CHRIS PAUKERT: If EVs are the future
and full-sized pickup trucks are the bedrock of the car industry
sales and profits, then you're looking
at one of the most important new vehicles in decades.
No pressure whatsoever.
Now we're here in Detroit for an early drive of this new work
truck.
Today, we're going to do some towing.
We're going to do some on road driving,
and we're going to use the exportable power feature, which
leverages this truck's big battery to power
all kinds of stuff.
Let's get to it.
So this is the first time GM is letting
anybody drive its Silverado EV.
Now this is the work truck, the one that's
meant for contractors and for commercial customers,
but it still will tell us an awful lot about what
the regular vehicle is.
And don't worry.
You don't need to be a contractor
or run a fleet to buy one of these.
Now you can spot a work truck on the street with all the
blacked out cladding that's all over this thing.
It's unpainted, and that may look a little inexpensive,
but there's a reason for that.
That's because if you run a big fleet,
you want to be able to change parts in and out really
quickly and not have to paint anything.
That keeps costs down.
That's really, really important.
Now the work truck, it also has a unique grille and wheels.
And between that and the flying buttress pillars out back,
I'm getting serious Chevy Avalanche vibes.
The only way you can get this work truck at least for right
now is with standard all-wheel drive and two motors.
All right, let's get some of the big numbers out of the way
first, and they are big.
GM says that this truck has 510 horsepower and 615 pound
feet of torque.
Now that's a lot more than you can
get in Ford's Lightning Pro.
Now here is where the numbers get really nuts.
This truck has an EPA estimated 450 miles of range, 450.
That is well over 100 miles more than the longest range
Ford Lightning.
And Importantly, with its 800 volt architecture,
this truck can handle up to a 350 kilowatt
rate from a DC fast charger.
That's about as good as it gets these days.
Chevy claims you can net up to 100 miles of range
in as little as 10 minutes.
Now, of course, big range means a big battery pack,
and this thing is no joke.
GM won't tell us how big the pack is,
but this truck, they will tell us the weight
is around 8,500 pounds.
8,500 pounds is more than 2,000 pounds more than a lightning.
In fact, it's more than the heaviest gas
Silverado 1,500 you can buy plus the weight of a Chevy
Malibu, a whole other car.
But do you hear something?
That's the weeping of the DOT and your road commissioners
in your state.
Now all that weight, well, it may not
be good for a lot of things, but one thing it's good for
is settling the ride down.
This chassis is different than the gas Silverado
and the diesel.
It's part body on frame.
It's part unibody.
It's got four wheel independent suspension,
and it's riding on coil springs unlike the Hummer
EV, which is on air.
And the tires that we're running on,
they're heavy duty truck tires.
They're running 61 PSI.
Usually that's a recipe for a rough ride,
but this thing is pretty smooth.
It's also damn quick with a GM estimated 0
to 60 of under six seconds.
In informal testing here, we got about 6 seconds.
And with all this power, it's not General Motors.
It's generous motors.
All right, when you think of work truck, if you're like me,
you think of a super basic interior, basically,
a beater with a heater, maybe Bluetooth if you're lucky.
This is a lot more sophisticated than that.
No, there's not a lot of flashy trim or anything like that,
but I've got a big infotainment screen here.
I've got a digital gauge cluster, all the controls.
I mean, they're basic, but they feel pretty good.
And I actually like the fact that they're basic.
I don't have to go through the menu for all the HVAC controls.
They're all right down there, simple to use.
I could use them with gloves on.
This is a work truck.
Now this has Google built into the navigation system.
And why that's important is when you put in your destination,
it'll tell you what your state of charge
will be when you arrive there.
That is clutch, and there's Apple CarPlay and Android Auto.
And it's wireless.
So interior space is actually pretty good.
The nose on this truck is a little bit shorter.
They've pushed everything forward.
Because you don't have an engine up there,
you can take advantage of that space.
So the cab here is pretty big.
I mean, this Silverado, you can have your space cowboy.
It's really nice.
Visibility, well, it's decent.
The a-pillars here are pretty thick,
and then those flying buttress pillars out back, well,
they're a little bit bigger than normal.
But it's not bad.
Now this is an early truck.
So we can't really judge it on quality just yet.
There's a lot of hard plastics, but some interesting textures
and maybe a few little flourishes
that you don't expect in a work truck.
One thing that's really nice here is the back seat is huge
and not just for passengers, for stuff.
There's a flat floor back there because this was designed
as an EV from the ground up, so there's no driveshaft to tunnel
back there.
So the digital gauge cluster is pretty nice.
It's very simple.
However, I did have to adjust the steering column
a little bit higher than I normally would
because I need to be able to see the miles per hour right
up top.
Now Chevy knows that commercial buyers,
well, they need room for a lot of stuff,
whether they've got laptops and work gloves
or the big gulp and their other big gulp.
And there's a lot of space here.
This center console is massive.
A lot of these EVs, they've got easter eggs, some surprise
and delight features in the interior.
This is a work truck, not about that.
I'm in one pedal drive mode right now,
and there's actually two settings.
I'm in the high regen. I got right in for the first time
and started using it.
It's really intuitive.
It's very natural, no problems.
So I live in LA, and a lot of people
don't use pickups as a daily driver.
But in the rest of the country like here in Michigan,
very, very common.
It's the family vehicle.
And electric pickups, honestly, they're
often better family vehicles than gas trucks.
There's reasons for that.
First of all, they're really quiet, second of all,
effortless acceleration, third, if you've
got a charger at home, no more gas stations,
but maybe the best thing is the frunk.
There's a huge amount of extra space up there,
and that means that junior doesn't have
to sit on top of the groceries.
Now I've already got a lot of experience in electric trucks,
and that's because Edmunds, we own some.
We own a Lightning.
We own a Rivian R1T.
We're operating them on a long-term basis for a year
to see what they're like to live with.
So if you're interested in those trucks,
be sure to check out our long-term blog.
Earlier I mentioned the Chevy Avalanche.
It's not just the cladding that has me thinking
about that long gone model.
Like that truck, some Silverado EVs
will come with a cargo expanding mid-gate but not this work
truck.
That makes sense.
Mid-gates are a neat party trick, but they're expensive.
And they're also the type of thing
that gets used a few times and then forgotten about.
Back when new avalanches were everywhere,
I could probably count the number
of times I saw this feature in use on one hand.
Now what do you think?
Let us know in the comments.
So why am I near a table saw?
Because it's one of the many things that you can
power with this work truck.
On board, this has 7.2 kilowatts of power.
All of them do.
You've got seven outlets spread throughout the frunk
the cabin and right here.
That's the same as the Ford Lightning,
but this goes a step further with an accessory.
It's called the power bar.
It's this guy right here.
Basically, it looks like a power strip,
and that's what it acts like except it actually
plugs in to your charge port.
That gets you an extra 3 kilowatts, which
means you're at 10.2 kilowatts.
That is a ton.
That means you can power all this and a whole bunch more.
Or if you want to go camping overnight,
you can power all your stuff.
You can power your smoker.
You can power a TV if you want to, air conditioning,
and you're probably only going to drop
a couple of percentage points on your battery overnight.
One other cool thing is if you're headed to the job site,
you can power up all your tools on the go while you're driving.
And if you're worried about having enough battery to get
home, you can set a limit on how much power
all these accessories can draw so that you can
make sure you get home safely.
While we're back here, let's talk about bed size.
This guy is 5 foot 11 inches long.
Now that's right in between the regular gas Silverado's two bed
lengths, but it's the biggest in the EV truck segment.
Between that unique length and these aero friendly flying
buttresses, that means that bed accessories
like racks and tunnels made for the regular Silverado won't
work.
That's a big deal, especially if you're
a fleet owner that already has a bunch of kitted out gas
or diesel models.
So there are basically no options
on this truck other than a spray in bed liner,
which clearly this truck doesn't have.
You can not get the trick multifunction tailgate
like you can on the RST and other models.
So is the Silverado EV giving you power envy?
Head on over to edmunds.com/sellmycar to get
a cash offer on your vehicle, so you can upgrade to one of these
bad boys.
So here's the dirty little secret about toying with an EV,
it's actually better than a gas or a diesel
with one big exception, range.
When this truck was first shown, they
said it could tow about 8,000 pounds,
and now today they've told us it's actually
up to 10,000 pounds.
I'm towing around 9,000 pounds right now,
and it's pretty effortless.
I've got a big old John Deere on the back,
and acceleration is pretty good.
Now why is towing with an EV actually a better driving
experience?
Well, first off, I'm coming to a stop right now.
I don't have my foot on the pedal at all.
What that means is I'm using a lot less of the brakes.
In fact, not only am I using less of the truck's brakes,
I'm using a lot less of the trailer's brakes as well.
That's going to save on wear and tear,
and it actually promotes a more stable feeling.
Now this truck, as I mentioned, is really, really heavy.
That's not so great for the amount of towing and payload
that you can put in the back.
But when you're on the road, that extra weight settles
things down, keeps the tail from wagging the dog.
Now I can feel the truck moving a little bit back and forth
here with that much weight on the back.
But generally speaking, I'm not feeling a ton back there.
This truck doesn't feel overworked,
and we're nearly at it's weight limit.
Now acceleration, obviously, affected a lot slower.
But since this thing does 0 to 60 in about 6 seconds,
even if you're adding a few seconds,
you're still going to have no trouble merging with traffic.
As soon as you plug-in your trailer pigtail,
this thing knows it's about to do some hauling.
So it changes all of the system parameters, your stability
control, your throttle tuning, all of that.
But there's also a tow haul mode button right over here,
and that gives you a little bit more power, a little bit
more torque.
Fun fact, you don't even need to be towing anything
to push that button and get a little more juice.
Now something else you probably wouldn't expect in a work truck
is this has a full 360 degree camera,
and that really helps in tight parking spaces
or when you're backing up trying to hitch your trailer.
Overall, this thing tows really nicely,
and it's got higher limits than the Lightning.
Oh, and one other thing.
When you plug-in the pigtail, it automatically
adjusts your range.
It drops basically to about half.
And then depending on how much you're actually towing,
you'll either earn range back and it'll creep on up
or if you're doing more work than it was expecting it'll
drop a little bit.
But at least you're in the ballpark right
when you start off.
Now as far as payload goes when this truck was announced,
they said 1,200 pounds, which is pretty
good for an electric truck but no great shakes overall.
Now they're saying 1,400 pounds.
Unfortunately, we don't have time to test that out today.
You may remember that when GM first showed the Silverado
EV over a year ago, they claimed it
would start at under 40 grand.
Well, that is not going to happen.
Now there will eventually be a cheaper version
of this truck with a smaller battery and less equipment.
But for now, this thing is expensive.
This model starts at just shy of 80 grand.
That smaller pack version that goes on sale later this year
will still cost around 75 grand.
Now that's a lot more than a Ford Lightning
Pro, which starts at around 62 Gs,
albeit, with a lot less power and range.
Oh, and in case you've forgotten the RST first edition
model for regular customers, it is well into the six figures.
Hey, it's expensive making a truck that's this different.
Just ask Rivian.
Now there are more models coming.
A Trail Boss will be here in 2024 along
with other cheaper models.
The big question I have is how many are GM going to build
and how fast.
Right now the rollout of the Hummer EV,
which uses the same Ultium battery technology
has been really, really slow.
So it took a little while to get here, but this new truck
from General Motors, honestly, it's
a lot more ambitious than what we've seen out of Ford.
And that's largely because it's from scratch ground up effort.
It's not just converting a gas truck over to electrification.
Now that pays a lot of dividends,
but it also creates a bunch of problems.
So this truck is a lot heavier, and it's a lot more expensive.
Frankly, we're not sure which approach we prefer.
We're going to need a lot more miles
behind the wheel of this guy to find out for sure.
So maybe we should buy one.
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