- The owner of a 50,000-mile Tesla Cybertruck details his experience.
- The pickup was delivered in March.
- It even went to the Arctic Ocean alongside another Cybertruck.
The Tesla Cybertruck. It’s controversial because of its looks, higher-than-originally-advertised price, several recalls and unfortunate mishaps experienced by some owners. However, not all Cybertruck owners have had issues with their angular electric pickups.
Take, for instance, the truck detailed in the Teslatino video embedded below. With a little over 50,000 miles added on the clock since March, it’s supposedly the highest-mileage Cybertruck in the world, so it’s the perfect candidate for seeing what could go wrong with the controversial EV.
This particular Cybertruck had its fair share of travel, including a pretty epic trip to the Arctic Ocean earlier this year, so what could have gone wrong surely already went wrong. Well, sort of.
Let’s start with the range estimate. This is an All-Wheel Drive Cybertruck which had an original range estimate of 318 miles on a full charge. Now, after 50,000 miles, the estimate never goes above 309 miles with a full battery, but bear in mind that the pickup has a roof rack and a roof tent, as well as off-road-oriented tires, all of which would affect the driving range in any EV. In other words, the range loss has been minimal given the circumstances.
In the energy efficiency department, the numbers look like this: an average efficiency of 513 Wh/mile or 1.95 miles/kWh. That’s not great but not terrible for a big truck with a roof rack and roof tent. Before these accessories were installed, the efficiency was a bit better at 471 Wh/mile or 2.12 miles/kWh.
So, how much did it cost to charge the Cybertruck for all this time? It depends. In total, the electric truck used 25,628 kWh of energy. Charging at home, where the owner’s electricity price is $0.11/kWh, comes to $2,819. If Tesla Superchargers are the only option, the total charging costs rise to $7,688, considering a price of $0.30/kWh. The owner said he predominantly used Superchargers from the very start, so the charging costs are pretty high, but the potential for lower costs exists in the form of home charging. By comparison, a gas-powered Ford F-150 would have needed roughly $7,000 in fuel, so take it as you may.
The only real issue with the truck was the motorized tonneau cover, which was misaligned a couple of times and some service visits were required. The recall for the accelerator pedal was also performed–the pedal cover was riveted at the bottom to prevent it from sliding out and blocking the accelerator in its wide-open position.
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Here’s where things get a little more interesting, though. The rear motor of this all-wheel drive Cybertruck was swapped for a new unit–not because it was broken but because Tesla wanted to evaluate the potential damage inside it. That’s because this is allegedly the highest-mileage Cybertruck out there, so the automaker wanted to get some real-world information about the hardware.
Steer-by-wire also got a big thumbs-up from the owner. As a reminder, there’s no steering column on the Cybertruck–instead, the steering wheel sends digital signals to the steering motor.
That’s pretty much it. Granted, that rear motor swap is rather suspicious and a regular, non-influencer-type owner likely wouldn’t get the same treatment, but there was nothing wrong with the original unit to begin with. But what’s your take on this? Let us know in the comments below.
