CyberTruck illegal in EU?

Crissa

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And with the rules being up in the air right now and the design not having been tested yet, we just don't know how hard it will be to get the Cybertruck into the EU.

It's a square peg that we know needs to be whittled down to fit different rules, but we don't know how round the hole really is, either.

-Crissa





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Luke42

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And with the rules being up in the air right now and the design not having been tested yet, we just don't know how hard it will be to get the Cybertruck into the EU.

It's a square peg that we know needs to be whittled down to fit different rules, but we don't know how round the hole really is, either.
Remember that the automotive design cycle is 3-5 years for most car companies.

In practice, all of the regulations have to be hammered out 5 years in advance if the regulators want a snowball's chance of anyone following them.

The only exception I can think of would be something like the side-mirror regulation where they're essentially removing a requirement (or providing an alternate means of compliance) due to industry pressure.

The European pedestrian safety regulations have been in place for a while, and aren't going anywhere. The Cybertruck will have to comply with those regulations if it is to be sold in nations which follow European vehicle safety regulations (which is most of the rest of world, really).
 

Crissa

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But the pedestrian requirements were supposed to be published last year and weren't. So far it's just a published result like the other auto safety ratings and getting a fail on any one doesn't mean it's banned.

-Crissa
 

Luke42

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But the pedestrian requirements were supposed to be published last year and weren't. So far it's just a published result like the other auto safety ratings and getting a fail on any one doesn't mean it's banned.
The pedestrian safety standards have been in effect since at least 2012. See:
https://www.euroncap.com/en/for-engineers/protocols/vulnerable-road-user-vru-protection/

The publication (ratification) of the revision is the end of the rulemaking process, not the beginning.
 

madquadbiker

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We just don't know. It depends on how they treat it - several existing American SUVs are sold in the EU in small numbers but have aggressive front grills and even less slope so...

We don't know until they test. Crumple zones will be part of the design, that's not a problem.

And one-offs are always harder to license.

-Crissa
I’ve got to have one so will not give up, the U.K. will be totally independent by the time the CT is in production but if for any reason they are not officially imported to the U.K. (this would suck) I will buy one from our Australian cousins or from Japan, both of these countries are not far away from signing free trade deals with the U.K.
 

Crissa

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Crissa

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madquadbiker

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Our problem is the government and the wider establishment are still stuffed with remainers, they still haven’t got over the fact of losing the referendum and that we will be out of the eu on January 1st 2021. You should hear them shouting about your chlorinated chicken and how unsafe it is, obviously this is utter nonsense as anyone that has spent any time in the US knows full well there’s nothing wrong with the process.
So until we are officially out these doom and gloom predictions will keep coming. Any news where the bbc is involved will always favour the eu, we now call it the Brussels Broadcasting Corporation.
 

carpedatum

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This is at least the second thread I've seen here on this topic. I think it is worth pointing out two things:

1) At least one major design feature of the Cybertruck prototype would actually make it illegal to sell it in the United States under current regulations - the lack of physical external rear view mirrors. Tesla's designers propose that there is another way and that we should be considering the whole problem. Could we do _better_ than physical rear view mirrors? In fact, we can. US regulations, once upon a time, demanded that every car have two 7-inch round sealed-beam headlamps. Regs can be changed, and can be made more results-based. We now have much better headlamps and much more flexibility in their design.

2) The clear intent of EU regulations regarding pedestrian safety is to reduce the number of dead people. Go EU! However, it is a sad compromise to suggest, as the current regs do, that we need softer vehicles because they are going to hit people no matter what we do. There is clearly a better way.

Make cars that don't hit pedestrians. At least, except in bizarre situations where even the softest of crumple zones would still produce dead people. You do that by not leaving the whole problem to the driver.

I invite folks to try searching Youtube with "tesla avoids" or similar. Then remember that we still don't have FSD. The design of the Cybertruck assumes pedestrian safety through collision avoidance. Otherwise it would be irresponsible and unsafe, and Tesla operates under a safety microscope.

The EU regs will probably have to change, sure, before CT can be sold there. However I believe the path to that is obvious - testing. If EU regulators can demonstrate to themselves that it would be safer overall to have more pointy stainless steel vehicles on EU roads that pretty much CAN'T hit a pedestrian, than to keep those vehicles away, I believe they'll probably find the language to allow them.

They'll need motive, of course. Tesla can lobby and it can demonstrate safety, but I think that when these things start rolling out of the factory in Austin, y'all in the EU should start making some serious noise.
 

Luke42

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The only part of this that's up in the air is the UK trying to decide if they want to align their standards with the US or the EU. Or, they could do what Canada does and recognize both US and EU standards.

The European safety standards are not up in the air. If you want to sell EVs in Europe, you follow the European safety standards. If you want to sell EVs in the US, you have to follow American safety standards. If you want to sell a single car model in both, you have to figure out how to meet both standards with the same car.

There's nothing nebulous or unpredictable about this.

The dodgiest thing about this is that it creates a non-tariff barrier to trade, and that's by design.

The part that's up in the air is that UK is still figuring out if they're European or not. The articles imply that they're not just going to accept American standards the way the Canadians do. It's ultimately up to the UK to decide what standards they'll use.

P.S. In a rational world, the US and EU car standards could be harmonized creating more-better international trade, along with cheaper cars and a wider selection of models for everyone. But we don't live in a rational world.
 
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Crissa

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There's nothing nebulous or unpredictable about this.
Oh, but we don't know what the rules will be in 2022-23 when they plan to ship to the EU. They dicussed stricter rules, which would block the Cybertruck, but didn't choose them. But so far it's just new ratings.

-Crissa
 
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Well, this discussion took of a little :)

Cheers for all the inputs!

So far, all i have been able to gather is that a lot of people seem to have information - but its always a dead end. Literally, no one knows how the CyberTruck will get through regulations, so guess all we can do is wait :p

Really fucking hope it will get through though - its sick!!
 

Crissa

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Note the five words Elon said about it, and the article put 'scrapped' but nowhere did Elon say they scrapped plans.

Even when he said it wouldn't pass EU safety, he didn't say they weren't planning, just that it wasn't a priority.

We spend so many words trying to expand what they didn't say...

-Crissa
 

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