[J.E]

I could be mistaken, but I believe the first ever electric car was the La Jamais Contente (The Never Satisfied) built in the 19th century.

 

[Greg Burr]

Re: GM getting out of RHD and retiring Holden brand

I visited Adelaide three years ago. Visited a Holden dealership, felt like a kid in a candy store.

 

[MisterMe]

I could be mistaken, but I believe the first ever electric car was the La Jamais Contente (The Never Satisfied) built in the 19th century.

If I had been asked, then my answer would have been Baker Electric. I would have been wrong, but at least I knew that correct answer was not the EV-1. It boggles my mind that our friend above or anyone could defend such a boneheaded error--an error that served no purpose. Going back to the early days of the consumer automobile, there was strong competition among steam, electrics, and gasoline. Gasoline won out, but it was not an easy fight.

That was the early 20th Century. One hundred years later, it appears that electricity is about to turn the tide.

 

[jamiepeterson2]

You have to be blind if you cannot see what GM is doing.

Sell all your extraneous assets to make a potential buyout more feasible.
Who would be surprised if SAIC bid to takeover GM lock, stock and barrel.

GM does not have enough liquid capital to maintain future momentum.
Bail out will be necessary unless a partner can come alongside to share the expense and pad the coffers.
Renault/Nissan comes to mind if GM were a risk taking business for sustainability or unusual profits. Slim chance of that ever happening. GM would be the perfect lead company for this paradigm.

Sunsets are GM favorite memes.
GM has got to get out of this maelstrom, or it will be toast.

 

[ksr]

You have to be blind if you cannot see what GM is doing.

Sell all your extraneous assets to make a potential buyout more feasible.
Who would be surprised if SAIC bid to takeover GM lock, stock and barrel.

GM does not have enough liquid capital to maintain future momentum.
Bail out will be necessary unless a partner can come alongside to share the expense and pad the coffers.
Renault/Nissan comes to mind if GM were a risk taking business for sustainability or unusual profits. Slim chance of that ever happening. GM would be the perfect lead company for this paradigm.

Sunsets are GM favorite memes.
GM has got to get out of this maelstrom, or it will be toast.

I don't think you're right about the liquid capital thing. GM's balance sheet is very healthy, thanks to its debt being wiped out by bankruptcy reorganization in 2009. And they're making a ton of money.

 

[ksr]

If I had been asked, then my answer would have been Baker Electric. I would have been wrong, but at least I knew that correct answer was not the EV-1. It boggles my mind that our friend above or anyone could defend such a boneheaded error--an error that served no purpose. Going back to the early days of the consumer automobile, there was strong competition among steam, electrics, and gasoline. Gasoline won out, but it was not an easy fight.

That was the early 20th Century. One hundred years later, it appears that electricity is about to turn the tide.

The error in the Forbes article about the first electric car wasn't significant to the point of the article. It's doesn't invalidate the article anymore than if someone running for American president said that the Civil War ended in 1866 rather than 1865. It's a trivial aside.

They said that Tesla was the first highway-legal EV. They should have said mass production highway-legal EV. It's a pretty small error, and again an insignificant aside to the whole topic of the article, which was about the future competition in EVs. And talking about first electric cars back in the 19th century isn't a correct answer. They said "highway legal." There was no highway system at that time. And if you had one of those electric cars from the 19th century today, it wouldn't be any more legal to take on a highway than it is to take a golf cart on the highway.

 

[VS Ute 5Litre]

The error in the Forbes article about the first electric car wasn't significant to the point of the article. It's doesn't invalidate the article anymore than if someone running for American president said that the Civil War ended in 1866 rather than 1865. It's a trivial aside.

They said that Tesla was the first highway-legal EV. They should have said mass production highway-legal EV. It's a pretty small error, and again an insignificant aside to the whole topic of the article, which was about the future competition in EVs. And talking about first electric cars back in the 19th century isn't a correct answer. They said "highway legal." There was no highway system at that time. And if you had one of those electric cars from the 19th century today, it wouldn't be any more legal to take on a highway than it is to take a golf cart on the highway.

That's ridiculous

How about we say the first highway legal car was in the 1950's then ? and everything that was released before that wasn't a car because it wasn't highway legal

See how stupid that sounds?

 

[Envoy4Life]

Amazing. This company continues its rapid shrink into global irrelevancy.

GM won't be in business by ~2030. And if by sheer luck they are, it will be via another government bailout.

 

[V-Car]

GM won't be in business by ~2030. And if by sheer luck they are, it will be via another government bailout.

Maybe the only positive about GM closing down Holden is that when GM goes bust again, it wont be Holden or the Australian taxpayer who gets raped and pillaged this time.

 

[Envoy4Life]

Maybe the only positive about GM closing down Holden is that when GM goes bust again, it wont be Holden or the Australian taxpayer who gets raped and pillaged this time.

You guys have it made.

Detroit/Michigan is so reliant on GM/F that if one were to fail, it would be the equivalent of tying an anvil onto the leg of a canary for the region and state economy. The ripple effects felt from the closure of one or both would be absolutely devastating. We may never recover.

They essentially have us by the balls because if they fail, the entire region goes with them. One has to wonder how long they can get away with that...

 

[RedVee8]

I predict anything assembled here just stablised or went up in value, anything imported just fell through the floor Opel style.

Yes, I look forward to the day that my wife’s Astra lease comes up for residual payment....???
Thank heavens I insisted on a VFII SV6 rather than the ZB. I actually suggested to her that she get an SV6 “Black” sedan when they were about, but she loved the Astra / smaller hatch. I think we may be paying for that decision when the time comes around.

 

[Downandout]

So what will happen to currently manufactured RHD GM vehicles? Colorado is gone due to selling the plant. But will Acadia continue through GMSV?

 

[timandhayley]

The only one they'll continue to build is the Corvette.

 

[Ruperts Trooper]

The error in the Forbes article about the first electric car wasn't significant to the point of the article. It's doesn't invalidate the article anymore than if someone running for American president said that the Civil War ended in 1866 rather than 1865. It's a trivial aside.

They said that Tesla was the first highway-legal EV. They should have said mass production highway-legal EV. It's a pretty small error, and again an insignificant aside to the whole topic of the article, which was about the future competition in EVs. And talking about first electric cars back in the 19th century isn't a correct answer. They said "highway legal." There was no highway system at that time. And if you had one of those electric cars from the 19th century today, it wouldn't be any more legal to take on a highway than it is to take a golf cart on the highway.

You're trying to apply modern Construction & Use Regulations to an EV over 100 years old - the first highway legal EV was achieved in the late 1800s, in a part of the world where they already had highways - the "trivial" error is like saying the US Civil War ended in 1965, rather than 1865 - sloppy journalismt destroys any credibility that otherwise exists in the article.

 

[GolfBravo]

I heard that Commodore production continues until the end of MY20 in April, so they will arrive in early June, just in time for the HQ shut down. Same with Colorado.

This has been on the agenda for months, and it proves that GM's story about making this decision only last weekend is complete b/s. They only decided last weekend that they can no longer get away with this B/S.

 

[timandhayley]

Yep, April build is the last month, which is essentially the orders placed this month (we order 2 months ahead). It has been hard to get stock over the past few months, particularly Trax, but I thought that was due to the strike in Korea at the end of last year and some larger fleet orders that have been fulfilled recently.

They've told us last vehicles arrive in May/June. I had a quick check today of pipeline inventory and they've still got a fair amount of vehicles arriving that are un-allocated. There's a reasonable amount of stock to clear over the coming months.

 

[Downandout]

I heard that Commodore production continues until the end of MY20 in April, so they will arrive in early June, just in time for the HQ shut down. Same with Colorado.

This has been on the agenda for months, and it proves that GM's story about making this decision only last weekend is complete b/s. They only decided last weekend that they can no longer get away with this B/S.

Probably because they had to disclose selling Thailand plant to Great Wall. So was waiting for the deal to go through

 

[nota]

The error in the Forbes article about the first electric car wasn't significant to the point of the article. It's doesn't invalidate the article anymore than if someone running for American president said that the Civil War ended in 1866 rather than 1865. It's a trivial aside.

They said that Tesla was the first highway-legal EV. They should have said mass production highway-legal EV. It's a pretty small error, and again an insignificant aside to the whole topic of the article, which was about the future competition in EVs. And talking about first electric cars back in the 19th century isn't a correct answer. They said "highway legal." There was no highway system at that time. And if you had one of those electric cars from the 19th century today, it wouldn't be any more legal to take on a highway than it is to take a golf cart on the highway.

No, they, and you repeatedly, have said "world's first highway-legal EV".

Friend in your well-meaning replies to my post I notice you susequently addended a 'serial production' proviso (to the Forbes quote I originally objected to) and now you delete the "world" reference to both the author's quote and yours previous.

It is the world context which makes this claim so absurd

I'd bet my leftie that Australia has never in its history gazetted any road-going EV car to be 'highway illegal' specifically because of its (EV) propulsion. Ipso facto those excellent Detroit Electric EVs imported here at the beginning of the 20th century were always legal, on any public roadway.

Which begs the question: In which countries can you cite any such legislation excluding EVs from highways? Not in Australia, or Bulgaria, nor Chile - shall we run it through the alphabet of Nations?

Last time I checked, Nations A, B, and C listed above etc are part of our shared world.


Factual trivia: Hans Tholstrup (genuine legend) and Larry Perkins (multi Bathurst 1000 winner) pictured in 1982 on AU's Highway 1 in remote Western Australia during their record-making 4,000 km EV trans-continental crossing from Perth to Sydney, using only solar power (fully independent vehicle, no external recharging). Please note: vehicle was legally road-registered and obviously on a highway!

Perhaps your country had previously enacted laws to ban EVs from your highways? Don't know, or care.

But for both you and the Forbes idiot to arseume that your USA DOT (Dept Of Transport) law - or whatever governing US Body it may be - holds sway over history because it had somehow appointed itself as motoring's World Authority, capable of banning EV's until 2008 from all the world's highways, even those outside US jurisdiction, since the dawn of motoring??

This is truly a ludicrous posit. Just absurd - can't you see why? Am I the only poster here who recognises this?

Plus imo it's base cultural arrogance. Not to mention typically imperialist thinking


World means GLOBAL - not Planet America! :nono:

 

[carisi2k9]

Re: GM getting out of RHD and retiring Holden brand

For our Australian friends, I'd say that this is an opportunity to capture the market share that already there waiting to be taken. Who has the pockets and the cohones to come through with this?

Entrepreneurship always is a balast to corporate risk aversion, but, they can only do it if there are people willing to join in on the risk.

Australian's don't have any money and the greedy rich ones aren't looking to employ Australians and are more interested in their nazi mobiles. Holden isn't the only brand to have died in 2020. 161 others have already gone to retail heaven as well. The only thing keeping our economy going is coal and iron ore mining and if it wasn't for those industries Australia would be a basket case.

 

[MisterMe]

The error in the Forbes article about the first electric car wasn't significant to the point of the article. It's doesn't invalidate the article anymore than if someone running for American president said that the Civil War ended in 1866 rather than 1865. It's a trivial aside.

They said that Tesla was the first highway-legal EV. They should have said mass production highway-legal EV. It's a pretty small error, and again an insignificant aside to the whole topic of the article, which was about the future competition in EVs. And talking about first electric cars back in the 19th century isn't a correct answer. They said "highway legal." There was no highway system at that time. And if you had one of those electric cars from the 19th century today, it wouldn't be any more legal to take on a highway than it is to take a golf cart on the highway.

The article made a mistake. There is no excuse for the mistake. Mistakes happen, particularly by people who don't know what they are talking about. Yet, you want to excuse the mistake. Worse and for reasons that are baffling, you have taken up the mantle and doubled-down on the author's mistake and introduced misinformation that is all your own.

The Tesla was not the first mass-produced highway-legal EV. As far as I can tell, there were number of EVs on American highways more than a century before the Tesla traveled American streets and highways. They were in showrooms long enough that you have to tie yourself into knots while trying to push your assertion.