Rivian - Electric Adventure Vehicle | Fully Charged

This car is something that seems to have taken the show by storm. It's an electric seven-seater SUV, big one too, full size, and a double cab pickup made by a company called Rivian. They're electric, otherwise I wouldn't be telling you about them. And this is the skateboard platform. I'm just about to have a tour of the car by a chap called Mark Van Ells. Mark. Good to meet you. Good to meet you as well. This is exciting, I mean. Yeah, we're very excited. There's a big buzz around these two cars which seem to have broken out in the last 24 hours. Yeah, everybody's very positive about what we're doing. Yeah, so let's rewind then. This is the chassis of the car, of both the pickup and the SUV. It's full EV, not plug-in hybrid. 0-60 in three seconds, which is unbelievably quick. I mean, that's supercar, hypercar quick. Yeah, very fast. Pretty exceptional for this type of vehicle. I was going to say, when you look at it, it doesn't look like it would do something like that. Well, we've been working for a long while now to develop vehicles, really, to take people on adventures, to allow them to go to places that conventional vehicles normally can't go to. So by using, really, the purity of the electric architecture, we never wanted to consider internal combustion or hybrids, so we started from scratch with electric architecture. We've been able to develop this platform, what we call our skateboard, and this is the basis for all of our vehicles, for both the S and the T, and indeed some future vehicles that will be coming out in subsequent years. So the S is the SUV. Correct. The T is the pickup truck. That's right. Our battery pack uses cylindrical cells, 21700 form factor, but the modules and the pack are designed completely in-house, both the hardware and the software. Our largest pack is 180 kilowatt hours. 180 kilowatt hours? 180 kilowatt hours, which is pretty much twice as big as anything available on the marketplace at the moment. So in the truck, that's over 400 miles of range, while on the S, the SUV, that's over 410 miles of range, so should be eliminating anybody's concerns around range anxiety. Goodness, mate. Well, I mean, I know that off-road vehicles should lend themselves really well to EV propulsion, because instant torque for rock crawling and quietness, so you can hear the train off. You've got a spotter, you can do some proper off-roading. Of course, ground clearance, you've got options of having this skateboard, this flat belly pan nice and high. So we have a quad motor design. Each one of these motors, these tiny motors, each one is nearly 200 horsepower. Oh, they're only there, aren't they? Yeah. Each motor controls each wheel, so we have a transfer box, a reduction gear, gearbox in the middle, and then this extremely long driveshaft, which gives us great wheel articulation. As you say, we can deliver instantaneous throttle response and torque control, but also we can vary the torque across the axle, so we've got infinite torque vectoring. We can even reverse the torque across the axle to give us some really unique handling characteristics, particularly off-road. And that's the thing, really, when you think about what that can do in terms of eking out every little piece of grip, whether it be on a steep ascent or a steep descent, that's really game-changing in the off-road market. Yeah, and I see adjustable airbag suspension. Yeah, so we have a huge range of articulation. We can go down to 208 millimeters, very low for getting in and out of the vehicle easily, but we can go up to 360 millimeters of ground clearance. Wow, that is a big bag. Which is amazing in terms of their off-road capability. Yes, yeah. And the vehicle's been designed so we have very aggressive ramp and departure angles, so we package the body absolutely to support this off-road capability. I can see on the SUV it's like an upswept underside, I guess for, what's that for, ascent, steep ascent, yes. Yeah, that departure angle is very important when you're coming off a piece of steep terrain. But also, dispelling another myth, because we have four motors, we have a huge amount of torque, 14,000 newton meters of torque. 14,000? 14,000 newton meters of torque at the wheel, so we can tow very heavy loads. Now, this is interesting because we get this question asked more and more on Fully Charged. I like the idea of an EV, but I want to tow a caravan, but none of them seem to allow me to. You've arrived at the answer. We can tow 11,000 pounds, which is pretty much 5,000, five tons, 5,000 kilograms with this vehicle. In fact, we could tow more. That's more than a Range Rover? Yeah, much more than a Range Rover. We could tow more, but that's just about then how much weight we want to add to the vehicle in terms of structure. But the towing capacity, because of this torque, is immense. But what it also delivers, which is important not just off-road, but on-road, is a really low center of gravity. Again, when we're thinking about climbing and descending, the low center of gravity is immensely important. And also, the motors are inside the axle, both at the front and the rear. So, in terms of on-road agility, you wouldn't expect this car to be maybe agile. Agile wouldn't be an adjective you'd use to describe it, but actually the agility of this vehicle, particularly with some of the torque vectoring, this is a really fun car to drive on the road as well as off the road. I've got to say I really like the design of it. It's very tasteful, very simple. Well, we spent a lot of time working on the basics, which for us is getting the proportions right. We didn't want something that was futuristic and kind of way out there, which would not be appropriate for the aspirational aspect of the ownership of this vehicle. So, we spent a lot of time on proportion. That's a big car. How big is this? Well, the S is just over five meters long. Five meters? So, it's not that big in comparison with, say, something like a Range Rover. Yeah. Certainly a long wheelbase. I mean, people are going to directly compare it to, I guess, the Range Rover or the Audi e-tron or the EQC Mercedes. Yes, possibly. This is a full three-row, seven seats. Yeah. So, even adults in the rear, we can get 85th percentile adult in the rear. So, this is a proper seven-seated vehicle. We also spent a lot of time developing what we think is a pretty unique face for this. Yeah. So, developing the lighting system and the real signature of our vehicles, what we call the stadium lights. So, these are... Oh yeah, they are like a stadium. Yeah, we call them stadium lights. So, this is the position light and then this is the daytime running light with the dip beam and the main beam lights, directional lights inside, which gives the car a really unique face. So, we're a new brand coming to the and we wanted something, maybe people wouldn't recognize the name initially, but they certainly recognize that and remember it and then they'd remember that's a Rivian. And the other unique feature, which is pretty cool, a nice little Easter egg, is when you're charging the vehicle, this changes to green and shows you the state of charge as the charge increases. Does it? So, you can sit in a coffee shop and look at the vehicle and see the battery charge increasing, which is pretty cool. That's very good. Safety is extremely important for us. This is a five-star car, IHS top safety pick. So, crash performance and real safety for our customers is very important. So, we use high-strength steel extensively at the front of the vehicle and down the sides and obviously to protect the battery pack, a huge amount of engineering detail at the sides and at the front and indeed underneath to make sure that the battery pack stays intact even on the most, the roughest of terrain. Of course, you've got rock terrain and you're going to have a good wading depth, presumably. So, we have a composite material, which is almost like a ballistic shield underneath the vehicle to protect from rocks. So, that's your first... So, we have Kevlar and carbon fibre underneath. The battery pack's completely sealed. That's another myth with electric vehicles. If you think about it, submarines are electric, used to be electric. So, this vehicle weighed for at least a metre of water. A metre? The battery pack is completely sealed. Wow. The drive units are sealed and actually the only limitation, the vehicle could go deeper but because we have so much space and so much volume, the vehicle will actually float away. It will take off, yeah. So, it's a buoyancy issue. So, if you load the vehicle up, it will actually go deeper than that. A metre of wading depth. Come around here. Let's go around here and have a look in the inside. So, we've taken a lot of inspiration from our sports equipment, bringing some of those materials and themes into the interior of the vehicle but also... Can I touch some of that? Of course. Also, lots of natural materials. Lovely wood, real wood. Yeah, it's really nice. And beautiful materials. On the floor, there is no carpet and the material which is used for the foot mats is actually used for our outdoor furniture which is extremely easy to clean and waterproof and weatherproof. So, again, no concerns about getting this vehicle dirty. So, it's rub rubber floor. Yeah, it's important to emphasise that we want people to go out and get these vehicles dirty. They're designed to get dirty and to get used. So, it's like this dirty luxury. Exactly. Basically. It looks spectacular. A little easter egg here where Rolls-Royce has got an umbrella. We have a little torch. Oh, you've got a good LED. Wow, that's really bright. And this is cool because in here is one of the cells, one 21700 cell. Of the pack. It's used in the battery pack to propel the vehicle. That's great. Charges on the move. It does. It charges when it's in there? Yeah. Oh, that's really... Lots of focus on cabin space. So, a huge amount of leg room for the rear occupants and then again at the rear for the third row as well. Of course, no trans tunnel. They're completely flat floor. Yeah, yeah. And then you say 83rd percentile adults. 85, yeah. 85. In the rear. You've got a full-size glass roof with another one at the back. So, two panoramic roofs. Electrochromatic roofs that you can change the tint of to change the amount of sun penetration. Right, okay. Let's talk like production dates and potential pricing. Yeah, so end of 2020. Yeah, that's not that far away. We're taking orders now or make a deposit online. Yeah. By end of 2020 in customers hands and for a base vehicle. Yeah. Before discounts, under $70,000. Under $70,000? $70,000. So, for the truck with the EV discount around $61,500. Crikey. And with the S with the discount $65,000. And you're an American company, aren't you? We're an American company. You're not American but... Yes. He's not American. I'm a brick in the US. Yeah. And loving it. We have a manufacturing facility in Illinois. Okay. Just south of Chicago, two hours south of Chicago where all the vehicles will be manufactured and all the supply base, the majority of the components on this car are manufactured in the US. Are they? Yes. And you're going to sell them globally? That's the plan? Yeah, left and right hand drive. Yeah. I'm very keen to get these in the UK, obviously. I am. After the US, we'll go to Europe and the UK, Europe and also China. Yeah. But our plan is for all territories, so Japan, the Middle East. Can we go over to the pickup? Because obviously there's nothing more American than a pickup. Yeah, we've been inundated with people who want a pickup, a plug-in but want an electric vehicle. It's interesting, we did a lot of research with EV owners who have like a sedan or an SUV but also have large pickup trucks or off-road vehicles because they wouldn't take their electric vehicle to those locations. When they see this, they love the combination. Again, utilising the advantage of that skateboard architecture, a huge amount of space in the front. So this is 330 litres. 330 litres. So maybe you can help me out a bit. Can I? Can I get this out? It's my cool box full of lager. I could get in that. It is like a mini hot tub. Well, it really looks like one. I think we'll do a version because if you think of all the electrical energy on board, we could heat the water and you could... Oh my goodness. Shall we close the front and then we got multiple tether points. Yeah, nice tether points for a gain on the luggage. Yeah. And as you can see again, same face, a Rivian face. Exactly the same face, yeah. I'm digging this. And then for the truck, lots of interior space, very different colour theme we're showing on this. So darker wood, richer greens, giving the car a very different feel. More of a forestry look. But here on the side of the vehicle, something completely unique is our gear tunnel. That is amazing. So storage for, in this case, a snowboard. But if you imagine strollers, golf bags, tools, equipment. If it's a heavy night, you could probably sleep in there. You actually could. You actually could sleep in there. But you can see it goes all the way through the vehicle. You could even Airbnb that in Japan. And then this door, you can stand on to put stuff on the roof. Oh, OK. Deliberately designed. So load bearing up to what kind of... Take an adult. Yeah. And then you can sit on here to change your shoes after your long hike. This is deeply practical. It's meant to be, yeah. It's deeply practical. Let's put this back in here. That's a huge amount of space. Obviously for a pickup truck, we've got a really generous bed. Tailgate system which folds to 90 degrees and 180 degrees. Oh, let's have a look. So in the 90 degrees position, this is 2.1 metres long. 2.1? 2.1, so you could fit a dirt bike on here and all the way down to 180. Oh, I see. So you can walk in closer. And then inside here, very important for us in terms of off-road capability. A full-size spare wheel. A full-size spare. And that is really full-size. A full-size spare. 20-inch. And if you don't want to take that, there's another 250 litres of storage in here. Dry storage that you can use for maybe some of the dirty gear. Why? I'm not a pickup guy, I'm a Brit. And I come and see people using pickups. Yeah. And obviously an immense amount of practicality. But if you've got four people in the car. Yeah. And it's raining. Where do you put your luggage? Where do you put the shopping? It rolls around in the back. Yeah. But for us now. You've got the frunk. The frunk. Gear tunnel. Yeah. And a huge amount of space in the bed. I've never been a pickup guy, maybe that will change. So many people have said that. So many people have said that. Well, because of exactly what you've just said. I look at it in England and go, why would you just fill this with rainwater and leaves? It's just useless to me. But suddenly it's not useless. Well, there you go. Fully charged views. A deeply impressive Rivian R1T and R1S. That is an amazing tour. I have to say, I'm very impressed. You're speechless there. I am actually. Thank you very much. I didn't expect there to be such an attention to detail. If you'd asked me to guess how much that SUV would have cost, I would have said. That's good to hear. A hundred thousand US dollars. Well, a fully loaded car with everything on it will be. I suppose you can order it with lots of doorbells and whistles. With a full battery pack and all the other interior. And I didn't talk about, we have full self-driving, so level three driving capability on the vehicle as well. So we have LiDAR at the front, three radar, four Ford cameras, two radar at the rear. This is going to be the world's first full EV production pickup truck, isn't it? Yes. It is, isn't it? There isn't one. There isn't one available. How does this compare size-wise to the Ford F-150S, which is what, America's best-selling truck? Yeah, slightly smaller. I mean, this is a, let's say it's a mid-size truck. It doesn't look mid-size to me. It's just a little bit smaller. This is 5.4 metres in length. 5.4? It's not huge. Okay. And 2.1 metres wide. I love it.