Tesla Cybertruck Becomes Undrivable After Touchscreen Stops Working – Lost the Primary Gear Selector & Visibility Out the Back

Dennis Fung is a Tesla Cybertruck owner who recently encountered a uniquely Cybertruck failure. The issue started when he got into his truck, and the screen wouldn’t turn on.

That’s frustrating enough; however, the Cybertruck uses the center touchscreen as the primary way to select gears. In addition, images from the rear camera displayed on the center screen is the only way to see clearly out the back.

After losing these capabilities, Dennis says he was forced to get his truck towed.

Dennis shared his predicament on the Tesla Cybertruck group on Facebook. Here is what he wrote…

“I don’t need to wait for Halloween for a horror show—I got into my Cybertruck today, and nothing happened. The car wouldn’t start, and the screen stayed completely black. I tried the mobile app, and everything seemed fine. I could unlock and lock the car, pop the frunk, open the trunk—you name it. But the one thing it refused to do? Start.

I must’ve tried rebooting the car a dozen times—still nothing on the screen. Then, I had a lightbulb moment: the backup shift buttons! They worked! So now I know the car itself is alive, just the touchscreen decided to take a nap.

So here I am, calling Tesla’s hotline and requesting a tow because without that rearview camera, I’m not about to drive this thing. Now I’m sitting in the car, waiting for the tow truck, courtesy of Tesla’s Uber credit for the day. But can you believe it? I’ve only had this truck for five days and under 500 miles, and it’s already pulled a trick on me!”

Below his post, Dennis shared several pictures from inside his Cybertruck as the vehicle was getting loaded onto a tow truck.

In most vehicles, if the screen stops working, it’s merely a nuisance; you can at least drive the car until it gets fixed.

However, as mentioned above, on the Cybertruck, Tesla has removed all physical controls and moved everything to the center touchscreen. This gives Tesla vehicles a clean, futuristic-looking interior; however, in the real world, things break.

Currently, all Tesla vehicles, except the Model Y, have done away with all physical controls. Everything including the gear selector is now on the center touchscreen.

On the recently unveiled Robotaxi, Tesla has even gone one step further. The vehicle doesn’t have a physical mechanism to open the door; the doors are controlled by the massive 21-inch touchscreen.

At this point, you might be thinking Tesla provides a backup mechanism to select gears. Yes, that’s true. As Dennis mentioned, the Cybertruck has a secondary gear selector.

However, these are deemly lit capacitive touch surfaces on the roof of the vehicle. They are enough for emergency situations, for example to temporarily position the truck.

That said, it’s going to be exceedingly difficult to rely on these buttons to perform day-to-day driving tasks. I can’t imagine the horror of trying to do a five-point turn using these buttons.

Putting the gear selector issue temporarily to the side. The second limitation that forced Dennis to get his Cybertruck towed is rear view visibility.

The Cybertruck famously has an exceedingly small rear view mirror. This coupled with a small rear window and high tailgate, it’s nearly impossible to see out the back using the mirrors. As a result, a lot of Cybertruck owners have chosen to remove the rear view mirror from their trucks.

When the center touchscreen is working, this is not that big of a deal. The rear view cameras can project the image onto the large 18.5-inch screen.

However, as I have already said, things do not always work as intended. In Dennis’s case, it appears that more than the gear selector issue, the rear visibility concern is what forced him to get his Cybertruck towed.

The third issue we want to address is reliability. As Dennis mentioned, his Cybertruck screen failed only five days after he took delivery, and after he drove it only 500 miles.

As I have reported multiple times in the past few months, Cybertrucks have an alarmingly high failure rate. The Cybertruck issues are concerning even when compared to Tesla’s other vehicles.

Overall, it’s interesting to see how Tesla’s minimalist interior is holding up in the rear world. Let me know what you think about some of the decisions Tesla made with the Cybertruck. Share your ideas by clicking the red “Add new comment” button below. Also, visit our site, torquenews.com/Tesla, regularly for the latest updates.

Image: Courtesy of The OCD Plug

For more information, check out: Tesla Quadruples the Reservation Price for the $16,000 Cybertruck Range Extender Battery Pack Following the Collapse of the Cybertruck Reservation List

Tinsae Aregay has been following Tesla and the evolution of the EV space daily for several years. He covers everything about Tesla, from the cars to Elon Musk, the energy business, and autonomy. Follow Tinsae on Twitter at @TinsaeAregay for daily Tesla news.