TESLA

YouTuber debunks Cybertruck rust myth as Tesla lead advises how to clean 'surface contamination'

With all the brouhaha surrounding the 'rusting' Cybertrucks when exposed to rain, Tesla's lead engineer for the electric pickup is dispelling the rumor that its stainless steel body rusts. They call it 'surface contamination' and explain how to clean it.

Tesla's lead Cybertruck engineer recommends simply using something like the CitriSurf 77 stainless steel cleaner ($35 on Amazon) if they want to wipe off the speckles that some owners thought were due to their $100,000 truck rusting in the rain.

He called the reports about Cybertruck rust in the last few days overblown and also mentioned that this is "surface contamination" that can also easily be removed with a Bar Keeper's Friend kit and Scotch-Brite non-scratch pads if needed.

The advice was given in response to a YouTuber who took one such "rust-speckled" Cybertruck and simply polished it with the aforementioned stainless steel cleaning products. As can be seen in Bearded Tesla's video below, the tiny spots are formed by "rust dust" rather than deep corrosion of the Cybertruck's panels after  rain exposure. Tesla's Lead Cybertruck Engineer Wes Morrill has a similar explanation:

Stainless is reactive and free iron that sits on it will rust. It's surface contamination only and can be cleaned off easily. Iron becomes iron oxide until there's no free iron left to convert. In the process it creates red corrosion product which you'll see on the surface. Clean it anytime or don't if it doesn't bother you. It's not the base metal. The specs are about the size of the pin of a pinhead.

As an example, he showed a comparison with a regular dirty white car sitting at a parking lot that had the same "surface contamination" speckles from rust dust on the clear coat.

The "typical clear coat is at most 50 microns thick so a scratch deeper than that cannot be fixed without repainting," he added, while "the benefit of Cybertruck is you can remove a scratch by buffing the metal even if it's super deep" down to a factory finish. Needless to say, Elon Musk chimed in with "Yeah" to the lead Cybertruck engineer's rust explanation.

Daniel Zlatev