Engineer, automotive enthusiast, woodworking hobbyist, and arguably the dad of the year, Vietnam-based ND Woodworking Art has an entire YouTube page dedicated to documenting his art – building luxury cars for his son out of wood. Sure, some dads stand in line to buy the latest Hot Wheels set… ND Woodworking Art just gathers a ton of lumber and builds the cars to his young child’s scale, creating functional wood automobiles that don’t just feature opening doors and turning wheels – they even have engines, brakes, batteries, and even lights inside them. Given that we’re now nearing the delivery date of Tesla’s most anticipated vehicle, the YouTuber decided to just go and build one for himself. Made entirely out of wood sitting on a welded metal chassis, ND Woodworking Art’s Tesla Cybertruck is one of his biggest builds yet. It’s a tad bit smaller than the original pickup truck (which has seen its fair share of controversies and delays), but comes with all the bells and whistles. You’ve got not one but two sets of opening doors, functional headlights and taillights, positionable rear view mirrors, a rear truck bed that opens, and perhaps the icing on the cake, a functional Tesla Cyberquad in the back, just as Elon had showcased back in November of 2019! As a celebration of Musk’s impact on the tech world, the YouTuber also carved the X (formerly Twitter) logo onto the driver’s door, filling it with epoxy resin and adding lights inside that make the logo glow when the car’s lights are switched on. The video above documents the entire 100-day process, culminating in one of the sweetest finales as the father and son ride together on the road in the Cybertruck and the Cyberquad!
Designer: ND Woodworking Art
While Tesla’s struggled (rather miserably) with meeting Cybertruck delivery timelines, encountering multiple design and manufacturing hiccups along the way, ND Woodworking Art had no such problem. Clearly not his first rodeo, the dad put together a schematic, began building the chassis, and layered it with wood, polish, and lights in just a span of 100 days. Let’s say, the Cybertruck’s angular design made things a lot easier, given that the YouTuber has worked with more challenging organic builds like this incredibly complex miniature Bugatti Centodieci. It’s no bulletproof metal, but then again that’s Tesla’s problem.
What’s more, the truck even features a load-bearing bed at the back that can hold items like a Cyberquad. The tailgate opens up, turning into a telescopic ramp that lets you roll the quad out, just how Elon demonstrated during the Cybertruck’s original reveal.
A look at the telescopic ramp built into the Cybertruck’s tailgate, along with the fully functional quad bike.
The entire process began with a meticulous planning phase, followed by building the car’s chassis out of metal piping welded together. With the original Cybertruck, the space-grade metal body itself doubles as its chassis… but you can’t do that with wooden sheets. The entire car sits on a metal skeleton of sorts, which also houses the car’s electric powertrain.
Once the chassis was ready, ND Woodworking Art began layering it with the wood planks, cutting them, angling them, and nailing/gluing them in place. The truck uses a clever combination of light and dark wood to create some visual drama, while also representing the original car’s metal body and black trims.
Almost every inch of the car gets wood treatment, from the outside to even the inside. The rear gets lined with darker wood as does the car’s interior cockpit and dashboard, featuring light wood chairs and a red wood steering yoke.
The doors open and close just like with any regular car.
The inside features wooden seating that’s carved to resemble cushioned car seats.
This wooden Cybertruck gets a wooden steering yoke to match.
Finally, ND Woodworking Art adds finishing touches to his homemade Tesla. It features a clear sheet on the front as a windshield, along with a functional wiper. The top gets tinted plastic sheets too, giving the car a nice shaded skylight. The front features the classic linear headlight along with left and right indicators, and the rear gets the linear taillight to match. Finally, as an homage to Musk, the YouTuber also embeds an ‘X’ logo into the driver’s door, which lights up on command.
