because all of the force of the collision is applied directly to weak mounting points and then every adjacent part basically falls like dominoes.
how much of that is due to the aesthetic of the car? Like, could you theoretically build a cybertruck that didn’t have this problem? (meaning it’d still look exactly like a cybertruck from the outside)
A car manufacturer could absolutely manufacture a vehicle using more conventional and safe methods with an industry-average level of attention paid to mechanic access, and which appears more or less identical to the Cybertruck as released from the outside. Likely there would be some minor differences based on tooling, but let’s just handwave away the little stuff like that or “parts bin” items that another manufacturer wouldn’t have access to.
Given that the level of attention paid to safety or repairability of the actual Cybertruck was worse than none, I imagine no other car manufacturer would actually make or sell something with quite the same number of deeply stupid and actively dangerous ideas even for a one-off concept car, so the interior would look quite different, but let’s again handwave that away as well.
The actual problems show up with the interior space. The stupid cost cutting and deliberate disregard for safety or durability did allow Tesla to use a manufacturing method that results in a thinner roof structure and lower floor height than conventional manufacturing methods would allow. A truck made to look like the Cybertruck with conventional manufacturing methods would have a much shorter cabin space and would likely feel more like you’re sitting in a sports sedan or a subcompact. There would also be large intrusions into the cabin (likely both in the ceiling and floor) to fit components that Tesla either skipped or didn’t need to use because of the manufacturing process that they chose to make the actual Cybertruck.
how much of that is due to the aesthetic of the car? Like, could you theoretically build a cybertruck that didn’t have this problem? (meaning it’d still look exactly like a cybertruck from the outside)
Depends on what you mean by “from the outside.”
A car manufacturer could absolutely manufacture a vehicle using more conventional and safe methods with an industry-average level of attention paid to mechanic access, and which appears more or less identical to the Cybertruck as released from the outside. Likely there would be some minor differences based on tooling, but let’s just handwave away the little stuff like that or “parts bin” items that another manufacturer wouldn’t have access to.
Given that the level of attention paid to safety or repairability of the actual Cybertruck was worse than none, I imagine no other car manufacturer would actually make or sell something with quite the same number of deeply stupid and actively dangerous ideas even for a one-off concept car, so the interior would look quite different, but let’s again handwave that away as well.
The actual problems show up with the interior space. The stupid cost cutting and deliberate disregard for safety or durability did allow Tesla to use a manufacturing method that results in a thinner roof structure and lower floor height than conventional manufacturing methods would allow. A truck made to look like the Cybertruck with conventional manufacturing methods would have a much shorter cabin space and would likely feel more like you’re sitting in a sports sedan or a subcompact. There would also be large intrusions into the cabin (likely both in the ceiling and floor) to fit components that Tesla either skipped or didn’t need to use because of the manufacturing process that they chose to make the actual Cybertruck.