The props team has already been working on the models for the vehicle components (you can already see them in some shops), and hundreds of vehicle items have already been made. They are currently making sure that they are all fully release-ready.
Any vehicle released in the last 18 months has already got spaces for all of the vehicle components, and any new ships will be released with spaces for their components. Currently, they are going back through the older ships (such as the Retaliator) to create spaces for the physicalized vehicle components.
At the moment, any component you see inside a ship is not the actual item, but instead just a texture replicating the look of the item. Some ships (such as the Carrack) do have the actual ship components inside the ship. There is currently an issue where the vehicle components are attached to the exterior of the ship (they look like they are placed inside the ship, but they are attached to the exterior), meaning that while the player can see them, they are unable to interact with the components. The vehicle tech team will be working on fixing this issue next quarter, allowing the component to be connected to all the external systems automatically. When this issue is fixed, players will be able to see the component inside their ship visually change when they replace the component.