Since the Tesla Cybertruck is an entirely new vehicle, it has to go through every possible test that the end users can perform themselves. The curiosity around the Cybertruck has to be satisfied as it is not a traditional pickup truck like the F-150 Lightning which inherited its genes from its ICE counterpart.
A Foundation Series Cybrtruck owner gave his newly-bought Tesla electric pickup truck to a prominent automotive enthusiast YouTube channel for towing in cold weather testing.
Tesla Cybertruck has an official towing capacity of 11,000 lbs. But the information about how far it goes with this much load attached to it was not available before. YouTuber JerryRigEverything took this upon himself and brought us this missing piece of the puzzle.
Jerry not only pulled 11,000 pounds with the Cybertruck, but he performed this test in freezing cold weather conditions. To amass the required load, he attached a flatbed tow trailer and loaded a Humvee on it. Jerry performed a similar test with a Rivian R1T last year and the electric pickup truck gave a 100 miles of range on a single charge.
Now it was time for the Cybertruck to go through this 11,000 lbs tow test with the added stress of the cold weather and slippery roads with snow.
Interestingly, the Tesla Cybertruck detects the trailer as soon as it is attached with its electrical connectors located on the left side of its tow hitch. As we can see in the screenshot of the Cybertruck center touchscreen display, a trailer icon appears on the left side of the screen as it is attached to the vehicle.
The Cybertruck screen also shows the controls for trailer braking. There are two different settings for trailer braking available here, Trailer Brake Gain and Trailer Brake Boost. Both of these settings can be set at different levels for the required braking of the attached trailer. Tesla Cybertruck also uses trailer brakes for regenerative braking and gaining small amounts of energy back to the battery pack.
The driving visualizations of the Cybertruck don’t render an attached trailer. The screen only shows a car behind following closely. Sometimes it even showed that a Tesla Semi truck was attached to the Cybertruck.
Before the test started, this Cybertruck was charged to a 100% state-of-charge (SoC). Jerry is using a Dual-Motor Cybertruck that comes with a range of 340 miles (547 km). Because of the intense cold weather, and delay in the test start, the Cybertruck’s charging dropped. So, the test started at 302 miles (89%) SoC.
As soon as the Cybertruck starts towing the trailer, it starts to adjust the estimated range according to the attached weight, road conditions, weather, and the ramp (uphill or downhill). According to Jerry, the Cybertruck started showing half of the range as soon as it started moving with the 11,000 lbs towing load (the Rivian R1T also showed similar behavior in its towing test).
Tesla hasn’t added much towing information other than what we shared in the above screenshot. At least an energy consumption graph would’ve provided some more insights into the test. However, Tesla can always catch up by releasing an over-the-air software update as both Rivian and Ford show a ton of towing information.
Jerry drove the Cybertruck on a highway and kept the speed between 60-70 mph. The trailer tires are also rated for this speed limit in this specific test case. However, the Cybertruck drove very smoothly and the acceleration did not feel laggy.
However, the Cyertruck reached 0-60 mph acceleration in 12.4 seconds while towing 11,000 lbs in this test.
Result
Tesla Cybertruck drove 90 miles (~145 km) while towing 11,000 lbs on this trip before the battery was almost drained. It used 108 kWh of energy. On average, it consumed 1,193 Wh/mi (watt-hours per mile) of energy while towing its max capacity.
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