By Craig Trudell | Bloomberg
Tesla Inc. recalled all the Cybertrucks it produced and sold in the first 15 months it’s been on the US market over a safety issue it’s having trouble resolving.
The carmaker estimates that 1% of the 46,096 pickups it’s calling back have a defect, according to a recall report filed with the US National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. Pieces of steel trim along the exterior of the Cybertruck are joined to the vehicle by an adhesive that’s “susceptible to environmental embrittlement,” the company said.
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Tesla says in the report that it will foot the bill for replacing the panels with ones that meet its durability requirements. But as of March 18 — the day Tesla submitted its recall report — the company said it had not yet corrected the issue in production. The manufacturer said it expected to sort out the remedy on or around March 21.
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“If the cant rail stainless steel panel separates from the vehicle while in drive, it could create a road hazard for following motorists and increase their risk of injury or a collision,” Tesla said. The company identified 151 warranty claims that may be related to the condition.
Tesla recalled the Cybertruck six times in the US within a year of launching the pickup in November 2023. One of those earlier safety campaigns, in June of last year, pertained to trim pieces along the exterior of the trunk bed that could come loose while driving.
Tesla shares traded down 1.2% as of 8:05 a.m. Thursday in New York, before the start of regular trading. The stock has fallen 42% this year.
‘Really Tough’
From the moment he first unveiled a Cybertruck prototype in November 2019, Chief Executive Officer Elon Musk has positioned the pickup as sturdy and and strong. “You want a truck that’s really tough, not fake tough,” he said on stage at an event in Los Angeles.
But after showing clips of the truck withstanding gunshots and inviting Franz von Holzhausen, Tesla’s design chief, to slam its doors with a sledgehammer, a demonstration of the Cybertruck’s “armored glass” went awry. The executive hurled a metal ball at the driver-side windows and shattered them.
Tesla made light of the incident when the Cybertruck went on sale in late 2023, selling $55 decals commemorating the damaged windows that quickly sold out. However, failures of the pickup’s trim pieces to stay adhered to the truck aren’t the only incidents that have raised questions about the durability of the pickup.
In August, YouTuber Cody Detwiler — whose account WhistlinDiesel has 9.31 million subscribers — released a video comparing how the Cybertruck and Ford’s top-selling F-150 pickup hold up over the course of a series of extreme stunts.
The video, which captures the frame of Tesla’s truck snapping off when the two pickups were hooked to one another by their tow hitches, has almost 31 million views.
In a more recent YouTube video by Zack Nelson of JerryRigEverything, the rear section of the Cybertruck frame collapses during a stress test.
Musk has stood by the pickup, posting on X last month that it was “apocalypse-level safe” after it earned a five-star overall safety rating from NHTSA.
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