Tesla Cybertruck Gets Bricked While Charging Using a Wall-Mounted Charger – Tesla Engineers Forced to Come Out to the Owner’s Garage to Try to Unplug the Truck

A Cybertruck that died while charging connected to a wall-mounted charger is causing Tesla engineers headaches. Tesla is sending people to the Cybertruck owner’s house to try to unplug the vehicle so that it could be towed to a service center.

Over the past few months, we have seen several bricked Cybertrucks. Most trucks failed overnight as they were parked at home, whereas others left their owners stranded on the road on multiple occasions.

Whenever I see a bricked Cybertruck, I have always wondered what would happen if the truck had died while the charger was connected.

We have seen a few examples of a Cybertruck that was bricked with the charger still plugged in, but in all instances, the Cybertruck was connected to a mobile Tesla charger. This charger is small and simply plugs into a dryer outlet.

This means when the truck gets bricked, the owners are able to unplug the charger from the outlet and tow their Cybertruck while the charger is still connected to the vehicle.

However, what happens if a Cybertruck gets bricked while charging on a wall-mounted charger?  This is, unfortunately, what happened to a Cybertruck owner, Kristoffer, from Kent, Washington.

Kristoffer left his Cybertruck plugged in overnight and set it to download and install the latest FSD software version—FSD 13.2.2. However, to his surprise, the Cybertruck owner woke up the next morning to find his truck completely unresponsive.

Making things worse, as I have already mentioned, the Cybertruck died while plugged into a wall-mounted charger. This charger takes an electrician to set it up and is permanently connected to the electrical system.

This means there is no option to unplug the bricked Cybertruck so that it can be towed to the nearest Tesla service center.

Kristoffer shared his frustrating experience on the Cybertruck Owners Club forum.

Here is what he wrote…

“My Cybertruck received a notification that it was ready to install the FSD 13.2.2 on Saturday, December 21st. The truck was plugged in at 80%, and I had started the update overnight. I woke up Sunday morning, December 22nd, and I could not get into the truck. It was completely dead.

I called in service, and they offered to tow the truck this morning. The tow guy was able to get the frunk to open but could not jump-start the truck to turn anything on.

Since it was left plugged and locked, the only thing it did for us was open the driver’s door. Nothing else. Since he could not get anything open nor take out the wall charging cable, he had to call it in to get a Tesla mobile technician. Unfortunately, they could not get anyone until tomorrow morning.

At this point, I have no clue what is going on. Had a mobile tech on the phone with me, and nothing he suggested worked. I hope this all works out. Family is coming into town and we’re excited to show the Cybertruck in person during Christmas.

Cybertruck is only about 8 months old with 5400 miles. I don’t drive often, glad it was in my shop when this happened.”

Below his post, Kristoffer shared a couple of pictures. The first one is a screenshot from his Tesla app showing that the truck died at 80% state of charge. The Tesla app also says that Kristoffer’s Cybertruck was “last seen a day ago.”

The second picture shows Kristoffer’s Cybertruck with the frunk open and connected to a battery and jumper cable.

This is certainly a frustrating situation to find your truck in just before the holiday season. And making things worse, as I have said, this is the first reported Cybertruck to die while plugged into a wall-mounted charger.

What are the possible remedies?

Tesla has fitted all Cybertrucks with a secondary manual charge port release. A simple mechanism exists; unfortunately, this manual release is located in the truck bed. In Kristoffer’s case, it appears that his Cybertruck died with the tonneau cover closed, which means there is no way to access the manual charge port release inside the bed.

So what to do now? The standard approach is to jump-start the 48-volt battery. This will give you limited operations, including enabling the steer-by-wire system and providing power to drive the vehicle up to a top speed of 5 miles per hour. With limited power restored, it’s possible to better position the vehicle for the tow truck.

However, in Kristoffer’s case, it appears that despite being able to open the frunk and gaining access to the 48-volt battery, the Cybertruck was not able to wake up.

In a previous case of a dead Cybertruck, Tesla engineers were forced to break in through the window and drill open the frunk to jump-start the vehicle. However, Kristoffer should consider himself fortunate because he was able to open the frunk, which means he will not need to resort to these types of measures.

This is the good news; however, in the previously bricked Cybertruck case, the truck was plugged into a mobile charger, which means the owner could easily disconnect the charger from the outlet and tow his truck to Tesla for the technicians and engineers to figure out.

In Kristoffer's case, he cannot disconnect the wall-mounted charger easily. He can get an electrician to properly disassemble the charger from the wall and ship his Cybertruck to Tesla with the charger still connected.

Or, in severe cases, he might resort to cutting the charger cable; breaking the seal and yanking out the charger cable; or breaking the charger port.

Whatever route he chooses, none of the options are ideal.

Precautions to take not to find yourself in a similar situation

If you are a Cybertruck driver, there are some precautions you should take when operating the vehicle. First, lest your truck become bricked, make sure to charge only using a mobile connector.

If the truck dies overnight, you can simply unplug the charger from the outlet and ship it to Tesla with the charger still connected to the vehicle.

On the other hand, if you want the faster charging capability of a wall-mounted charger, make sure to always leave your tonneau cover open so that if the truck becomes bricked, you can access the secondary mechanical charge port release.

Overall, it’s interesting to see what strategy Tesla will employ to extricate the vehicle from the wall-mounted charger. Please let me know what you think in the comments. 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 Tesla, inc.

For more information, check out: Owner Finds His Brand-New Cybertruck Leaking Half a Gallon Of Oil – Tesla Says the Issue Will Take a Month to Fix

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.