You've heard a lot about the Hummer ev, over the past year
you know, it has 1000 horsepower that it can crab walk diagonally and that it can go 0 to 60 in 3.5 seconds using watch
to freedom mode. But what you haven't heard is what is it actually like to drive
I'm Zane from GM Dash trucks.com and I just got back from Milford Michigan at G M's Milford Proving Grounds where I was among
the first people in the entire world to drive the 2022 GMC Hummer
Ev. The video you're about to watch was shot by General Motors and provided to me after the fact you see
I was not allowed to bring any camera equipment on Milford proving grounds property
Lest I accidentally film a future product that they don't want anybody to see yet
Prototypes were running around everywhere around us. And GM wants to keep some of those details and vehicles secret for the future
So I really don't blame them. We're going to start off with an action reel to give you an idea of where we are and
what we're doing. Then we're gonna transition into a 20 minute drive with Jim Green
a vehicle dynamics engineer for General Motors and Hummer EV. And then finish up that video with me talking back here and giving you my
driving impressions about what you can expect if you've got one of these vehicles on order
And let me tell you, you're not gonna want to miss what I have to say
So without further ado, let's travel over to Milford Michigan and get behind the wheel of the all new GMC Hummer EV
electric Super Truck. And here we are at General Motors Milford proving grounds
We're about to take the All new Hummer ev the 1000 horsepower super truck for its very first spin by non GM
employees and I am so honored to be one of those people and I've been looking forward to this for well over a year now
So I just got to tell you IW why waste time. Let's get behind the wheel and see how it does
So here we're gonna have uh kind of stop by the cones and once we're clear
uh if you wanna go ahead, you can do an acceleration, just give you a taste of what the truck feels like in the gravel
and uh be prepared, you might get a little bit of motion out of it, so kinda be ready to compensate
And once you get to the other cones there, we'll just kind of go to coast and slow back down for the corner coming up
ready whenever you're good to go. That's
crazy. You can trust me. I know. I do. Wow. Wow. The
uh, just to feel the mass of the vehicle take off like that and grip
it was really impressive. Yeah, the, the motors, you know, I'm more traditional off road kind of background and
uh, I love a V eight in a 4 to 1 T case. Right. But
um, the motors have won me over. They're, uh, they're pretty incredible what they can do
Yeah, I don't, that doesn't leave me wanting for a gas engine whatsoever
It, it has the opposite effect of when I go back to my Silverado
You know, it's a 2019. It's a nice truck. I love it. But the latency like the hesitation you get in the transmission where it's
got to think about what it needs to do and there's parts moving this truck has none of that
Yeah, this, this is dr wise, I think that's gonna win customers over big time
So by default does is the four wheel steering always active and, and adjusting kind of
So, uh, lower speeds you'll actually turn where the, the front wheels and the rear are out of phase
That helps you get a tighter turn radius, more maneuverability, uh, as you get up to highway speeds
So as your front tires turn, your rears will actually turn in phase and that's
I, I believe it's right around 3025 to 30 miles an hour where that transition happens and that's completely automated
Um, at higher speeds, we do use the active rear steer to help stabilize the vehicle
It actually is tied into the brake control system. Ok. So it's kind of part of the stability control system
But I, I think the key benefit is vehicle this size, you'll see the maneuverability gain you get with rear steer is pretty
pretty phenomenal. Makes the truck very nimble, makes it super maneuverable. You can get it into things off road that you really shouldn't be able
to get into, which is good and bad. I've
had some people ask me if the overall weight of the vehicle
I know it's gonna be like over 9000 pounds. Is that gonna affect its ability to go off
Like how, how is that weight and being off road, like work together
So, you know, depending on what surfaces you're on. Like, obviously, like you can't take a heavy duty truck in the sand and expect it
to be perfect. Um This truck actually does incredibly well in the sand
Um You know, so I don't think there's a trade off in that respect
Uh If you're talking about like moab and things like that again on the rocks
I don't think it's a big trade off. Uh There's more than enough power to compensate for the
the mass of the vehicle. Um But in, in reality is I don't think it's that different than
you know, like a HD pickup truck, to be honest. So, for me personally
you know, I, I haven't seen a big trade off because of the mass necessarily. Um
just because the system is designed around, you know, mass, we're gonna do a little bit of a camera demo here
Uh, you've probably done a bit off roading and, you know, one of the classic things
I mean, as you come up to a crest of a hill, right? You see the sky, uh
and this is where the cameras are. Something again that I didn't think in my head initially
I thought it was kind of a gimmick, but in reality, the cameras are a pretty nice feature off road and
uh, kind of show you some of the views. Ok. And how many cameras just for my audience
how many cameras are on this particular vehicle I'm trying to recall
Was it eight or no? I think it's way more than that. Let me ask
I believe it's 18. Now that you said it now, I'm like, I think it is 18 with ultra
All the, I think is the correct number 18 different views that you can look at
So people should be able to see anywhere, any situation they're in
they're gonna have a good view to get a, uh, a handle on it 100%
So there's a number of options. So each of these are kind of different controls
Um, I'm looking at the underside of the, of the vehicle right now
That's great. So, actually let's go ahead. We're gonna, I'm gonna have you put the nose right up the top of the hill and basically
kind of like the point where you're about to go over, but you can't tell
So if you stop right here. Yeah. So the, the beautiful thing about this right is if you've got rocks
you can look at your front tires or your rears so you can kind of self spot yourself here
Um You can do a split screen so you can see the top down and the front rear simultaneously
My daughters hate this. They get car sick. Um You can have a front view where you're actually looking at the hill
here or rear. If you've got to back down, you can do these kind of top down
which are more valuable. Like if you're in like a rock field or something and you're kind of crawling through or you can do these
other kind of hybrid views where you just need a different angle to see what you're about to climb
Um You know, I I find the most usable, you know, if you're in the technical stuff
these help, but typically what I'm doing is, um, do that like these guys right here
Um So like the first ride trip we did in Mo Al Open Heiser rode with me quite a bit
Al uses his view all day. I didn't even get out of the truck to spot him. I would just like
show him the line because you can do this and now you got the guidelines on in front of you
You know, where you're gonna end up and what you're gonna hit and what not you, what you're not gonna hit
And even when we do have uh spotters. So, you know, some of our, some of the guys we worked with are very experienced off
road. And so I help kind of spot the larger team a lot of times you find out you're watching them on the camera because
you get a better high def view because they're obscured by the hood. Um
and when you mess up, they don't look as mad or disappointed. But yeah
if you wanna go ahead, um, one little trick, if you wanna play, uh, on the downside
if you wanna let the vehicle coast, once we go over and then you can use the paddle to kind of help break
So it just kind of push and hold in that region paddle
it'll work going downhill, it'll work on the level and it just gives you like a bit of an elevated boost and it's dependent on
speed. Um, sort of kind of fade in as it stops and this little display is showing me not only how much
uh, wattage I'm or kilowatts, I'm getting back from the vehicle and regenerative
But when I press the accelerator pedal, it's showing me how much is going out to the
So it's, it's a real time either what you're expending or what you're regen back
It's all power up. It's the equivalent to like a fuel economy gauge almost in a instantaneous
But this is a direct, you know, this is what's going out of the battery. So
you know, horsepower kilowatts. Um, you know, so kilowatts are, that's your power basically
right? You know, so if you're sitting there in park with your laptop plugged in
it'll show like a one kilowatt value. Ok? To let you know that you're your burning energy
So you'll see the trucks kinda interesting to watch. They're doing a little bit of a steering demo
So if you wanna kind of bear to the right and you'll see the cones there
the pointer. Yeah. Actually I'm gonna have you go right between these two guys over here if you put about your
driver's door, uh just pass those and uh a little bit warm if we could
That's great. So if you wanna just go ahead, do a full lock, turn to the left
so just kind of steer all over the left, just give you an idea of what sort of turn radius you have for parking maneuverability
It's really interesting because you can feel it's, it's a very different uh feeling from a normal vehicle that only turns with the front wheels
and when we go to train mode a little bit later, there's actually a game where we bump up that ratio
It won't help you as far as the full turn circle. But as far as maneuverability
um it gains it up and it helps the truck really follow your steer inputs
Cool. And here for the first portion, I'm just going to have you basically do the slalom and this is a fairly tight cone course
So just kind of drive through it, you know, fairly slow. But gives you an idea of how tightly you can wind round through trail
Incredible agility for what the size of this vehicle is. If you had a long wheel base pickup truck
this would be very difficult or impossible to get through. Especially without really thinking about it
man. You know, looking at that course, I'm like there's no way I can turn through it and then I'm cutting those cones even shorter
than it seems like you would. Yeah, you've got room to spare, basically. Very cool
So in addition to the, the modes, you know, we've got additional controls here for raising and lowering the vehicle or steering
Um, so we're gonna go into crab mode. So if you want to do a push and hold
we kind of wait for it here. So we actually have, you do a push and hold and you'll see that little timer
ok. So now I'll do push and hold again. So this is how you engage crab mode
It's something you have to do on your end. So basically stop. But we actually turn it back up
But it was so much fun to push the button. Oh, kind of gets you ready to go
like, feel like you're doing something and it's kind of a, a nice little safety feature where it very deliberate so the driver can't accidentally
engage this. Uh, so you've got to be stopped. Um, but you'll see now there's a little crab icon and basically what this does is
now you're in crab walk. And so at lower speeds, basically below 20 MPH gives you the full effect
Uh, as you accelerate up, it'll actually fade back to normal and turn itself back off
So you can't drive down the highway with it. But if you wanna go ahead and kind of feel
you know, the first say 100 degrees of steering input will give you more lateral
If you go full lock, the front tires will still keep turning, so they will overcome the rears
Wow, that's so weird. It's kind of weird seeing the horizon move in that way
Yeah, like this, you're like drifting over. Oh
man, I'm gonna show my friends this so much. Yeah. So like, like Aaron said
it's kind of a cool little party trick feature, but there's definitely times where it gives you an option to take a line off road
that doesn't exist for other trucks, you know. So it's not something I'd see using every two minutes
But, uh, you get into like a, you know, trail and moab like poison spider
you get a bad balance. This kind of helps you save yourself. Yeah
if you get stuck up against a tree and you don't wanna turn out of it, you can kinda horizontally shift your way out of
it. Instead I have a dent in my, one of my development vehicles that was because we didn't crab boat out of a spot we
should have. And so to disable current mode, you come back to a stop here
So you could actually just accelerate away and it'll eventually, you know
time itself back out. Or if I do a single push, um, we'll go back to auto steering
If you chose that, you know, maybe you want to back the vehicle up, you could actually turn rear
steer off just to help make it, you know, maneuver a little more traditionally. Um
but normally it's gonna operate an auto. So just pushing the button will either disable it or go to auto
but holding it will bring it to crowd. Ok. Rear wheels have up to a 10 degree steering ankle in what will
actually go to 10 degrees and you'll see the indicator of the dash
The fronts can achieve about 45 which is fairly typical for a truck
Is there any way to disable the engine sound? Completely or is it just different
So, if we go to here by going straight to there? Yep
Yep. Ok. Keep your end straight and you'll see the rock. So I got it in here and
actually I'll correct that it doesn't disable, it'll let you change it in between different things
But for regulations, you do have to have some. Now, is that on the outside as well or just on the inside
Sure. And when we come up to the stop here, if you put your window down, there's like a dring noise that's kind of subtle
So I'm kind of probably hearing a combination of maybe what's coming from the outside and
or is it, is it, is some piped in through the speakers on the inside or is it just so you can hear that that's
the pedestrian noise that's like a mandated noise and you'll hear there's all kinds of jets and car noises and stuff
We had one that sounded like angels at one point. Uh People looked at that one really funny
Um So what we're gonna do is actually I'll have you rotate the map to the right
We're gonna go to train mode. Here we go. So keep going
It's the sky right here. This disables stability control. So it brings up a little driver prompt
Uh If you don't select that, you won't get the full train mode. Uh But once you go into train mode
you'll actually start to raise the vehicle, you'll see, there's a little icon in the upper right
Uh, that indicates the mode plus the state of the vehicle. You can always confirm that if you do a push on the up down
um, eye controls. Um, and thats feel it kind of moving up
And if you want on your right hand side, if you take that uh at three o'clock
if you kind of scroll up and down there, um, it's the toggle
there's actually a suspension height indicator and these are all customizable. Of course
this will let you see as the vehicle raises and lowers. But more importantly
when you're off road, it gives you an indication of, you know, the rebound or j traveling
Yeah, I'm seeing a display that shows me all the tires and they're like heights and elevations uh to get a better view on where
each tire is vertically and you'll see that it'll move in real time here for us and we'll
just kind of fall along there's a gravel that they lay down. Ok
Now that I'm in terrain mode, my throttle pedal is a little bit more sensitive and it has changed just
the overall demeanor of the vehicle quite a bit. You can look at this as a
this is kind of, you know, train mode has two levels. If you're in D or L
it gives you more of a four low effect in L. So like a 4 to 1 T case
whereas AD is somewhere between four high and four low, so it'll give you some brake activation to help kind of slow the vehicle through
motor and brake pressure. Um D is kind of a more ideal for like this type of thing
L is more for if you are in real steep terrain or you've got sharp drop off where you want to have that extra assist
So you don't slam the truck back down on the ground, kind of gives you that control and precision cool
Um So from here, we'll just kind of follow the line I'd recommend is kind of there to the left a bit
Ok. And you'll see there's rocks, we can try to run up on that left side
Another one of those situations is hard left turn where the four wheel steering has made a huge difference
Now, we're gonna go over a pile of rocks that I would have would never attempt in pretty much any other vehicle
But this thing just uh no problem at all. So, you know
you do have three independent rear motors here. And what that does is allows us to control the torque a little more precisely on the
rear. So, you know, the, the rear locker, uh the fact that we don't have a mechanical rear locker takes advantage of the fact that
you know, the motors are completely independent. I can put all of my torque on a single motor
I can have, you know, 5000 Newton meters of torque driving forward, I want and I could have 5000 Newton meters of torque driving backwards
on the other if I wanted. Um, it's really all and how we tune it and calibrate it far better
more tunable than any mechanical or, you know, mechanical system you could ever devise
Yeah, because in a traditional vehicle you're tied to an engine and transmission, you cannot do you know those separate totally independent torque controls like
we have here unless you throw a lot of weight and clutches and even then they're still not capable of uh the full range
It'll tell me to apply the brake. It's priming the system here
That was like a God five minutes. It's
pretty fun. And to think that you literally take this truck down the class
really. We, we've got point the spider or steel bender at low drive right off the trail covered in mud and go do
I don't know, two vehicles kind of have that dual capability. The range of
right. Certainly the conditions, the roads and it, it's just amazing at everything
whether you're on the road or off road or going over boulders or
you know, showing off to your friends with the WTF mode. If you could see my face without this mask
my jaw would be like on the floor. It's incredible. So, one of the other things I love and this is what really sells me
is like the day to day driving. When you're on the highway, you got just kind of the ability to pass and accelerate
You know, we're going 55 right here, just how effortless merging on the expressway like that
It was 5580. Basically, you just power right on demand at all times
Don't hesitate how much of the battery charged as like a typical
a lot of freedom. But you talk very little. Uh, I mean
you're, you're probably talking a percent or two. And so if you're out there and you do it repeatedly
then yeah, you, you start to perform battery now but you'll find driving
you know, day to day at highway speeds, things like that. It's not
it's not like it's 5 10% every time it's nowhere near that you could go and you could show some friends that a few times
and not have to be worried about whether you can get home or not. Oh, yeah. Absolutely
Yeah, it's, you can do dozens basically. I'm sure there's an actual limit to that
But the, can you, like, overheat the motors or use so much
Uh, they, they won't let you, uh, basically they'll start to reduce your power to kind of manage thermal
So just like a normal engine would start to change how, how efficient it is and you know
how it performs. This will be the same thing. But it's doing basically with controllers watching the temperature it'll do certain
things like, you know, cabin cooling, it'll start to reduce your cabin cooling to help keep the motors cool
And the battery, once it gets to the even hotter temperatures, you'll actually start to reduce the Torvill
And that all happens kind of in a very seamless way. So, as it starts to creep up on you
you don't even know how it basically prolongs that system's capability. We're going 65
So that's my thing. She got it. And
one of the thing has such massive tires, it's got digging all day long
Yeah, if you can see the amount of racks that you threw 1000 horsepower is uh very impressive
Yeah, we were, we took the truck to the Silver Lakes in you
I don't think anyone's face stopped smiling. I mean, the TRX can pretty much climbs anything to point them out
Acceleration of the sand and it's, if it were the tr to shine
I absolutely pay for that. Thank you so much. It was my pleasure
Something we've been working on for quite a while. So it's, it's really exciting to be able to kind of demo it here
What an experience and what a truck well done. Thank you. So
what do you think? I got to admit my time behind the wheel was really exciting
So here comes the time you've been waiting for, I'm gonna share with you some of my notes and I hope you'll forgive me
But I have written some of them down. There's so much I'd like to tell you and I don't want to forget anything
So, first off, I really enjoyed my time behind the wheel. I think you might know
But I have a addition one on order for myself and this few hours behind the wheel that I did last week
it only has made me even more excited to take delivery of my Hummer
Ev in just a few months, but overall, it's a torque monster
Al Oppen Heiser, the chief engineer of Hummer Ev, let us know that at the motors
the uh three electric motors are putting out around 1200 pound feet of torque before gear reduction
which is absolutely insane. And you can feel it when you accelerate
It's kind of like heavy equipment in a way. The vehicle is like a tank and those big meaty tires just start clawing away at
the ground, the instant you push down the accelerator pedal. And that leads me to my next point
All of the input on this thing is instant. Unlike a regular gas powered vehicle where when you push your foot on the pedal
there's this movement, the gas needs to be fed to the engine, the engine needs to accelerate
The mechanical functions need to transfer through the transmission in the Hummer ev
It is accelerator pedal and instant acceleration almost instantaneously. It's kind of uh uh satisfying
It's shocking almost like using an RC electric car, you pull the trigger and it moves right away and that's what it's like on the
Hummer ev, off road, the 13.5 inches of suspension travel is impressive
You soak up every bump and rut like it's not even there
We drove on a road course that GM didn't include when they provided us with our footage and we went over simulated railroad crossings at
highway speeds between 65 and 75 miles an hour. And the Hummer was like
what? I didn't feel anything. It, it just glided over them and the suspension just soaked up those
those railroad crossings like they weren't even there. Uh, it was really
really impressive when it came to crawling over the boulders. It just climbed right over them
I mean, I, I, it was really a non-event. I can't, I wish I could tell you about how
uh, crazy it was or how it was challenging, but the combination of the four wheel steer and the huge suspension travel literally
and, and just all the torque vectoring that it can do between all the different wheels and the locked rear axles
It just climbed over and went over it like nobody's business. No drama
no mess, no fuss. No nothing. And then you got to talk about WTF mode
Wow. What an experience. We've seen it. We've seen clips, we've heard GM talk about it
but in all honesty, you will never appreciate it until you experience it in person
My first impression when Jim pushed down the accelerator pedal was that we had been rear ended because it was this violent acceleration from a
stop. The thing just kicked forward as if, uh, a vehicle had hit us from the back
or this massive creature had kicked our rear tailgate propelling us forward and then it just kept on accelerating before we knew it
We were going not only 60 miles an hour and 3.5 seconds
but then 7080 climbing from there, it uh really was a lot of fun
It put a huge smile on my face and I can imagine there's gonna be a lot of new Hummer ev owners who can't wait
to show that feature to their friends, crab walking and four wheel steering
like I mentioned are really, really unique features. Crab walk. Yeah, it's gonna be a party trick that you're gonna show to your friends in
your driveway or going down the road, but off road on a trail when you're pinned up against a tree or you're in a tricky
situation, it's gonna come in really useful and just the four wheel steering by itself will allow you to maneuver in places and
positions that you wouldn't even dream of. Had you been in a full size or even a mid-sized truck
It genuinely felt more maneuverable than even a Colorado ZR two. So with all that said
I hope you've enjoyed this video. I had a lot of fun being there and being inside of it to film it
And I've got to thank GMC and their crew for inviting me out to Milford to be one of those first people in the Hummer
Ev, it was an incredible experience and it's only made me more excited to get behind the wheel again
If you really enjoyed this, please take a moment to subscribe, head on over to GM Dash trucks.com and read my written full first
drive review. We've got some more pictures over there that weren't included in this video and stay tuned
We should be getting our own Hummer in the next few months and GMC has promised me more time behind the wheel in the near
future. So I'm Zane from GM Dash trucks.com. Thanks for watching and I'll see you again soon