• A YouTuber snapped the frame of his Cybertruck while doing a stunt with it.
  • The fracture calls into question potential safety risks for those who tow with the Tesla.
  • Advocates for the electric truck say it was damaged during other tests but that might not be as reassuring as it seems.

The first video from acclaimed YouTuber WhistlinDiesel featuring the Cybertruck is out. Across some 21 minutes, the host submits the truck to several violent and brutal ‘durability tests’, resulting in the truck’s frame breaking off.

This Tesla splits opinion like no other. Part of that comes from the claims of CEO Elon Musk who called the truck an armored personnel carrier. Cody Detwiler, also known as WhistlinDiesel, put claims like that to the test in this new video but none exposed a potential issue the way his towing stunt did.

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Detwiler attempts to retrieve a Ford F-150 stuck on an obstacle. To do so, he hooks the Cybertruck up to the Ford via the hitches of each truck and pulls the Ford off the obstacle. But during the process, the hitch tears away from the frame of the Cybertruck and brings part of the frame with it.

Trucks haul other trucks and sometimes even larger vehicles out of sticky situations. When something fails it’s usually the rope or chain connecting the two vehicles. Other times, the failure point comes at the hitch mount itself but even that isn’t very common. Frames are typically fully boxed sections of steel and are incredibly robust, specifically for towing.

Standard truck frames do fail but often it’s the result of overloading the payload capacity of the truck. In those cases, the frames usually bend rather than snap or break. But in this specific case, the Cybertruck’s frame broke into pieces, which is a bad look. Some online believe that the frame was actually broken or fractured during the Youtuber’s previous “tests”.

Detwiler drives the Cybertruck off of a culvert, and the rear hitch slams into concrete, with some claiming that the frame was bent at that time. If that is indeed when the first fracture happened, it could explain why this is the Cybertruck’s first documented towing failure. Plenty of other YouTubers have towed a lot more without issue. Still, it calls into question just how safe any frame is that can break away in the manner that this one did. 

Image Credit: WhistlinDiesel