Or do they void-fill the doors and body with something?

    Flat panels are not anywhere as stiff as curved panels

    Same for windows. So much for “thermonuclear explosion-proof glass”, Elon.

    Also, the shape has horrible aerodynamics. If it had a combustion engine, they couldn’t sell it in large parts of the world due to fuel efficiency.

    Point 2 in particular is huge. Depending on the exact alloy steel can vary wildly in characteristics. One alloy might bend almost as easily as aluminum, while another might be nearly as hard as tungsten. Adding to that proper heat treatment and the difference in the mechanical characteristics of the finished product can be absolutely massive.
    Yes but that can be adjusted. The factory can provide what you need. The design is the limiting factor here. Flat panels are simply bad design.

    Flat panels cause problems but they’re not insurmountable, they just need to be taken into consideration. It’s going to be more expensive to make them flat because you’ll have to include more material behind the panels. In a sense they cease to be structural and instead are more decorative.

    From an engineering perspective it’s a horrendous choice, but a perfectly valid one from an aesthetics perspective and it’s far from the first time some designer has made a decision that the engineering department has cursed them for.

    I imagine the real issue here is that Musk or the upper management at Tesla is trying to penny pinch and is unwilling to make either design concessions or to pay for the engineering time and materials necessary to fix this right.

    Don’t older cars have mostly flat panels? So it should be possible, right?

    How old?

    Early 1900’s: Yes. Metal panels had the same problem, timber panels did not (their thickness stops them from flapping).

    Late 1900’s: I don’t think anyone used flat? There were definitely designs intended to look flat (esp 80’s and early 90’s), but there were still subtle curves to those panels to bias them and stop them flapping, as far as I recall.

    Happy to be proven wrong :)

    but there were still subtle curves to those panels to bias them and stop them flapping

    Okay, that explains it. Thanks!

    Company doing stuff they have no expertise with.
    This is a problem with all of their vehicles lol
    Just today I took a quick look at a Tesla stopped in front of me and saw 3 misaligned parts. In like 10 seconds. Quality is shit.
    Just leaving a “Aber die Spaltmaße” comment here.
    Panel gaps are just a ubiquitous feature of a Tesla. This isn’t a surprise, and the apologists will say it’s no big deal.
    I am not a car guy. Would gaps allow water to come in and causes issues as well as act like asail increasing air resistance?
    Don’t ask questions, just hail Elon our overlord who can do no wrong!
    Seig heil! Seig heil! Wait, wrong person… Or is it?!?
    It would slightly increase wind resistance. Every car has weather stripping, making water not a concern even for comparatively very large gaps.

    LoL some Tesla’s dont even have drainage tubes installed or weather strippingissing or installed incorrectly like needing an article about it

    Also if you look up just “water leaking” and “tesla” you will find their forums full of people saying their cars let in water and even one person saying it gets in when they use a car wash and Tesla saying its normal and to just hand wash the vehicle from now on.

    Some level of gaps is totally normal but this is a shit show.

    Tesla Model 3 Taking A Leak Is A Common Issue: See What Causes It

    Sources told us the Tesla Model 3 incontinence issue is more common than we could imagine. It's related to sealing problems, particularly on the trunk lid.

    InsideEVs
    Probably not in this case. Most vehicle doors are designed to channel any water that enters the gap. But, Tesla may not be aware of this practice and rely only on the seals.
    You should see the videos of model Y owners (a model they’ve had many iterations on) roll down their window during rain to get a drive through order and the water pours into the car directly onto the, you guessed it: button console used to open/close the window and DOOR.
    What a surprise! The other well known stainless steel car, the Delorean DMC-12, is FAMOUS for being a huge pain in the ass to work on. Dents and dings are tremendous problems, and stainless steel is super heavy.
    Not to mention all of the manual labour it took to make all the panels to fit properly. No 2 delorean were the same
    Depending on the grade, the weight difference between stainless steel and carbon steel of the same thickness is not much of any at all.
    Don’t most cars use aluminum as well as carbon steel in their frames, to save on weight?
    I doubt this has any stainless in the frame. Really it should be a comparison of stainless vs aluminum and plastic body panels
    I think the majority just use regular steel. Ford was a talking point when they started using aluminum for the F150 body panels. And then they started running into corrosion issues where the aluminum meets the steel fasteners and frame.
    Well at least Elon can pretend that all the panels were within 10 microns of gap when they left the factory, and it totally warped 2 cm (20000 microns) on the way to the customers.

    So wait. You’re telling me that materials can expand and contract due to many conditions such as shifts in temperature? Ya don’t say (that was directed at Elon, not you).

    Sure, he could say that. It’s still his/Tesla’s fault. Shipping the product is part of the process, and they’d still be responsible for that (or should be at least. Who knows in this dystopia).

    He’d probably just say that it arrived in perfect shape, the customer just fucked it up and are lying. Or something like that.

    Seems like the answer here is “you’re an idiot if you buy Tesla products”.

    Essy lesson to learn, imo.

    Good old fashioned blame the customer. He’s so good at it his fanbois will do it for him.

    I truly applaud the attempt to radically innovate, from stainless steel to eliminate car rust (how much of it truly is stainless, mechanically speaking?), to major aesthetical design overhaul (even though it does not appeal to me at all). With so much innovation, delays ought to be expected

    That being said, everything else is just atrocious. Production issues are blamed on unexpected delays because of innovation and vice versa. It just screams project mismanagement. This thing should’t have been revealed at all. Also, why the fuck does this have bullet proof glass? A truck for the apocalypse? Are they trying to sell an APC? Who asked for any of that?

    I wouldn’t call any part of this innovative
    Idk, it’s kinda innovative to see musk finding new ways to shoot himself in the foot
    The oligarchs are preparing for the apocalypse they’re bringing about themselves. This is the car they’ll be driving through the rubble.
    I would pick a Toyota pickup run the mother on syngas from wood. Civilization is over but I can still get air conditioning and drive.

    The glass isn’t bullet proof, although it’s toughened. The body panels are supposed to be bullet proof (obviously only up to a certain point, as nothing is ever bullet proof against everything).

    I think the bullet proof nature of the panels is more of a happy accident with the stainless being used just being very tough to begin with.

    Oh no! You have to respect the “Spaltmaß”! * cries in German *

    I mean in the end it is a sign of sloppy craftsmanship. The gaps themselves might not be so bad, but they reflect an alarming lack of quality control, that could very well affect more critical systems.

    If I can’t trust you to make a good looking turd, how can I trust you to make an actual quality product?