Tesla’s Cybertruck electric pickup may soon be able to function as a boat, Elon Musk revealed.
“We are going to offer a mod package that enables Cybertruck to traverse at least 100m of water as a boat,” Musk shared to X on Monday night in response to a video excerpt from an episode of “Jay Leno’s Garage.”
In the clip, where Leno takes the long-awaited Cybertruck for a spin, Tesla’s vice president of vehicle engineering Lars Moravy tells the TV host that the steel truck could be made into a boat with some simple tweaks.
“The vehicle almost floats, maybe you have to add a little bit of extra buoyancy just to keep it up,” Moravy told Leno.
“If you’re creative, and you want, you could figure out how to put an outboard motor, plugged into your outlet there, turn it on from your screen, and go boating,” he added.
Musk chimed in with an X post saying: “Mostly just need to upgrade cabin door seals.”
Tesla fans will “believe it when we see it,” as one X user put it, especially following Musk’s long-delayed reveal of the Cybertruck on Nov. 30 — two years after the stealth bomber-like vehicle was initially supposed to go into production.
Meanwhile, a video of the vehicle failing to climb a snowy hill has gone viral, which doesn’t bode well for Cybertruck’s foray into the water.
In the video posted to Instagram and earlier reported on by Business Insider, a Cybertruck hauling a pine tree can’t seem to gain traction after sliding off the Corral Hollow OV off-roading trail in California, per the caption.
A Ford pickup truck had to come to the rescue and pull it up the hill and onto a dirt road.
Ford CEO Jim Farley has since insisted that the video wasn’t a publicity stunt. “NOT advertising. Glad a @Ford owner was there to help,” Farley tweeted in response to the viral video.
Aside from the snowy snafu, fans also weren’t impressed by the truck’s sticker shock-inducing price, which reportedly left them fuming in “disappointing rage” as Musk announced another year of delays before the stainless steel trucks would rumble off assembly lines.
The entry-level, rear-wheel-drive version of the Cybertruck costs $60,990 and is not expected to ship until 2025. The mid-tier Cybertruck with all-wheel drive costs $79,990, and the top-tier “Cyberbeast” costs $99,990.
Only a handful of deep-pocketed executives were able to nab a Cybertruck upon its debut last month, including Reddit cofounder Alex Ohanian and venture capital billionaire Phillip Sarofim.
The truck’s angular, stainless steel-clad exoskeleton has safety experts concerned that it could hurt pedestrians and cyclists and damage other vehicles on roads.
“The big problem there is if they really make the skin of the vehicle very stiff by using thick stainless steel, then when people hit their heads on it, it’s going to cause more damage to them,” Adrian Lund, the former president of the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS), whose vehicle crash tests are an industry standard, told Reuters.
Tesla, however, has touted that the structures of the truck absorb impact during a crash.
Musk even said on social media that he was “highly confident” the Cybertruck would be safer than other trucks for occupants and pedestrians.
Representatives for Tesla did not immediately respond to The Post’s request for comment.
Credit: Source link
