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Transportation Power

GM Sells Out First Year of Electric Hummer Production (reuters.com) 115

General Motors said it has sold out the first year's worth of its hulking GMC Hummer EV electric pickup truck after a splashy video reveal on Tuesday. Reuters reports: The GMC website showed a "reservations full" banner over the Hummer EV "Edition 1," due to start production in the fall of 2021. The next version of the truck, the $99,995 Hummer EV 3X, is not scheduled to begin production until the fall of 2022. The least expensive Hummer EV, starting at $79,995, is scheduled to go into production in the spring of 2024, GM said.

The Hummer EV was designed and engineered in 18 months, GM officials said during a presentation on Wednesday. The brawny truck can "crab walk" sideways on rough terrain using its four-wheel steering system, and has a "Watts to Freedom" mode that accelerates the truck to 60 miles per hour (97 kph) in 3 seconds. The Hummer EV is in part a response to Tesla's Cybertruck, which has a very different but equally eye-grabbing design and a bevy of extreme performance features. [...] Startups Rivian, Nikola Corp and Lordstown Motors are among other companies that have electric pickups in development.
Further reading: GMC Hummer EV vs. Tesla Cybertruck, Bollinger and Rivian
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GM Sells Out First Year of Electric Hummer Production

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  • by mccalli ( 323026 ) on Friday October 23, 2020 @05:07AM (#60639086) Homepage
    The more EVs the better, and the more choice the better too. Good for them, carry on.
    • What's better for the environment, A small 4 door car that runs on gas or a behemoth of a truck that runs on electricity generated from coal and natural gas?

      • by drinkypoo ( 153816 ) <drink@hyperlogos.org> on Friday October 23, 2020 @09:16AM (#60639730) Homepage Journal

        What's better for the environment, A small 4 door car that runs on gas or a behemoth of a truck that runs on electricity generated from coal and natural gas?

        False dichotomy. The truck also runs on wind and solar. Also, people who buy these would not likely buy a small car that runs on gas. They would buy a big truck that runs on diesel, or maybe one that runs on a whole lot of gas (like one with a V10.)

        • What's better for the environment, A small 4 door car that runs on gas or a behemoth of a truck that runs on electricity generated from coal and natural gas?

          False dichotomy. The truck also runs on wind and solar. Also, people who buy these would not likely buy a small car that runs on gas. They would buy a big truck that runs on diesel, or maybe one that runs on a whole lot of gas (like one with a V10.)

          Where I live the electricity is mostly from the hydro generators in the nearby dams on the Columbia river.

        • i still think that the best option is a fuel efficient car for daily driving, and an older, used truck for the occasions that need a truck. Unless you're a contractor or tradie that is regularly hauling 4'x8' sheets of plywood/drywall; or otherwise need a larger bed and/or towing capacity -- having a truck that pulls 20 mpg as a daily driver is kinda silly.

          for example: used f150's are pretty effing reliable, and there are millions of them. Buying a brand new vehicle for the most part is more abo

          • I fundamentally agree, and I'm angling for one of those 7-lug F250s despite the weirdness, if it turns out to be salvageable. They're sort of like a F150 SD. But then I'll get rid of my car, because I can't reasonably maintain two vehicles. I recently have moved into 4x4 country, though, and have reason to own one again.

          • Domestic cars should run on electricity. Trains, airplanes, should run on cleaner fuel like propane, or hydrogen gas or whatever, Boats shoud be nuclear powered. A small 10x10 reactor for a 220volt xxx amps producer. If there is a market, there will be such a product.
      • In many areas of the United States, the percentage of Energy that uses Coal especially have reduced. And Many states (even those Red ones) have a power grid that is supplemented by Solar, Wind, Nuclear and Hydroelectric.
        If you look at Electric Cars MPGe which is an attempt to do the conversion you see that the bigger electric cars are well over 60MPGe.

        Also Power Generation isn't like running your car, where it is turned off when you are not needing it, These power plants are always running, perhaps at diff

  • by Anonymous Coward

    Being the only 3 to be able to purchase a first generation overpriced thing.

    Artificially creating a situation where you run out of stock simply to generate headlines (free advertising!) is awful. You should be forced to disclose how many were available.

    • The only Traditional Automaker that seems really interested in Electric is VW. And that is because it got really walloped with the Clean Diesel scandal, and forced to build an electric car infrastructure. So they might as well use it.

      But the other Traditional Automakers are still pushing the old idea that Electric Cars are Slow, Limited Range and Expensive. So we have GM making the Hummer, While not slow, Its range is less than most Tesla, and much more expensive. Just to show that they are "Interested"

    • The version they're selling for the first year is the one that costs >$100k. It's not at all intended for mass-market.

    • The price isn't that far off from the original Tesla Roadster (which is also a , nor is it that far off from how much the original Hummer cost back in the day.
  • by EnsilZah ( 575600 ) <EnsilZahNO@SPAMGmail.com> on Friday October 23, 2020 @05:34AM (#60639128)

    ...one would need to know the number they're planning to produce, which doesn't seem to be mentioned anywhere.

    • by nospam007 ( 722110 ) * on Friday October 23, 2020 @06:01AM (#60639156)

      "...one would need to know the number they're planning to produce, which doesn't seem to be mentioned anywhere."

      Doesn't matter, they sold both of them.

    • by BAReFO0t ( 6240524 ) on Friday October 23, 2020 @06:15AM (#60639194)

      Artificial scarcity seems to work, even with still imaginary things.
      I learned that from the media "industry", after they were left with no actual phyical media to sell.

      • by Anonymous Coward

        Exclusivity is a play on the tribal nature of man. It's a very profitable angle to market on.

    • It is still significant if you were thinking about buying one the first year but not willing to put down a deposit ahead of time.

      Now, the deposit is only $100, which is weird. It must cost GM about that much to administer the deposit plan. It's not like $100 per first-year vehicle is helping them develop the thing. So clearly it is about marketing, 100%.

      • I'm pretty sure deposits usually sit in some sort of escrow account until delivery anyway, regardless of the amount.
        The significance of the deposit is that it's different threshold of commitment to put money down, even if it's a refundable $100, than just filling up a form online (like in the case of Nikola where they let any schmuck who can operate a browser pre-order 20 Semi trucks and then boast about the order numbers), and I assume they can also cross check the credit card data.

      • $100 is how much a Cybertruck reservation costs. So they're probably just matching the "industry" going rate.

  • Nikola (Score:5, Insightful)

    by gavron ( 1300111 ) on Friday October 23, 2020 @05:46AM (#60639134)

    "...startups ... Nikola..." You might try reading the news more often. Nikola is dead. They videod a truck going downhill, said they wouldn't product a pickup truck, GM walked away from investing, and their shares dropped so much because NOBODY wants to invest.

    No, Nikola is not a startup competing with GM. They're a failed fundraising scheme.

    Too many links to post. Slashdot, ArsTechnica, Popular Mechanics, CNN, etc. These mice have eaten the cheese and nobody wants to buy them more cheese. There won't be a "Nikola" anything in production ever.

    E

    • I think GM is considering Tesla a Startup as well. In some ways they are correct, as they are still having issues with growth and quality. In other issues such as the fact the company is valued much more than GM.

  • So fucking what? (Score:2, Insightful)

    by AndyKron ( 937105 )
    Unfortunately, like 99.99% of the people in this world, I don't have $100K to burn on a vehicle.
    • 700k people on the planet being able to do that, is probably still an overstatement

      • by sphealey ( 2855 ) on Friday October 23, 2020 @06:53AM (#60639260)

        I don't live in a particularly wealthy or fashionable Small City, but I see plenty of $70k cars on the road that could easily sticker out at $100k with options. I don't know where the money to buy or even lease those is coming from but there are a lot more than your reasonable Fermi estimate would suggest. Including the old GMC pickup truck re-bodied with "tactical" and badged as the "Hummer H3" which probably ran in the $70-90k region tricked out.

        • Ford kept jacking up the truck prices and people kept buying them. A maxed out King Ranch is over $100,000 now! $100k for a truck that will never see a load of gravel or cow shit in the bed. That price range used to be Mercedes G wagon territory.

          • Regulation kept making cars suck, trucks were exempt.

            • by drinkypoo ( 153816 ) <drink@hyperlogos.org> on Friday October 23, 2020 @07:52AM (#60639408) Homepage Journal

              It's OK, manufacturers are making trucks suck on their own.

              GM is mounting the DEF tank in the strike area. All manufacturers' ITBCs (integrated trailer brake controllers) are fragile and when you overload the circuit protection features are likely to require whole modules replaced instead of just a relay or fuse. On a modern ford with ITBC the trailer charge wire shuts off literally when you open the driver's door. On a dodge ram the vehicle puts itself into park when you try to reverse with the door open, so you can't open the door to look down (or back) at stuff while you're backing up. Just had that problem while loading a truck camper into a '19 Ram 3500. Ford taillights are now a zillion dollars because of the sensors in them.

              A truck ain't a truck any more.

              • Don't worry they are happy to charge you a pile of cash for fairly cheap cameras.

                ITBC's tend to be awful, like most anything in the auto industry they would be better off getting out of the way and letting 3rd parties have better integration access, except they would not make them more money.

            • What regulation are you speaking of?

              • by drinkypoo ( 153816 ) <drink@hyperlogos.org> on Friday October 23, 2020 @09:20AM (#60639754) Homepage Journal

                Rollover standards increased. Rear impact standards increased. Side impact standards increased. Offset frontal impact standards came into being. All this stuff is improved by adding more metal to the vehicle. This not only makes vehicles heavier, it generally involves reducing visibility, especially rearward but also side and forward. Cars of the 1990s were the last to have decent sight pictures, especially rearward. That's why they all need to have back up cameras and rear collision warning sensors now, you can't see shit even if you turn your head like a responsible person. I'm not against those features existing or even being standard, but they should not be considered a substitute for actual visibility because sometimes those systems fail.

            • That doesn't explain why trucks are more expensive. The narrative would be such regulations would make it difficult for a company to make cheap cars.
              A Pickup Truck New can cost more than many sport and luxury cars. The only saving grace is their resell value drops like a rock, so you can get one Used for much cheaper.

              • Ford kept raising prices and people kept paying it. You can only price according to what the market can bear. Apparently their trucks are worth that much.

                • Trucks are stupidly easy to design and build. There is tons of space both inside (with quad cabs) and outside, and you can put more content in them for the same price. Plus, they aren't subject to the same emissions restrictions, so historically they haven't had as much smog equipment on them. That part has changed recently, though.

    • The really sad thing is that many purchasers of expensive cars/truck don't have the money for them either, they take out loans they can't afford to pay for them, hence why so many Americans are 1 missed paycheck away from going broke.

    • by PeeAitchPee ( 712652 ) on Friday October 23, 2020 @06:53AM (#60639258)
      It's not for you -- it's for wealthy early adopters. People said the exact same thing about the 1st gen Teslas, and now they're mainstream and affordable. When a huge automaker like GM introduces technology like this in a flagship vehicle, it's not long before a lot of that tech is spread out across their entire fleet. That's how we eventually got mandatory anti-lock brake systems (ABS) along with electronic stability control, one of the most important life-saving iterations of automotive technology of the past 25 years.
      • Tesla had the first mover advantage.
        Now by 2022 people will have a choice, A Tesla Truck with many of the same major specs for half the price or risk it with GM.

        Tesla with its expensive cars, had the advantage that they were first without any competition. Here is a really fast car, that is electric. You may want to pay extra for it because you will be able to get something that no one else has.

    • Well don't fucking buy one then. You going to bitch about the super computer story from a few days ago because you can't afford time on that as well?

    • by Jeremi ( 14640 )

      Unfortunately, like 99.99% of the people in this world, I don't have $100K to burn on a vehicle.

      Like ~100% of the people in this world, I don't have $57M to burn on a SpaceX launch .... and yet, I still like to read about them, because I am interested in new technology even when that technology is not something I plan to personally purchase or use.

  • But somehow, people don't accept my bridge and second Eiffel tower...
    And becoming a bank is hard.

  • Energy is going to get very expensive in the coming years, not just crude oil / gasoline energy, but _all_ energy, electricity, natural gas, hydrogen, whatever. Consequently moving heavy things around fast will become very expensive. Future vehicles _should_ be small, lightweight and slower, i.e. not this.

    • by gtall ( 79522 )

      I give up, why? If demand continues to drop for oil as seems to be the case given renewables and gas eating their lunch, then the price will fall. Gas itself is having its lunch eaten by renewables and the industry over-investing in fracking. Renewables are dropping in price due to achieving economies of scale and they have a lot of room to run there. Even nuclear appears to be making a comeback.

      • Because AOC wants every five person family drive to work and school in a Mitsubishi Mirage EV.

        • Oh No A congresswoman representing a very urban section of the United States, is pushing an agenda to support the constituents that they represents.

          How bad for a member of congress to do their job they were elected to do.

          No they need to fully back the Political Party no matter what stupid crap goes on, not their Constituents or the State or Country.

          Why is blocking the progress of such Mitsubishi Mirage EV for those people who live in areas to benefit from it, should be actively blocked as well. Arn't you b

    • Re:Don't Get This. (Score:5, Interesting)

      by Gilgaron ( 575091 ) on Friday October 23, 2020 @09:03AM (#60639684)
      A 100k vehicle is more a status symbol than a utility vehicle, you can get a small house for that. The people buying these will essentially help fund the further development of more normal utilitarian vehicles as GM builds their infrasctructure. It's why Tesla started out with targeting a luxury vehicle market rather than subcompact.
    • Small and lightweight won't pull the camper.

      What I don't get is the fascination with 0 to 60, and peak horsepower. Range under load is what matters. Can I get from Omak to Winthrop Going over Loup Loup pass with a 24 ft travel trailer without burning out the motors? Or from New Meadows to Grangeville up White Bird Hill? (Idaho) That's the challenge.

      And none of those places have a charger. So has an electric car made the Boise to Moscow run yet? Not only do you get to climb White Bird, but the Lewiston Grade

      • I have seen lots of trucks with burned out motors on Whitebird hill. That hill is not for vehicles with poor maintenance histories

        I remember getting car sick on the old Whitebird Hill

      • Then don't get one yet.

        While the EV market has grown to a point where it is overly useful for most of the people. It still hasn't filled all the Niches that ICE cars have filed.
        If you look at the shots of Tesla's Giga Texas site. You see a whole set of Gas powered construction vehicles, Also you will see an ICE based truck for Tesla service.

        Being that we don't have any EV Trucks out yet. It is difficult to really say how much of its range will be lost when pulling. The EV Truck isn't built like an EV Ca

        • If the EV reaches the top, it will get down, no argument there. My gas truck hit 48 MPG on a long downhill according to the dashboard display. But you won't get back more going downhill than you put out getting up the hill in the first place. See thermodynamics. And higher power draws are less efficient due to internal resistance, so where a battery might discharge at 90% efficiency normally, pulling a load uphill might take enough current to drop efficiency to 85% which means you will recoup even less of t

          • The electric car gets 48mpge when going up a large hill with a large load. Going down hill, you will not get all your energy back, but you will regain a good portion of it. While you are burning 48 MPG just going downhill. And probably also burning up your breaks.

            The electric motor has a lot of torque, by itself, and while working hard, doesn't generate massive amount of heat like a gas car does, also the motors do have coolant to make sure they can distribute excess heat and cold, well. But these are

    • With homes with solar-panels a lot of the extra energy will be offset by home generated energy.

  • Will the ex-governor be buying one of this? If I remember correctly he was the one that asked to buy the military vehicle and gave them the idea to sell this monstrosity to people with very small dicks
    • He drove one of the real diesel H-1 hummers. The H-2 is a body kit on a Chevy Tahoe and they're not nearly as capable or robust.

      • by Megane ( 129182 )
        Apparently the worst thing about the H-1 was that it came with a crap diesel engine and most ended up scrapped because of it. The few that were sold with gasoline engines or refitted with one (or an EV conversion) should be fine, plenty of spare parts now!
        • They came with the old crap GM 6.2/6.5 IDI diesel. Every part of the 6.5 is weak. Every part of the 6.2 is weak except the pistons. But if you have one today you're in luck because the 6.6 Duramax is an easy swap from the 6.5. You probably want to have your transfer case built though, because it has vastly more output, especially if you chip it (which you couldn't do with the old motor, since it was all-mechanical except maybe for an electronic throttle on later models.) They actually put the Duramax into t

    • by mccalli ( 323026 ) on Friday October 23, 2020 @10:37AM (#60639994) Homepage
      His is already modified to be electric [kreiselelectric.com].
  • Not that I'm complaining, I think the Ridgeline is a super cool vehicle, for a car-truck. I'd like to own one but my lady wants me to get a more serious work truck. But that sail area is totally Ridgeline.

    • by jtmach ( 958490 )
      I'd say more Avalanche than Ridgeline, which was also produced by GM and came out before the Ridgeline did.
      Either way I like the look, but I prefer their small trucks. Hopefully this tech will make it down to the Colorado line some day. Though probably by that time, the Colorado will be the same size as the current Hummer.
      • It's not triangular enough for Avalanche.

        I'm sure they will make an electric Colorado (or similar) sooner or later. I don't care though because I am huge and even full size trucks are getting hard for me to be in because they've filled them with so much plastic bullshit.

    • Honda Ridgeline is a minivan with the back cut out. Not a truck.

      • Honda Ridgeline is a minivan with the back cut out. Not a truck.

        It goes places most stock trucks don't go, because it has superior rear suspension and clever AWD. It certainly doesn't have the capacities of an actual body-on-frame truck. It does however have more ground clearance than a minivan.

  • It looks like a great work of engineering. Congrats to GM.

  • Why is the hummer described as "The hulking GMC Hummer EV electric pickup truck"?

    The same article later says "The Hummer EV is in part a response to Tesla Inc's TSLA.O Cybertruck, which has a very different but equally eye-grabbing design and a bevy of extreme performance features. "

  • ...with the anti-science propaganda funding?
  • by oumuamua ( 6173784 ) on Friday October 23, 2020 @09:50AM (#60639866)
    It still has huge mass, and gobbles energy, going electric doesn't fix that, just makes it semi-green until the electric grid is completely green.
    • With this vehicle, you'll get to check off one more box on you're "I'm responsible" checklist and still avoid any actual responsibility. It'll appeal to a certain segment, and they've got money.

      Remember, this is the company that had an electric car in mass production 15 years before Tesla and sent them all to the crusher.

  • https://www.gm.com/our-stories... [gm.com]

    Obviously, the Hummer is a key component in General Motors plan for zero traffic congestion outlined above.

    Seriously: the Hummer was designed to handle the challenges and rigors of off-road driving, and combat movement, and few vehicles are better suited for the task. It was never intended to be a daily urban commuter, despite GM's lipstick and mascara additions. Unfortunately, the vast majority of non-military Hummers, like every other off-road capable consumer vehicle out

  • Elon tweeted they had over x number of reservations, then more and more. So did they sell out 100 reservations? 500? 1000? 1,000,000? Why *CLOSE* reservations? Aren't you in the business of selling vehicles? WTF?
  • What it doesn't say is the the first year's run of vehicles is especially limited in number... Thus, sold out is not that big a deal.
  • $100 deposit? Big deal. First, it's refundable. Second, people will easily walk away from it if they want to. People are just hedging their bets. Same is true with the Cybertruck, which will be a lot cheaper. Now let's see either one of these guys actually produce real models people can buy.

  • It might mean something if we knew how many vehicles were in the 'Edition 1' run. Was it 50,000 or just one? Considering that the vehicle doesn't even have a functional prototype yet and mass production is years away, may as well file this away for a couple years.

A committee takes root and grows, it flowers, wilts and dies, scattering the seed from which other committees will bloom. -- Parkinson

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