Will the Cybertruck Be able to tow a 5th Wheel?

[Blup85]

Here's another neat 5th wheel concept with corresponding article and youtube video.

View attachment 485443

Cool, but TBH pretty dinky.. make it a dual axle with a propper stateroom at the front

 

[keeney]

it’s 3mm thick and very hard which is why the have to score it. But it’s also very light...

Huh? 3mm thick (0.118 inch) steel is not light. It weighs about 0.3 lbs per cubic inch.

 

[CMoZ]

Huh? 3mm thick (0.118 inch) steel is not light. It weighs about 0.3 lbs per cubic inch.

Conventional steel which is not what they’re using. They’re using a proprietary alloy designed at SpaceX for rockets which necessitates low weight, weight eats money when getting to space. This is all ignoring the fact that they outright said “it will be about the same weight as the F150” they outright said it, and it’s not like they didn’t have a prototype to weigh of all the things they could get wrong I’m betting that’s not one of them

 

[ulrichw]

[...] and it’s not like they didn’t have a prototype to weigh of all the things they could get wrong I’m betting that’s not one of them [...]

I don't think the prototype weight is a great guide for them: From the Motortrend reveal article: "Construction of the prototype is "unibody-on-frame" in the same vein as the new Land Rover Defender, but the production Cybertruck will be pure unibody"
(https://www.motortrend.com/cars/tesla/cybertruck/2021/tesla-cybertruck-electric-pickup-photos-info/)

I suspect the prototype is considerably heavier than the final truck will be (due to the redundant frame) - the question is how good are they at estimating how much of the weight they can lose?

 

[Rusty1]

Apparently the CT will weigh in as a 3/4 Ton truck. If so, I think it needs to be 5th wheel capable to compete with F250, Chevy/Dodge 2500.

 

[Brando]

CyberTruck has at least one more year of design/engineering work.
No one knows any details for sure - things can and do change.

Most anything can be designed/engineered or offered as an option.

You'll just have to wait and see.
dreaming & speculating is fun

 

[MP3Mike]

Apparently the CT will weigh in as a 3/4 Ton truck. If so, I think it needs to be 5th wheel capable to compete with F250, Chevy/Dodge 2500.

No, it won't weigh that much, but the GVWR will be up there because of the increased payload capacity over a F150.

 

[Xenoilphobe]

Might have been brought up and discussed or just a stupid idea but i'll ask anyway. Why can't the trailer have its own battery pack like the cybertruck or any other Tesla so it extends its range? Kind of like having an extra gas tank on big pickup? That trailer would be able to have one heck of a big battery

Wonder how many power walls that trailer could carry?

 

[Saghost]

Wonder how many power walls that trailer could carry?

Hmm. 14000 pound towing limit. Here's a supplier of enclosed cargo trailers showing weights empty and loaded:

ENCLOSED TRAILER WEIGHTS AND PAYLOADS - Brothers Trailers Tampa - Enclosed Trailers for Sale in Tampa Florida | Trailer Dealership | Cargo Trailers

Figure maybe 2800 pounds empty, so 11,200 pounds of payload. With a 14 kWh powerwall weighing 269 pounds:

https://ww.electrek.co/2016/10/28/t...-in-home-energy-storage-14-kwh-inverter-5500/

That's potentially 41 powerwalls for ~574 kWh of usable capacity - for ~$250,000...

 

[JBee]

Lol better off towing a couple more TM CTs on a trailer for less money than the powerwalls.

 

[Uncle Paul]

Remember the ICE answer to these towing capabilities is a huge dually smelly diesel with a 5th wheel in the bed. Makes the bed totally useless for anything else and will get around 5mpg overall with load. Will typically cost more than Cybertruck as well. Will ride like ass when not towing, not fit in a garage or even parking lot stalls. Needs a step to climb up into cab. Essentially a one trick pony. It will idle like a can full of rocks and stink up everything around them while spewing canceragenic particles.

 

[M3BlueGeorgia]

Does anyone think the Cybertruck will be able to tow a 5th wheel trailer with the sides and where the batteries are at?

Seems entirely possible that a fifth wheel could be welded onto the bed.

The question is whether it'll be a third-party extension or something Tesla would offer as a factory option.

 

[M3BlueGeorgia]

5th wheels are a better design, and I think there should be more of them for half tons, but they are really for dually one tons and ton and a half trucks

Since the Cybertruck has a 3500 lb load rating, why don't you call it a 1.5 ton truck?

 

[ricohman]

Remember the ICE answer to these towing capabilities is a huge dually smelly diesel with a 5th wheel in the bed. Makes the bed totally useless for anything else and will get around 5mpg overall with load. Will typically cost more than Cybertruck as well. Will ride like ass when not towing, not fit in a garage or even parking lot stalls. Needs a step to climb up into cab. Essentially a one trick pony. It will idle like a can full of rocks and stink up everything around them while spewing canceragenic particles.

Have you owned a modern diesel? No stink, no noise.
The CT will compete against half tons anyway.

 

[Saghost]

Lol better off towing a couple more TM CTs on a trailer for less money than the powerwalls.

I didn't say it was a practical or sensible use of money. I just answered the question.

 

[JBee]

@Saghost

Lol true.

I am wondering though if its possible to design a trailer in such a way that it either improves or at least keeps the same drag co-efficient.

 

[ThomasD]

A basic rule to go by is that the tongue weight of a 5th wheel trailer is about 20 percent of the gross trailer weight. Based on the 5th wheel trailer dry weight of 13,400 pounds the dry hitch weight is correct at 2,535 pounds.

 

[Breezy]

There are plenty of F-150s towing smaller fifth wheels, like the one I have. Towed another with a Ram 1500 before that. Lots of people don't want to live with an HD truck 100% of the time when they're only towing a camper 5% of the time.

Since the Cybertruck appears to be out of the question, I'm holding out hope that the electric/hybrid F-150 will have a conventional pickup bed with room to attach a fifth wheel hitch to the frame.

 

[ThomasD]

Don't forget to include the 5th wheel hitch in your payload figures

 

[muleferg]