Episode 552: The $60,000 Cybertruck Seems to Be a Hit

On this week's episode of Ride the Lightning, the Tesla and EV podcast, the newly offered

$60,000 Cybertruck seems to be generating plenty of demand, but its price is already going up.

Plus, Model Y's recent interior changes appear to be imminent for the Model 3,

Lamborghini abandons its EV plans and more.

What's happening friends? From scorching San Francisco, we had summer in February here today,

very strange, but a nice change of pace for us when it's often not even 75 degrees in July.

My name is Ryan McCaffrey, welcome to Ride the Lightning, your weekly Tesla and EV podcast,

publishing on March 1st, 2026, recording here in the evening on Friday, February 27th.

I've got a tired Lily the Silly Labrador just out of sight from me after a nice little warm

weather walk and a nice chill Daisy the Boxer looking out the window to my left.

Zelina has gone back home, it was so nice to have her here for just to have a nice visit.

It was like she was at summer camp. She didn't have to be a service dog, she just got to play with

two other dogs for a week, so that was fun. Well, I want to say thank you to all of you.

I got so many supportive messages after my sort of unplanned rant, I didn't intend to

to get as riled up as I did, but talking about the $60,000 Cybertruck last week and the whole,

well, only for 10 days comments. So thank you to those of you that sent me a supportive comment.

And sure enough, since last week's recording, we do have a clarification and update on the status

of the $60,000 Cybertruck. And I want to caveat this before I continue a moment further, that by

the time most of you hear this, you know, this episode publishes on March 1st, the price of the

$60,000 Cybertruck, the standard all-wheel drive version, will be going up on the day this episode

comes out. So this is one of those rare times where the recording and publishing of this podcast

just falls into a spot where it's, it kind of leaves me, leaves me hanging out to dry a little

bit. I wish I could get you the accurate information, but in any case, we'll see what happens. I guess

whatever did happen as you're listening to this, you can either not along if I get it right, or you

can just smile and laugh if I get it wrong. But we did get a clarification this past week from

Tesla CEO Elon Musk of the many people that responded to his very vague post of, you know,

only for 10 days that I was talking about last week, one person asked, how much will it be in 10

days? And Elon responded, quote, depends on how much demand we see at this price level, end quote.

And then after that, we got a proper clarification of this on the Tesla.com website,

on the Cybertruck Design Studio, where at the very top of the Cybertruck Design Studio page,

highlighted in gold, it says very clearly price increases after February 28th. And so

Elon's comments seem to suggest that if they did see sufficient demand for it,

they might keep that price. And now all of you know the answer to that. I mean,

it does seem like there's demand for it. I'll get to that in a second. But keeping it at that price

does not seem like it's going to be the case according to the wording on the Tesla website.

And so when the price goes up by the time 99% of you are hearing this, it's a question of how

much, how high it goes from the $60,000 it's at. My heart says $65,000. My brain is planning for the

what I would consider a worst case scenario at $70,000. I can't imagine it would be $75,000,

because then it's right on the heels of the premium all wheel drive at $80,000. So I think

70 is the ceiling, 65 is probably the best case scenario. So we'll see. Again, you all know the

answer to this as you're listening to me do this podcast. But circling back to what I meant by the

there does seem to be demand for this $60,000 version of the Cybertruck, the estimated delivery

window is showing for me here in California as a quite vague 2027. I just checked again right

before recording this because when I'd initially made my notes for this week's podcast earlier in

the week, it was showing for me as September to October. So now it's pushed all the way back to

2027. Does that mean January, February, 2027? Does that mean November, December, 2027?

We can't be sure. And I guess if you're placing an order with your $250 non refundable order deposit,

you're not going to know for a little while, at least the answer to that either.

Now this variant isn't going to start delivering at all until June. So if Tesla is already booked

out six plus months, six to 18 months, I guess we have to call it. It's probably closer to six

than it is to 18. But again, we don't know for sure. So if they're already booked out six plus

months on this variant, it means they're getting orders. Now that is, there is one thing we have

to reasonably consider here. And I promise I'm not trying to reign on the parade. And this isn't

what I think is happening, but we have to acknowledge the possibility. The possibility is

that Tesla is simply not allocating very much Cybertruck production to this $60,000 variant,

which again is possible. I don't think it's in Tesla's best interest to be making people wait

six to 18 months to get a $60,000 Cybertruck. So I don't necessarily, not necessarily,

I don't subscribe to that reasonable hypothesis that it's a very limited slice of the Cybertruck

production allocation, but it's, it's not all of it, right? Because if I choose the premium

all wheel drive version, which I would say prior to the introduction of this $60,000 version was

probably 90% of Cybertruck production. Because again, just anecdotally what I see on the street,

because I do see lots of Cybertrucks here in the San Francisco Bay area, I would say maybe one in

10 Cybertrucks are Cyberbeasts, you know, with the Cerberus three headed dog logo in the back

right corner of the tailgate. So the new $60,000 all wheel or whatever it costs now as you're

listening to this, but the new regular all wheel drive version is cutting into that allocation

somewhat, not, not the Cyberbeast allocation, but the premium all wheel drive allocation.

So five to seven weeks is what it shows for premium all wheel drive. 2027 is what it's showing

for the basic all wheel drive. So I mean, my best guess would be that it splits down the middle,

that if it was 90, you know, 90% was premium all wheel drive, it might now be 45 premium, 45

regular all wheel drive and 10% Cyberbeast. So regardless, whatever the number actually is,

Tesla is clearly getting a bunch of orders if they're showing 2027 as the deliveries if you

place an order for one today. Now here's another sign that they're getting as if that wasn't enough

of a sign, but here's another sign that they are getting orders for this thing. You can no longer

order it with a referral link, meaning you cannot get a $1,000 discount unless it's your own code.

You can still use a loyalty bonus, the loyalty benefit. If you're an existing Tesla owner,

if you have a car, you have a Tesla account, but if you're a new Tesla customer using someone's

referral link, you can no longer get $1,000 off and get it for $59,000. That was the plug was

pulled on that in the middle of the week. And so I just want to come back to the criticism that I

was levying last week. I do stand by it introducing a variant for 10 days, especially after you've

sent out formal company marketing emails, I got one, did you, announcing that new version with no

mention of a timeline being on that $60,000 price. It's not great. Now to Tesla's credit,

they did send out a second email this past week that did mention the February 28th deadline that

the price would be going up after February 28th. And so the question is, well, why did that happen?

Why did it go down the way it went? And my best guess is probably because the content team or

in-house marketing team that crafts those emails probably didn't know about the 10 day thing when

they were crafting and sending those emails, because it probably wasn't communicated internally

if it was even premeditated at all, or given that it was posted by the CEO in the middle of the night,

he may have just decided it. Maybe there was some meeting that day about the truck and,

oh, we're barely making any money on it, and he may have just decided in the middle of the night,

you know what, let's just cut this off after 10 days and we'll see what demand looks like.

And then he just goes ahead and posts on X without running it by anyone, because that's how this

company has always operated. And mostly that's been a pretty good thing in terms of their nimble,

their quick, they make moves that generally favor the customer, but in this case, again,

I just feel like this really could have gone down a lot better. As I said last week, I just think

it's just not fair to the Cybertruck team who busted their tails to put together a good $60,000

version of the Cybertruck that was actually compelling without presumably losing the company

money on each unit sold. And like I said, I also don't love how you're treating customers,

especially with the follow-up, because you're basically holding a figurative gun to your

customer's head saying, oh, you like this $60,000 Cybertruck? Well, it sure would be a shame if it

went away in 10 days if not enough of you buy it, and then it's seemingly going away anyway.

I mean, most people can't make a car purchasing decision in 10 days

if they weren't already planning one. A car is a huge purchase. I imagine a lot of people got

that first email that Tesla sent out announcing that new $60,000 trim and thought, okay, yeah,

cool, I'll be super interested in that when we're ready to buy our next new car later this year or

next year or whatever. But they circle back around months later or a year later, whatever,

and find that the price has gone up possibly out of their budget range. Well, they're not going

to be happy. They're going to have gotten excited about it, and then it won't be available to them.

So I don't love it. I'm disappointed by the way it was handled. It is what it is. Now,

you could say you could make a case here in defense of the way this has gone by saying, well,

anybody could go ahead and just lock in the $60,000 right now or as I'm recording right now,

not by the time you hear this, but you could lock it in by just putting in an order with that $250

non-refundable deposit. And if your number comes up, if the time's not right for you,

or you change your mind, whatever, then you're out $250, but if the timing does work out for you

whenever your name comes up in line in 2027, and it all works out, then you do get to take

advantage of that $60,000. So I see both sides of it. I still don't love how this went. I'm

definitely less upset about it this week than I was last week. But again, I'm really curious

what the price is going to be. If it's $65,000, again, you all know the answer to this right now

as you're hearing it, but if it's $65, honestly, just being honest, as upset as I was last week,

if it's $65, that's still a pretty, I think for what this truck is, the range, the performance,

the utility, I went over all of it last week. I think $65,000 would still be pretty appealing

to a lot of people. If it goes to $70,000, or even, I'll say this, if it's above $65,000,

I think that's where it's going to lose a lot of the enthusiasm, a lot of the momentum

that it's had for this past week plus since it was originally announced. So I hope it's

no more than $65,000. Maybe there's even a world where it's $62,500. I feel like that's

maybe unlikely. I don't know why I have nothing to go on that but my gut, but

we'll see when you're listening to this. I'll be waiting to see. I'll wake up on Sunday morning,

and the first thing I'll do is, well, the first thing I do on Sunday mornings is check to make

sure that this podcast went up okay, because I schedule it in my RSS feed, my hosting service,

and then I'm at the mercy of Apple Podcasts and Spotify and all these guys to pick it up and

publish it properly as scheduled through my hosting service. So that's always my first thing. It's

no joke. That is the first, first thing I do when I wake up on Sunday morning. But the second thing

I'll do is check to see what the price of the standard all-wheel drive Cybertruck is. But

again, you know, this whole thing, it just, it could have been avoided if they had said

from the get-go. This is an introductory limited time offer, $60,000 for this Cybertruck.

It's only going to, you know, if it had been messaged this way from the beginning,

I certainly would not be nearly as upset for, for customers or for the Cybertruck team,

but it's just because it didn't go that way and the way it went, I just feel like my, my gut says

that this wasn't a planned thing, that this was a CEO decision in the middle of the night for,

and I'm not saying he didn't have good reason. He, I'm sure he, you know, he's, he's put together

a trillion-dollar company. I have not. I have never done that and I probably never will do that.

So, you know, I, I get that there's, there's a level of trust that a lot of people have there,

but I just, you know, we all make mistakes. We all could handle certain things differently.

And I feel like I just, I wish this had been messaged better from the get-go, but in any case,

it is definitely worked to some degree because Tesla is, is booked out on the

standard all-wheel drive Cybertruck into next year. But yeah, this, this is again,

this is why most companies have communications teams to get on the same page with messaging

before you go out with your message. But in any case, I'm, I'm, all we can do now is move forward

with what we have. So in the meantime, well, at least while I wait for what the new pricing is

going to be, as promised last week, I made the new $60,000 Cybertruck the subject of this week's

Patreon poll, which I remind you is open to everybody. It's totally free. You don't have

to be supporting me on Patreon. You don't have to be giving me a dime on there. Just stop on by

my page once a week. The poll usually goes up on Tuesday nights. My, my Patreon page can be found

in the link in the description or just by going to patreon.com slash Tesla podcast.

And the poll question was temporary or not, and it was, how do you feel about the $60,000

Cybertruck variant? Thank you to the over 300 of you that voted as of the time of this recording.

And not surprisingly, 46% said I'm not interested in the Cybertruck at any price.

That's perfectly reasonable. It's a full-size truck. A full-size truck is not for everyone. However,

I think what's interesting in this poll is the 31% of you that said I would at least

consider this version, whereas before I would not consider an $80,000 Cybertruck. So I thought

that was pretty telling here. And then after that, it's single digits. 9% of you said this is the

right price for me. I'm ordering one or I will eventually, if it sticks around beyond 10 days,

8% of you said great price, but the air suspension is a deal breaker for me, understandable.

And 7% of you voted $60,000 is still too expensive in my book. And you know,

something I didn't talk about last week that I think is worth mentioning real quick before I move on

is that $60,000 in 2026 is basically equivalent to the $50,000 dual-motor Cybertruck that was

originally announced in 2019 for $50,000. And that truck was promised to be a 300-mile range.

I believe, if memory is serving me correctly, I think it was 300 miles. And I forget what the

zero to 60 they said was. But basically, the short version here is with the inflation we've seen

between 2019 and 2026, the $60,000 version that they have been offering here for the last 10 days

prior to whatever price it went up to, basically is like it is Tesla fulfilling that promise.

Now, the Cyber Beast is still way past the $70,000 price point, even with inflation

from 2019. And it certainly doesn't have the 500-mile range that was mentioned in 2019.

But that middle truck, the $40,000 one has not come around and might never. But that middle one,

Tesla arguably just delivered it. It just took them, well, seven years from the announcement

and two plus years from the beginning of production to actually get it out the door.

So Tesla does deserve, I think, a lot of credit for that because that was such a big part of

the initial interest in the Cybertruck and then the subsequent lack of demand for it when it went

into production, right? So many people, including so many of you, put a reservation down that $100

refundable reservation down for the Cybertruck, largely on the fact that they were offering

either a $40,000, 250-mile range truck, a $50,000, 300-mile range all-wheel drive truck,

or a $70,000, 500-mile range, what we now know as Cyber Beast. And so the fact that they have

delivered the middle one of those, which is arguably the one that, I mean, of course,

the cheapest one would probably sell the most units. But in terms of features, performance,

like everything, the fact that they basically have delivered on that middle one now,

I don't want to let that go unnoticed. Tesla, I think, does deserve kudos for making that happen.

Next up this week, the Model Y's recent interior changes appear to be imminent for the Model 3.

Saw this one on Drive Tesla Canada, who wrote,

back-end references discovered in Tesla's EU and China configurator assets by ex-user

Tesla underscore NL underscore TR, point to the addition of a new trim code,

IN3PB, Interior 3 Premium Black. This code is tied to a black headliner and has already been mapped

to 2026 Model 3 Performance and Premium Vins. Following that same trend, another upcoming

addition is a new entry spotted in Tesla's electronic parts catalog called display underscore

16 underscore QHD, which clearly refers to the larger 16-inch QHD display that was

also recently added to the Model Y. Multiple 2026 Model 3 builds associated with this component

are marked with a green dot, suggesting the hardware is already in production or imminent.

At this point, none of these changes have been officially announced by Tesla.

The references were discovered within Europe and China configurator assets and back-end systems,

but they have not yet appeared in public ordering pages. While this should certainly surprise no one,

at least none of you listening to this, this is clearly going to be one of the differentiators

between the standard and Premium versions of both the 3 and the Y. With the Y already getting this,

it's inevitable that the 3 would follow suit and probably sooner rather than later,

which is exactly what appears to be happening. I'm sure I said as much here at the time, but

I do really like the black interior. I think it looks better personally.

I just think black interior, excuse me, black headliner will look more premium to most people,

and I did a Patreon poll on it back when the story broke about the Model Y switching over

to black headliner, and the plurality of responders in that poll did feel the same way.

So yes, I do think this will happen quite quite soon. It just makes too much sense from a supplier

perspective, right? If you look at it from Tesla's point of view, you want to have the Y

and the 3 headliner material be mostly all one color and not a bunch of one color and a bunch of

the other color. If they can instead have their supplier be providing like 80% of the black for

the Premium and Performance Ys and the Premium and Performance 3s and then 20% gray headliner

material for the rear wheel drive Y and the rear wheel drive 3, that would presumably allow them

to get a better deal on the black headliner than if it were more of a 50-50 or 60-40 kind of thing.

At least that's my best guess. I acknowledge I'm not a supply chain expert, so I might be wrong

here, but just even setting that aside, it does just make sense that the 3 and the Y would

follow the same interior design language since they both pretty much have the same interiors,

and again, they'll still have the light gray for those non-Premium cars,

but I do think those are probably going to represent a minority of what's built overall across

both the 3 and the Y. Before I continue with the rest of this week's Tesla and EV news,

I want to mention this week's Lightning Round episode over on Patreon. For those of you kindly

supporting my efforts here a weekend and week out with Ride the Lightning, I've been at this

for 552 weeks straight, and I'm super proud of that, and super grateful for those of you that

choose to support me and my family with Ride the Lightning here on Patreon.com slash Tesla podcast.

Every week for the most popular tier, which is the $10 per month tier on my Patreon,

I do a Lightning Round mini episode, and if you join today, you get access to all of them,

and there are over 180 Lightning Rounds now. There's so much content, and honestly, I really

had fun with this week's because I kind of didn't have a plan for it before I started. I was like,

okay, what do I want this to be? Anyway, the Lightning Round this week is the five EVs

I'm most excited about in 2026, and I don't want to sound like the clickbait thing,

like the clickbait blog kind of deal, but I guarantee you you're not going to guess all five.

Like even the first one, which I went five, four, three, two, one, number five will surprise you,

which I know sounds like ridiculously clickbaity, but anyway, if you'd like to hear that as well as

the other 180 plus Lightning Rounds, you can join me on Patreon, support the podcast, I'd be so

grateful if you were willing and able to do that to find out all the information and to

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once a year annual pledge, there's a 10% discount on that if you'd prefer that rather than being

billed monthly. And then a quick note for my EV owners listening out there, and I'm not just

talking to Tesla owners. One thing that comes up pretty regularly here is how long people keep

their cars. I'm one of those people. We've got, let's see, the shortest, I don't know, I've always

kept cars for a long time, so has my wife. And it turns out statistically, a lot of Americans at

least, I don't know about Europe so much, but we have the data for the US and people are keeping

their cars longer and longer. And so whether folks realize it or not, there is a timing element

to ownership that matters if you're thinking about doing an extended coverage plan. So when it

comes to EV coverage, it's not really about if you buy an extended coverage plan, it's about when.

Coverage is generally more cost advantaged when it's purchased before your factory warranty ends

rather than after. And that's because pricing eligibility and available options change with

time and mileage. Even if nothing's wrong with the car, think of it like tires. That's a good

analogy, right? You don't wait till they're bald to plan your tire replacement. You're looking at

mileage, wear timing, you're planning it all out, you're on top of it. EV ownership works the same

way. And my friends at Accelerate Auto with their X care plan, I'm a customer myself on our 2018

Model 3 performance, X care helps EV owners understand where they are now, what changes later,

and when it makes sense to act. And if you'd like to learn more, you can go to their website

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online, you can use the referral code lightning at checkout for $100 off if you're doing it over

the phone. So again, xcare.com, referral code lightning for $100 off or call 844-755-4186.

Next up this week, Tesla is not backing down in its efforts to claim ownership of the Cybercab

trademark, filing a formal challenge with US regulators against French beverage company

UNIBEV whose earlier filing is blocked Tesla's application.

Saw this one on Drive Tesla Canada and they wrote, according to newly filed documents submitted by

the US Patent and Trademark Office Trademark Trial and Appeal Board, boy that's a lot of words,

you need to acronym that better guys, obtained by Electric, Tesla's filed a detailed opposition

against UNIBEV accusing the company of fraud, bad faith filings and attempting to capitalize on

Tesla's growing portfolio of cyber branded products. The dispute arises from a complicated

trademark timeline that's been unfolding for months. Tesla publicly revealed the Cybercab

during its WeRobot event in October 2024. However, UNIBEV had already filed for the name in France

earlier in 2024 and submitted, later submitted a US application on October 28th, 2024 before Tesla

filed its own paperwork in November. Under trademark law, earlier filings often carry

significant legal weight which previously resulted in Tesla's application being suspended while the

competing claim remained active. In its February 18th, 2026 opposition filing, Tesla outlines

five separate legal arguments challenging UNIBEV's claim to the name. Tesla alleges the beverage

company falsely told the US Patent and Trademark Office that no other companies were using similar

Cybercab branding for related products. The automaker argues that claim could not have been

accurate given the extensive publicity surrounding the Cybercab reveal two weeks earlier.

The company also questions whether UNIBEV ever had legitimate plans to produce vehicles or

transportation services covered under the trademark classes it applied for. Tesla says the filing

fits a common trademark squatting strategy, registering high profile product names outside

a company's core business in hopes of later negotiating a payout. Tesla's filing also points

to connections suggesting awareness of the automaker's branding, noting UNIBEV's principle

follows Elon Musk and other Musk family accounts along with SpaceX on social media.

I must preface this by saying that I am certainly no lawyer or judge,

but based on what Tesla's filing points out, it would sure seem like Tesla might have a real

case here, at least using the barometer of common sense, which is all I can really apply since I

don't have the legal knowledge. If any lawyers out there do want to reach out and tell me how long

something like this typically takes to reach a resolution, one way or the other, whether it's

going to go Tesla's way or not, I would appreciate it because that's the part I'm really curious

about. I mean, obviously I'm curious about the result, the ruling, if Tesla will be granted

the CyberCab trademark or not. But I'm curious, is this a situation that's going to linger for

months and months because CyberCab is supposed to basically be released like officially launched

in about six to eight weeks from now? So that's coming up pretty quickly. So I don't know if this

is going to be a months and months legal hassle or something that would be wrapped up in weeks.

Either way, I will keep you posted on this because it will be mighty big news if Tesla ends up unable

to use CyberCab because a beverage company beat them to the trademark filing. Now, as I had said

in this initial story, it does seem like, and again, any legal experts, any lawyers out there

can please correct me if I'm wrong on this. But the fact that Tesla waited until well after

the public unveiling of the car at the WeRobot event, that seems like a misstep on Tesla's part.

However, on the other side, as Tesla claims that the company Unabev falls, again, falsely told

the patent and trade office that they were filing under the transportation services or

vehicle production. So that seems like it's open and shut right there. If Unabev,

why didn't they just file it under beverage, like CyberCab, Sauvignon or whatever? I'm curious now,

and if so, if there are any legal eagles out there that want to help me out on this, I'd certainly

be grateful. But it does seem like Tesla has a pretty good case here against Unabev, and again,

we'll just see how long it takes to play out. I think maybe last time, when this had initially

come up, I thought that it probably would just end in a settlement, and Tesla pays them some money

and gets the filing. And maybe that's Tesla's penalty if in fact they should have filed their

trademark sooner. But in any case, regardless of that, I do think that's probably a decent

probability of that's how this turns out is Tesla does go ahead and settle, which I know

might say, well, then the trademark squatter is basically winning here. But at the end of the day,

Tesla's a massive company with massive piles of Scrooge McDuck cash in their silo, and if they

want that cybercab name bad enough, if the appeals process doesn't go their way, then they might

resort to just paying them out. We'll see. But an interesting twist in the case, no doubt there.

Moving on here, in Tesla news that will affect all of us directly, Tesla's working reportedly,

working on a major wiper upgrade. I saw this via Tesla Reddit user ConfidentImage4266 who posted

in the Tesla Lounge subreddit and said, software 2026.2.0 something something something, they're

not revealing the number maybe for some sort of security reason, like if they reveal the number,

it can be traced back to them. I don't know, but an upcoming software build reveals a new vision

system currently being tested under the name wiper underscore vision underscore v five underscore

shadow underscore mode. So here's what appears to be changing per this Reddit user. The system now

uses full surround camera vision, not just the front cameras, it can detect water spray from

vehicles ahead, and it can identify reflections and mist forming on the hood. Tesla seems to

pardon me tongue twister there, Tesla seems to specifically be targeting drizzle and road spray,

which are the exact conditions where current auto wipers tend to struggle the most,

credit to X user Tesla underscore n l underscore tr. Again, we're hearing from them,

they get the shout out again on that one, which is which is pretty cool. The feature is still running

in shadow mode as the title of that line entry in the code suggests, meaning it's active for data

collection and testing, but not yet controlling the wipers directly. So interestingly, as an

addendum to this, the original poster on X that's referenced there for the second time in this podcast,

by the time that I saw this post on Reddit a few days after it initially went up,

I clicked the original source link because that's always journalistically a sound thing you want

to do is don't just take the word of the reporting site, click through to the original source and

check it for yourself, make sure there's no misinterpretation or anything like that. But

anyway, so I clicked through to that original source link from that X user, and that post

had been deleted or removed. I don't know, it just said when I clicked through it said this page does

not exist. So hopefully this is real, because it'd sure be great if Tesla was about to roll out a

significant improvement in the windshield wiper functionality for us all. Now to Tesla's credit,

at least in my experience, the wiper situation has gotten a good bit better recently,

which I do want to say I very much appreciate. But if we really do have a new fifth generation

revision coming, hopefully it can finally get us to the point where the wipers work reliably

at the right setting for any given condition and, big one for me at least and probably for most of

you, they don't do those annoying and quite frankly somewhat embarrassing dry wipes anymore.

When you're just driving down the road on a sunny day and the wipers go off. So hopefully some good

news there, we'll have to see. This is probably something that's not going to appear in release

notes for an update, because I don't know, I mean Tesla's never, they've never put this in notes

before, probably because it might be seen as something of an admission of guilt that the

wiper activity is not great. So I guess we'll have to maybe wait for Tesla NLTR or maybe a green

the only to dig into the code and tell us once it's active, once they see it in there and it's

happening. In other EV news this week, I've got a few stories, one, two, yeah four of them in fact,

in the other EV news department. The Lucid Group released its fourth quarter and full year 2025

financial results showing strong delivery growth and record revenue, but also highlighting the

continued financial challenges facing the automaker as it attempts to scale production and work toward

profitability. Another tip of the cap to drive Tesla Canada who reported in 2026, Lucid expects a

significant increase in output, issuing production guidance of 25,000 to 27,000 vehicles, potentially

more than 50% higher than its revised 2025 production total of 17,840 units. Beyond

increasing production of the gravity SUV, Lucid is also preparing for its next growth phase.

The automaker confirmed plans to begin production of its upcoming mid-sized platform vehicle

while advancing autonomy efforts tied to planned robot taxi deployments with Neuro. However,

challenges remain. The company recently announced its third round of major layoffs,

affecting roughly 12% of its U.S. salaried employees as part of a broader effort to improve

efficiency and control spending. So the layoffs are terrible news and I don't want to minimize that.

But what I do think is the most notable, at least the most exciting thing, because layoffs are certainly

the opposite of exciting, but the most exciting thing here is the news of the mid-sized vehicle.

Will that really go into production this year? Like, can Lucid really get their Model 3 fighter

out the door less than 12 months after shipping the gravity? I'm not saying they can't do it,

I'm just saying recent history is telling us it's really hard to do. Tesla has arguably never

shipped two cars within 12 months of each other. Model S debuted in 2012, Model X shipped in 2015.

Both of those cars saw big delays. Model 3 of course in 2017, Model Y in 2020,

Cybertruck in 2023, and the Cybertruck of course also had some significant delays.

Now unless you want to count the new Model S shipping in June of 2021 after the Model Y came out in

March of 2020, so still not quite a year, but even then I don't know if I want to count that

because it wasn't a completely new car, which is what Lucid's doing here, with the gravity

totally new car and their mid-size, which will be a totally new car. But even if we did count that

for Tesla, going from Model Y to new Model S, that's still 15 months, not 12. So I mean, I guess

the new Model 3 and the Cybertruck were right about the same time, but again, I'm not counting it for

this thought exercise. But the point is, I'm skeptical of Lucid, especially while it remains

in its still pretty young state as a car company, just launching two completely brand new vehicles,

12 months or less apart. I am skeptical, but I'm not, again, I'm not down on it,

I'm rooting for them, rooting for any and all new good EVs, especially more affordable ones,

but his recent history says it's the odds are against them that they'll get it out that quickly,

but regardless, I'm eager to see that car and I hope it can compete because there are just,

there really aren't a ton of EV sedans out there. I mean, we can always use another good one

in the marketplace. You've got the Model 3, you've got the Ioniq 6, you've got the BMW I4,

and that's, I guess, well, what? There's the Mercedes EQS, the sedan version, but that's,

yeah, that's a big car, that's not a mid, so I guess, yeah, in terms of midsize, it's Model 3

and it's Ioniq 6. I think, I'm struggling to think of another one, at least here in the United

States, in terms of midsize EV sedans. So, I would love to see it or, well, we will see it,

I will look forward to seeing it. I know that SUVs are the thing that the market wants,

but I've always been more of a sedan guy, so I'm looking forward to seeing what Lucid reveals.

Next up this week, Lamborghini has abandoned its EV plans. I saw this one on Inside EVs,

who wrote, Lamborghini is all about the drama of noisy combustion engines, but we weren't surprised

when it unveiled a pure EV with plans for production since, like all car makers in Europe,

it faced a 2035 year gas engine ban. However, with the ban postponed, it turns out it's not

going to happen after all, since the manufacturer isn't willing to invest in producing a vehicle

that it's not sure will sell. Lamborghini CEO Stefan Winkelmann recently talked to The Sunday

Times, saying it would be, quote, financially irresponsible for the company to invest heavily

in the department of a pure EV when interest in such a model is, quote, close to zero.

But is that so? The electric vehicle in question should have been the production version of the

Lanzador EV, revealed in August of 2023 at the Pebble Beach Concourse Delegance.

It would likely have undergone changes during its transition from concept to production,

but it would have remained a high riding SUV like 2 plus 2 coupe grand tourer with an electric motor

powering each axle, delivering a combined output of over 1360 horsepower. The original plan was

to launch the Lanzador in 2028 or 2029 as a pure electric vehicle. The model could still arrive

though with plug-in hybrid power instead. We will see an increasing number of performance plug-in

hybrids as we get closer to 2035 when automakers must cut their CO2 emissions by 90% relative to

2021. Lamborghini also has no intention of building a larger electric SUV, but it already

offers an Urus, I think that's how you say that, the Urus P8 plug-in hybrid electric vehicle

with 789 horsepower and up to 37 miles of pure electric range.

Well, this is a bummer, and for me it only makes me root for Ferrari's luce that I've been talking

about recently more than I already was since if the luce is a success, perhaps it will inspire

their longtime rivals, Lamborghini, to go ahead and take another crack at getting into the EV game.

Now, I don't know about all of you, but for those of you around my age, I'm talking about

80s and 90s kids who grew up with supercar posters on your walls, I've always liked both Lamborghini

and Ferrari. I've never been a big Porsche guy, like I've never driven a Porsche of any kind,

but in terms of just the supercars in posters on my wall, I've always loved Lamborghini and Ferrari,

but if you made me pick, I would say even as a kid, and probably this is still true today,

I would still say I would pick a Lamborghini over a Ferrari, just personally, totally subjectively,

obviously. Nothing against Ferrari, but I've just always loved the aggressive,

fighter jet-like wedge designs of the Lamborghinis. I mean, when I was a kid, I definitely had a poster

of the Lamborghini Countach on my wall when I was fairly young, and then later I had a Lamborghini

Diablo poster on the wall. And I will say, I was always obsessed with the scissor doors too,

that Lambos had, because Ferrari always had regular doors, and it just wasn't as cool.

So, I've always preferred Lambo, and I would love to see Lamborghini make a Pure EV, but for now,

go luce, let's go Ferrari, let's show Lamborghini what it's missing.

Next in other EV news, Rivian is planning to scale its service infrastructure as more of its

electric trucks and SUVs hit the road, announcing a significant expansion aimed at improving ownership

experience ahead of the highly anticipated launch of the R2. One more tip of the cap to drive Tesla

Canada, who says, according to Rivian, more than 50 new service centers are scheduled to open through

next year, pushing its global network beyond 150 locations by the end of 2027. Larger,

higher capacity sites are planned for regions where Rivian ownership is most concentrated,

which I would presume would be the Pacific Northwest, because any time I'm up there,

it seems like Rivians in the Seattle area are like Teslas in the San Francisco area,

where they're just everywhere. So I would guess that higher concentrated areas are Seattle,

San Francisco, and LA. Anyway, getting back to the story, I lost my place here.

Yes, while customers in less densely populated areas will increasingly rely on mobile support

options. Mobile service has already become the company's most popular service method,

and Rivian plans to increase its fleet of service vans by 50% through this year. At the same time,

Rivian has been expanding its workforce to support growing demand. The company says it added and

trained more than 1,000 service specialists over the past year alone, while continuing to hire

additional technicians for both new and existing locations. Those investments appear to be having

an impact, with Rivian reporting a 35% reduction in service scheduling wait times compared to

the previous year. Well, you love to hear this. Service, as you may recall from the early Model

Three days, was the number one thing that I kept harping on on this podcast with Tesla,

as they were in the initial part of their own major growth spurt from a low- to mid-volume car

company into a high-volume one. And I guess, as we sit here in 2026, we can probably say that

it seems like Tesla's done a fairly good job of keeping up with the necessary growth on the

service side with the growth of the fleet itself. Could Tesla use more service centers? Well, sure.

But I don't really read about any serious issues with service or wait times for service or locations

out in the Tesla community. Again, not to say that there aren't pain points, but

it seems like Tesla's done a pretty good job of it. But I guess the point here is, Rivian,

they're already starting to scale up on the service side, which is very reassuring because

they're only just about to start significantly increasing their production and delivery volume

with the R2. The R2 can be awesome, but if you can't get any service support when you need it,

because service isn't available in your area or if it takes weeks to get a service appointment,

even when there is a service center in your area, well, guess what? People aren't going to recommend

your car to friends and family, or they're just not going to be happy and they're not going to

become repeat customers. So hopefully, Rivian is riding the wave well here and they won't get

swallowed up by that wave. They'll continue to ride it and be able to keep up with service

infrastructure and service needs as their fleet grows. And the last story that I have for you this

week is about NHTSA. The administrator there has announced that the agency will be holding a major

event on autonomous vehicles on March 10th, so coming up very soon. Credit for this goes to our

Tesla tipster friend, Sawyer Merritt, who posted on his ex-account saying with a quote from the

actual agency, the first portion of the meeting will feature keynote addresses from the Department

of Transportation Leadership and Industry Executive Panel discussions on key automated driving

systems topics. The second portion of the meeting will build upon the ADS workshop held last November.

NHTSA gleaned valuable information from stakeholders on various topics. In this subsequent meeting,

NHTSA intends to gather specific input on potential actions, including potential future

guidance to the safe domestic development, testing and deployment of ADS-equipped vehicles.

Well, the timing of this is certainly interesting as it pertains to Tesla, because of course

that previously announced April timeline for the formal launch of the cyber cab.

Could this be an announcement of a new federal level policy that will allow for inputless vehicles

to operate on public roads? Because remember, even the Waymos are jaguar eyepaces that still

have steering wheels and pedals. So if you're a Tesla shareholder, you are probably crossing your

fingers hoping that that's exactly what this announcement is so that the cyber cab or whatever

it's called pending this trademark dispute can get out on the roads and start making money for Tesla

in April. So we shall see in just a little over a week here.

Alrighty, that's everything I've got for you in the world of Tesla news.

Stick with me though, I will be right back with your ride the lightning hotline calls coming up next.

Happy electric motoring. Welcome to the next segment of the podcast,

which is where I get to hear from all of you. It's the ride the lightning hotline,

your chance to call in and ask questions, leave comments or discussion topics for the podcast.

If you would like to participate and potentially get featured on an upcoming episode,

there are two ways to do that. Either submit your question, comment or discussion topic

by making a voice recording on your phone's voice recording software, try to keep it to

90 seconds or less please so that I can get to as many callers each week as possible,

and email that file to me at teslapodcastatgmail.com or you can take that same 90 second or less call

and just actually call in and leave a message on the ride the lightning hotline. The toll free

number is 1-888-989-8752 that number again 1-888-989-TSLA. And if you know someone special out there

with an upcoming birthday, anniversary, graduation or some other special occasion,

you can give them a unique gift of recorded voices from friends and family telling them why

they're special. The recordings can be podcasted or put onto a keepsake. If you'd like to learn

more, visit lifeonrecord.com. First up this week is Dave from Florida responding to Brian from

last week's episode about the CyberCab not fitting all use cases for multi-stop errands and whatnot.

Go ahead Dave. Hey Ryan, Dave from News Summer in the Beach, Florida. Hey just responding quickly

to Brian's call on episode 551 about how the CyberCab really doesn't fit certain use cases.

And as you mentioned, a higher option certainly sounds like a great idea. So much for hour or

so much for hour plus a small amount per mile, something like that would solve that expedition

type of shopping experience where you're going from one store to the other. And I think that's a

perfectly reasonable request to make. Second, waiting for arrival. If you're waiting 15 minutes

for the cab to arrive, what if you simply integrate calendar functionality with it

so that you can have a checkbox in your calendar that says I need transportation for this.

And it would automatically route a request to Tesla or to Uber that says I need transportation

from here to there and I'm leaving at this time. And the service level would be, you know,

the ride would arrive 10 to 15 minutes prior to your necessary departure time.

Give you time to get in and get everything set up. And especially with the CyberCab,

there's really no cost to sitting around, maybe a nominal cost, and then it gets you there and

you're on your way. So that could be from appointment to appointment, etc. depending

on availability in your area. Just my thoughts. Take care.

Thank you for this call, Dave. I do love this idea. Our cars already integrate with our calendars

if we allow them to. And actually I do because I find it super useful when my car already has

the destination loaded in the nav because it's pulled from the appointment on my calendar. So

presumably it would be relatively trivial to add it to the RoboTaxi app and RoboTaxi experience.

I think your suggestion is great. I am happy to co-sign it and try to help speak it into

existence. Thanks so much, Dave. Next up this week is Mel from North Carolina.

Hey, Ryan. This is Mel from Fayetteville, North Carolina. I'm calling about,

so I'm a longtime Tesla owner since 2019. I've got a Model Y and a Model 3.

But currently here over the past couple of months or so, I don't know what I pressed

or if everyone else is having this problem. But when I go to unlock my door,

the passengers cannot get in unless I open up the driver's side door. I can't even get in

the passenger side or even open my trunk unless I open the driver's side door first,

lean in and press the unlock button that is popping up on my screen. I'm at a loss.

I've been all over the dashboard. I should know this stuff because I've driven Teslas forever,

but I'm stuck and I'm frustrated. And it's something that I need someone to reach out and

or give advice back or maybe you know, but it's driving me crazy. Yeah, so anyways,

that's my shout out to everybody. I don't know where else to go other than reaching out to you

and the Tesla community to say help. Thank you. Hello, Mel. Although I am definitely not the best

source for tech support, I acknowledge I am happy to try and help. And I have one suggestion that

I'm hoping will solve this for you. And if it doesn't, then I'm not sure if there's anything

else to be done except making a service appointment to try and get Tesla to diagnose it at a service

center. But if you go into your locks screen in the car settings menu, you will scroll down and see

driver door unlock mode in there. If that's checked, uncheck it. The description, I went

when enabled, the driver door and charge port will unlock when the key is detected near the driver's

side of the vehicle. Holding down the interior driver door button will unlock the rest of the

vehicle. That's what it says in the menu there. So maybe based on your call, based on what you

were saying, maybe that somehow got enabled on you, maybe it just accidentally got checked

somehow. So give that a go. I hope that helps. If it doesn't, I think you're probably going to

have to take it in for service on that one. So Mel, good luck to you. I've got time for

one more call this week. It is a reaction to the $60,000 Cybertruck from last week and then

Elon Musk's subsequent 10 day limit on it. Here's Bill from Wisconsin. Hey Ryan, it's Bill from

Chippewa Falls, Wisconsin. Again, I've had a little chance to settle down here and I was thinking

about more about why Elon would have tweeted about that new trim of the Cybertruck only being

available for 10 days. I wonder if this was him intentionally trying to keep that trim from being

wildly successful because he's so all in on autonomy. And as he said in the recent earnings call,

they want to start selling Cybertrucks with no steering wheel or pedals for cargo delivery.

Maybe he's trying to submarine his own product so he can say, see, we need to start making them

as an autonomous old caption. I would hate that, but maybe that's where he's going with this.

Just spitball like, see ya. Well, Bill, I am absolutely here for conspiracy theories, but

while I'd love to put my tinfoil hat on for this one, I would have to think that if that were really

the case, Tesla never would have offered this $60,000 version in the first place. Again, I guess

we'll have to wait and see until, well, in my case next week's episode to see what the new price is

or if by some miracle the price doesn't go up and the demand is strong and per Elon's tweet,

it stays at $60,000, but we shall see. You'll know when you hear this, but I'm looking forward

to finding out. Bill, thanks as always for your call. I do appreciate it. And thank you to everybody

that kindly took the time to call in this week. I promise I will get to more of your ride the

Lightning Hotline calls on next week's episode. And with that, we move along to what's going on

with me and my car. I call this segment the Soul of Adventure. My car is clean, ready to rock. I

will say I'm continuing to stay vigilant with FSD usage in the new car in the AI4 car. I'm up to

98.3% FSD usage, which means, because I've seen this already from, from keeping an eye on it,

when it gets to 98.5, it will round up and show 99%. So I've still got some driving to do, but

this weekend, if it goes well with FSD, could roll me up to 99% FSD usage. So I'm just happy

to have it clean because we're supposed to have beautiful weather this weekend. I do need to clean

my wife's car, the 2018, the spirit of adventure. That's got to get clean this weekend,

but the weather should cooperate for it. So I always enjoy that again. I've said this 100 times,

but I just, I can't explain it. I just find the act of cleaning the cars cathartic in some way.

It just makes me happy to do it. So I'm always happy to do it. And this is the weekend for one of them.

An entertainment recommendation for you this week. This one is for adults only, not in any sort of,

not in the way you're thinking, but it's a video game. It is, uh, is rated M for mature,

new release this week, huge new release, biggest game of the year so far, Resident Evil Requiem.

The ninth main Resident Evil game that series has been going for 30 years now. And the new one is

excellent. I am looking forward to digging into it myself. It's available for PC, PlayStation 5,

and Xbox series X and S. So if you're into scary games, survival horror, Resident Evil,

basically invented the genre and the new one is exceptional. So give that a look if that sounds

good to you. Time now for your pro tip of the week. It comes from John in West Virginia. Go ahead, John.

Hey, Ryan. This is John from West Virginia. Thank you for what you do.

So I've been running into an issue from time to time to where my music has been paused because

I've used the voice navigation or I've used McGroch and the music does not restart.

What I have discovered that it says music paused for voice navigation.

In order to get this to unpause my music, if I press my right scroll wheel once,

then swipe down to cancel out that voice command window, I'm able to restart my music.

I hope this is helpful to somebody. Thank you and have a great day.

Oh, this one is super handy here. Thank you so much, John. This is quite useful. Always love tips.

It doesn't matter. Big or small, any pro tip is useful. If it makes your Tesla or EV experience

even 1% better, then it's a worthwhile pro tip. Thank you very much, John. Appreciate you calling

in with that. And a reminder, if anybody else out there has a good Tesla or EV pro tip of the week

that you'd like to share with me and your fellow Tesla and EV owners and enthusiasts,

I would love for you to call in with it and you might potentially be featured on an upcoming episode.

Now, I only play one pro tip a week by design, so I promise, though, I will eventually get to

your pro tip of the week if you send one in. So how do you do it? Just send it in like you would

a regular ride the lightning hotline call, which I gave you the two easy call-in methods for that

just a little while ago, so refer back there. Let me mention a few friends of ride the lightning

that can hopefully be useful to you here, and then I promise I will bid you farewell for the week.

I'll start with RPM Tesla. They offer over 1,400 Tesla products that ensure compatibility with

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to pay for return shipping if you're dissatisfied with the product. Their product return rate is

less than 3%, allowing them to offer free returns, zero restocking fees, and lifetime warranties.

RPM believes selling high quality products and standing behind them fosters brand loyalty.

They also have over 600 DIY installation videos on YouTube and Vimeo,

so installing their products is simple and very detailed. For all Tesla owners,

visit RPMTesla.com and use the promo code RPMRTL for an additional 5-10% off your next order.

Yes, this will be combined with their current discounted sales prices. This exclusive promotion

is only available here on RTL. So again, that's RPMTesla.com, promo code RPMRTL.

AbstractOcean.com, so many great aftermarket accessories, lots of useful stuff, plenty of fun

stuff too. It's a nice mix of practical, useful things and also fun things. Whether you've got

well really any of the Teslas, whether it's an S3, XY, or Cybertruck, or even the Rivians as well,

they've got products for those. Everything from lighting kits for the inside and outside of the

car, they've got the puddle lights, they've got the custom fit tempered glass, gorilla glass,

screen protectors for all of those vehicles that I just mentioned, all the Teslas and the Rivians.

Just so much stuff, I encourage you, if you've never taken a look on their website before you

listen to this part of the podcast and maybe you've just heard it enough where you're like,

okay, yeah, that's fine, just give it a quick, just trust me, just take a pause right now on the

podcast, just take out your phone or if you're in front of a computer, just go to abstractocean.com

and click on whichever vehicle you have in that top banner there and just see what they've got.

I guarantee you'll find something you like and if and when you do, put it in your online shopping

cart and when you get to check out, use the coupon code RTLpodcast to get 15% off of your

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The Infinity Shield is the ultimate garage door opening and closing sensor. You know,

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full coverage garage door sensor utilizing 25 beams. Yes, it detects any protruding bumper,

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and use promo code RTL at checkout for a $35 discount. Again, that's

infinity-shield.com promo code RTL at checkout for that $35 discount.

The snap plate, that's the one I recommend if you either want or are legally required to have a

front license plate on your vehicle, go to everyamp.com slash RTL and from there you're

going to choose which vehicle you have and from there you're going to choose either the snap plate

which is safety optimized with breakaway features to sacrifice itself in a worst case scenario

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bucks more I think. I haven't looked recently. It is strength optimized with hardened features

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front plate on your car get the snap plate or the snap plate plus and again there's a discount

available. Go to everyamp.com slash RTL and use the coupon code RTL at checkout on whatever product

you end up purchasing. Immaculate reflections that is my detailer. If you are in or going to be in

the greater San Francisco Bay area with your Tesla or other car that you love get in touch with Jeff

at Immaculate Reflections ahead of time get on his schedule get an appointment by going to IR

detailing.com and then from there you can click the contact button in either the upper left corner

of the page or right in the center of that home page. You can reach out and discuss with Jeff

what's your budget what do you want to have done to the car he will work with you whether it's

paint protection film on some or all of the car whether it's ceramic coating on the car you know

so that's that's going to take the place of traditional wax maybe you want to have paint

correction done to get your paint finish looking better than ever and dare I even say better than

new whatever it is Immaculate Reflections will do an awesome job on your car I will personally

vouch for that I've had both cars done at Immaculate Reflections and the work really is

just pristine I couldn't be happier with it and you will be too again IR detailing.com and when

you reach out to make your appointment just make sure to mention upfront that you're a ride the

lightning listener and politely request the ride the lightning listener discount.

Again my Patreon found at patreon.com slash Tesla podcast that is how you can voluntarily

choose to support the podcast if you like my hope is that eventually and maybe this is the week

that I will earn your support and even once I earn it I've got to continue to earn it every

single week and that's why I make sure this podcast comes out every week it comes out on time

for the Patreon backers it comes out early I do that lightning round mini episode every single week

so there's just so so many of those that become instantly available to you if you join at that

most popular ten dollar per month tier all the tiers all the information it's all there

at patreon.com slash Tesla podcast or click the link in the episode description we also have a

really nice lively community there too there's a there's a sort of chat channel like a kind of

like a discord of sorts in there there's where where everybody just kind of keeps an open dialogue

it's the chats the group chat in the open open tesla discussion chat in fact we just welcomed in

Scott Sheper who's the newest maximum plaid backer I'll give him his proper shout out here

in a minute but Scott chiming in after joining the patreon saying what's up everybody just joined

fellow tesla nut here and he got warmly welcomed in so come come join me come join everybody

over on patreon we have a good time in fact this coming weekend as you hear this this first weekend

to march we will be having our march patreon zoom hangout it happens every month that is for the

folks at the maximum plaid tier or higher so that one's reserved for the upper tiers however

if you pledge at any tier or upgrade any existing pledge you do get a one-time thank you invitation

to whatever the next month's patreon zoom hangout is so that's I'm just I'm doing my best to say

thank you for your generous support on patreon so I am looking forward to our next zoom hangout

coming up because we always always always the hour flies by we always have a fun time chatting

if you are not already following this podcast it's totally free to do I recommend doing it on

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means you don't have to remember to go hunt down each week's new episode your follow your

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spotify tune in or youtube podcasts or pretty much all the big ones just search ride the

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you're done the referral program is back or at least I guess it's not back it's that mine got

reset so you can use my code again if you want to I'm not here to push it I'd say use somebody

else's code if you have somebody else in your life but if you're buying an s or x before they go away

or a three or a y or a cyber truck now the again the the whatever it costs now

base level cyber truck is not available for that thousand dollar discount the premium and

cyber beast cyber trucks are uh s and x are a thousand dollar discount three and y if you buy

with a referral link you get three months of free fsd so anyway if you need a referral code

you know find some buddies but if you just don't have anybody in your life with one

you can use mine type in ts.la slash ryan73014 in any browser it'll take you to the tesla

landing page choose your car configure it submit the order and once you do that it'll it'll have

the order submitted with the referral bonus baked in finally you can follow me on x and or on

instagram I have the same username on both that username is dmc underscore ryan you can always

email me anytime about tesla or ev related things at tesla podcast at gmail.com finally I'd like

to say hello and thank you to those top tier patreon backers who do get invited to the monthly

patreon zoom hangout each month looking forward to seeing and chatting with a whole bunch of you

I'll start with the maximum plaid tier and that newest maximum plaid backer Scott Shepard Scott

welcome thank you so much for your generosity and your support on patreon I hope to see you at this

weekend's patreon zoom hangout and a big thank you and hello goes out to the rest of the maximum

plaid backers they are Jonathan Wales Cameron Clark Daniel Grummer Seth Capello the Galpin family

Ryan from New York City Darren Nicholl Cos Barnes Patrick Wisnesky Todd Badger Joe Edgel

Kevin Yank the tesla owners club of San Joaquin Valley Will Steadman Jeremy Harris Chris Beech

Tom Mills Cory O'Donnell Aaron John Cody Joel Sap Paul Casarino Chris Osborne KB Adam LaVoy Jason

Chalukis Travis Krenzel Bruce Otterstein Tom Behan Josh Pennington John from Cream Ridge New Jersey

Dustin Hart Derek Finley Charles Clement Damon Klein Jeff Brown Jerry Slinger Kenneth Corbett

Brian Bertoglio Kim Bae Troy Sievers Chip Hooper Matt Chinander Robert Moran

Rob Christopher Mann Michael Williams and Eric Harbert next up the Roadster in Space tier backers

who on top of everything else get a one-on-one hangout with me each month if they elect to

utilize it and it's always fun to talk to these folks big thank you to Pete White Lyle Austin

Steve Radspinner Fernando Cordero Lawton from Chicago Sean Knightig Neil Weaver Jackson Wallace

Rolf and Jennifer Evers Howard Anthony Smith Victoria Ayacaveto Tesla Hitchhiker 42

Cara Weston Robert from near Philly American Home Contractors Doug Carey Michael Gallo and Tony

Figaroa and finally the grandfathered in plaid level supporters big thank you and hello to George

Cassiopo Logan Willis Peter Chalet Eric Randolph Dory and Steve Guberman the Tesla owners club of

Taiwan Ron Lee Charlie Gillespie Jeff Angwin Chase Cabanillas the Lydia family Aaron Altshule Jared

Brown Jamie Dalton Mike and Barbara from Louisville Matt Nixon the Tesla owners club of Wisconsin

ish not Elon Musk in quotes Peter and the Bear Boys of Colorado and that will wrap it up for

episode 552 of Ride the Lightning your weekly Tesla and EV podcast this was a fun one for me

hopefully you enjoyed it thank you so much for your time your attention your enthusiasm your

support in whatever way you're giving it whether it's on patreon or just by listening each and every

week I do appreciate you all I don't take any of you for granted because you know when I started

this thing I was pretty much just talking to nobody I was talking to myself and I just put it out

there and I kept putting it out there week after week and tried to keep getting better and slowly

over time an audience built up and so I'm just I'm so grateful I know again I don't take it for

granted I could I could lose lose you all tomorrow if I if I don't put out my best effort

week in and week out so thank you to all of you super appreciate everything and with that

I will bid you adieu saying happy electric motoring and I'll see you back here next week

music

Elon Musk people don't like Elon Musk the guy founded PayPal and Tesla and people are like

also have you been in a Tesla have you been in a Tesla my buddy let me drive his Tesla I laughed

out loud at how fast it went been clinically depressed my entire life on dozens of medications

in a Tesla for 13 seconds cured forever I mean I think a Tesla is the most fun thing you could

possibly buy ever that's what it's meant to be our goal is to make it's it's not exactly a car

it's actually a thing to maximize enjoyment it's maximum fun

Episode 552: The $60,000 Cybertruck Seems to Be a Hit

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