The Cybertruck's Steering Has a Significant Lag

"Imagine crashing because of your steering ping."

Tesla's Cybertruck is a major departure from conventional automotive design in many ways, from its peculiar shape to its use of stainless steel.

High on that list is also the pickup's steer-by-wire system, which translates the movement of the steering yoke to all four wheels using actuators, foregoing any physical connection.

Tesla claims that the system means that "steering Cybertruck feels more responsive and requires less effort from the driver."

But if a recent video spotted by Jalopnik is anything to go by, the system suffers from a considerable delay between the movement of the steering yoke and the front wheels, raising questions over whether the truck is truly safe to drive.

https://twitter.com/heartereum/status/1797578760797192261

The video quickly drew plenty of derision.

"Imagine crashing because of your steering ping," one user joked.

But as many other netizens have since pointed out, there may be a good reason for the delay.

Other users on Tesla CEO Elon Musk's social media platform X quickly amended the viral video with a Community note, arguing that "without steer by wire would take far longer to make that turn."

"It isn't lag," the note reads. "This is a safety feature."

They may be onto something. Going from one extreme of the steering range to the othertakes a considerable amount of movement of the steering wheel in a conventional car, as one Reddit user demonstrated with his Ford F-150. Besides, completing the maneuver seen in the video while traveling at speed could result in very erratic and potentially dangerous movement, and in extreme cases even flip the vehicle (although you'd have to try very hard to flip a 6,600-pound EV).

The Cybertruck's steering wheel is also designed to translate far more movement to the wheels with relatively little turning of the steering yoke at slower speeds. At highway speeds, that ratio becomes much lower to ensure stability on the road.

"There’s absolutely no real-life scenario in which you need to turn the wheels that quickly while stationary," one Reddit user pointed out.

Car journalists have generally spoken highly of the steer-by-wire system, noting the truck's surprising agility. However, most have also noted that the unusual setup takes time to get used to.

But what about the responsiveness of the steering at higher speeds? What would happen if a Cybertruck driver had to swerve out of the way of an oncoming obstacle, a situation where every fraction of a second counts? As users on Hacker News pointed out, even a minimal amount of lag could lead to a driver overreacting, making the situation worse.

Plenty of questions remain. For one, we don't know whether the delay is present when the Cybertruck is in motion, or how a possible delay would compare to a stationary one, especially when taking its variable turning ratio into account.

Nonetheless, there's a good case to be made that this particular video may have primarily served as a way to take a potshot at Tesla and draw a crowd.

To be clear, there are plenty of other valid criticisms of the unusual pickup, including terrible range, shoddy workmanship, besmirched body panels, lack of manual controls, a finicky and unreliable truck bed cover — and lots of lemons being delivered to customers.

"There's many, many, many, many reasons to hate on the Cybertruck but this isn't one of them," one Reddit user argued.

More on the Cybertruck: Elon Musk Is Gonna Blow a Gasket When He Sees This Pride-Themed Cybertruck