JAY'S TINT SHOP Brings JAKEeWRAP to LIFE

Elon's Alien Dreadnaught Brought To Life

JAY'S TINT SHOP

Makes JAKEeWRAP Real

This is a preview of a fascinating story I have been working on for the past 7 years. It's the story of how I finally brought my JAKEeWRAP for CyberTruck to life, and perhaps most importantly how Jay from Jay's Tint Shop in Kirkland, Washington made my dream a reality. The photo below shows Jay in my JAKEeWRAP CyberTruck, after he wrapped it with my two tone concept design what includes my triangular rear sail panel that looks like a third window on the back of the CyberTruck.

Why I Waited So Long 

I purchased my CyberTruck several months ago, which was really strange as I was so prepared to purchase one immediately after they became available, but I held off for two reasons:

1. CASHGRAB Telsa's hardcore cash grab pissed me off so badly, it actually stopped me from initially purchasing a CyberTruck when they first became available. When Elon first announced the CyberTruck, Tesla invited me to attend the formal CyberTruck launch event on November 21, 2019. I was so stoked, I immediately pre ordered one. Elon got on stage and said the CyberTruck would start at $39K, and the Flagship Tri-Motor model would have a range of 500 miles, and cost $69K, as we see below.

It took Tesla 5 years to get the CyberTruck to market, which was far from ideal, but I am ok with that fact, as good things take time, and Tesla had to weather a number of storms, including Covid. What I was not cool with was the severly greedy cash-grab approach that Elon took when he finally launched the CyberTruck, by essentially DOUBLING the pricing, while significantly reducing the promised 500 miles of range on the Tri-Motor model to only 320. 

In my personal opinion, this was the single greatest mistake Tesla ever made. Talk about overpromising, and underdelivering. Not to mention, forcing all early adopters to purchase the "Foundation Series" in order to fulfill their order is a bate and switch if you ask me.

If Tesla had not taken this approach, and actually delivered all models to all people who had pre-ordered them, at the prices they originally promised, I am convinced the CyberTruck launch would have been a huge hit, instead of the complete blunder it ended up becoming. The only greater or equal blunder in Tesla history was Elon's decision to include Falcon Wing doors on the Model X, which was equally foolish. 

Let me be clear: I am the president of the Tesla fan club. I am madly in love with Tesla, and think it's the greatest automotive brand in history. 100% of my criticism is purely constructive, as I would like Tesla to be the absolute best it can be. That being said, there is certain room for improvement with Tesla.

2. Beta Tester: As mentioned, I was so turned off by Tesla doubling the price while significantly reducing range, that once the first CyberTruck models started shipping, I realized that if I bit the bullet and just purchased at that time, I would essentially be a beta-tester, which was also not appealing to me. 

Also, Tesla offered me a ridiculously low trade-in value for my 2023 Model S, which I loved, so the confluence of these three variables made it easy for me to decide to just wait for a couple of years, until Tesla revised the CyberTruck, but that day never came, and I got sick of waiting, so several months ago I purchased an AWD CyberTruck.

Let me be specific about what I was waiting for. I incorrectly assumed Tesla would almost immediately update the CyberTruck design to increase range and fine-tune and dial in all the details. The exact opposite occurred. In other words, Tesla ran the ball down to the 2 yard line and just stopped!?!! Features like the half-baked at best rear view mirror system, with the rear camera that is barely visible when it rains should have been addressed immediately, but two years have gone by with ZERO resolve, which is historically unlike Tesla.

From what I can tell, Tesla has significantly improved the build quality of the CyberTruck, while making ZERO innovative improvements over the past two years. I believe it's likely that just after the CyberTruck launch, Elon was exhausted with product development, and decided to focus all resources on perfecting FSD, which explains why there has been almost ZERO innovation in Tesla vehicles since they started selling CyberTrucks.

On a side note, just to put things in perspective, waiting almost two complete years to finally purchase a CyberTruck and customize it to meet my JAKEeWRAP design reference has been super frustrating. Specifically, many, many readers of TeslaMagazine.org, and RolexMagazine.com have been so inspired they actually wrapped their CyberTrucks to my JAKEeWRAP two tone standard, as we see with the X.com post below, which Elon Musk personally commented favorably upon. 

Just be crystal-clear, the CyberTruck pictured above in the X.com post is NOT mine, as it belongs to an enthusiast who liked my JAKEeWRAP design reference enough to incorporate it 1:1, and he did it over a years ago, so when I would see posts like this I was stoked to see proof of concept, but at the same time it was frustrating to see other people rocking my look, while I was not.

CyberTruck is The Best Vehicle Ever Made 

Let me be clear, I think the CyberTruck is objectively the best, most innovative vehicle ever made in the history of the world. Elon's sales and pricing tactics, aside, I am madly in love with my CyberTruck. As with every Tesla I have owned to date, and I have owned 5 of them, they are always delivered half-baked with a bunch of details that have always required me to bring all my Tesla vehicles back to Tesla service and fight with them about fine-tuning the details to make the vehicles the way they should have been when they were delivered, which is always an exhausting, frustrating and a self defeating experience, which Tesla can and should fix.

The difference now is Tesla is more popular than ever, and Tesla service seems to be completely overwhelmed, in a negative way. For instance, if you want to schedule a service appointment today, there is a 30 day wait until you can get your vehicle into service, which is NOT good. I was told by my Tesla service advisor this is due to the fact that Tesla vehicles are more popular than ever, and they are having a hard time keeping up with servicing all the cars they have been selling.

I took my CyberTruck in to have a number of details fixed, and most of it's done, but I have to return again, to let them finish dialing in all the details, as they were 'too busy' to fix them the first couple of times I brought in my CyberTruck.

Back To The Future 

So enough of the negative, and let's focus on the fun and exiting aspects of CyberTruck ownership, with a focus on my journey to bring my JAKEeWRAP design reference to life.

Let's start back at the beginning. The evening Elon Musk Showed off the CyberTruck in Austin, Texas, I ordered one immediately!!! It's important to understand I am a hardcore design fanatic of the highest order. I eat, sleep, breathe and dream design, and have been a designer for the past 5 decades. When I first saw the CyberTruck, I was blown away by how great it looked, but as the same time, as a designer, all I saw was an incomplete work of art. In other words, I saw what potentially was a masterpiece of design, that looked unfinished and incomplete to me.

The image above was published the first evening as a PR image, and when I studied it, all I could see was a Triangular window system that had been cut off in the back, to look like a 1090s Pontiac Fiero (Yuck!!!!), and I also thought that there was too much silver, or monolithic steel, so I did what I always do, and got to work trying to figure out how to improve the CyberTruck design in order to make it perfect in every way.

The two images and text below are from an article I published on November 11, 2019, and show my exact design thinking:

"I watched the Tesla CyberTruck launch event live, and since I am a designer, thoughts began racing through my mind on how to make the CyberTruck look much better. So I sat down at the computer and started playing with the design. In the image I created below, I extended the geometry of the rear window to complete the pyramid look which could house optional solar panels. Then I painted the bottom of the car a matte black (as seen below) and added a wide red pinstripe, which I think looks super badass!!!! Completing the pyramid windowscape also reminds me of the Nike swoosh logo, which looks like it's in motion when standing still..." —Jake Ehrlich (November 11, 2019, originally published on RolexMagazine.com)

So basically the image above showcased my original concept on how to significant enhance and complete the design of the CyberTruck. The image below shows my actual CyberTruck, taken on December 11, 2026, and it's almost identical to my original JAKEeWRAP design reference pictured above.

On the image below I added a much fatter red side stripe, than on my original 2019 JAKEeWRAP design reference as I later figured out it was much better this way.

In case you were wondering how I came to the conclusion the significantly fatter red stripe was so much better, years ago, I was playing around with trying to figure out the exact details of the JAKEeWRAP, as seen in the image below.

In particular, I was trying to figure out if it made sense to also wrap the top of the funk in black, which now seem like an obviously inevitable choice, and I experimented with making the red stripe the exact same height as the front running light it intersected with, and then it was immediately obvious the geometry organically flowed perfectly...

Step by Step

The image below represents the first step Jay's Tint Shop took, which was to add my JAKEeWRAP rear triangle panel which is cut from STEK glossy black PPF, and we also added the same along the window sills to tie it all together. I drove the CyberTruck for about a week with just the updated windows to test it out.

Step 2, was bringing my Truck back to Jay's Tint Shop in Kirkland, Washington to install STEK Dyno 10 Year PPF in matte black, which has a slight almost satin like finish to it, as pictured below. Jay was so stoked on the design of my JAKEeWRAP he asked me to create a sign for him that featured my CyberTruck wrap for his rear wall, which I included in this image, and I think it looks pretty RaaaaaaD. 

Ironically, the JAKEeWRAP CyberTruck is far from done, as there are several more steps we will be taking, including adding the red fat stripe, as well as figuring out exactly how to handle the top silver area. We are contemplating several different approaches for how to handle the top silver triangle area:

1. Keep it naked, meaning just leave the stainless steel exposed. The drawback of which is that it will show fingerprints, and can look dirty easier.

2. Cover it with clear PPF in Glossy or Matte, then ceramic coat over it.

3. Maybe just use Bar Keepers Friend Gel to get it bright silver, then simply ceramic coat over it as featured in the following detailed video:

So please stay tuned, as I will be documenting the additional steps in articles and in a my upcoming complete video review of the CyberTruck. It will be filled with all kinds of unique insights you won't find anywhere else, like a head to head comparison of the CyberWheels versus the Core Wheels.

If you are located in the Puget Sound area, or anywhere near Seattle, be sure to reach out to Jay's Tint Shop in Kirkland, Washington, as they do amazing tinting and PPF wrap work. You can call them at (425) 825-5560, or check out their website at JaysTintShop.com.

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