GM Invests $877 Million for Flint Assembly Upgrades

New body facility links assembly plant with Flint Metal Center
FLINT, Mich. – General Motors’ oldest assembly plant in North America, a popular destination for pickup truck customers who want to watch their vehicles being built, will undergo transformation in the coming years.

GM officials today announced plans to invest $877 million to build a new body shop for the assembly plant, locating it closer to the Flint Metal Center, which supplies sheet metal and other parts used in the Chevrolet and GMC full-size pickups produced in the assembly plant.

The investment will also cover improvements to the general assembly area inside Flint Assembly, as well as retooling and the installation of new equipment at the plant.

“This investment will allow us to use a more innovative approach to deliver material between two critical facilities, reducing handling and the time it takes to ship parts,” said Cathy Clegg, GM North America Manufacturing and Labor Relations vice president.

Since 2011, GM has announced investments topping $1.8 billion for Flint Assembly. This includes $600 million for plant upgrades and a new standalone paint shop that is under construction and slated to open in 2016. Work on the 883,000-square-foot body shop is expected to begin in the first half of 2016, with completion slated for 2018.

“In the last several years, GM’s investments in the city of Flint have topped $2.5 billion, creating hundreds of construction jobs and an economic boost for the community,” said Flint Mayor Dayne Walling. “This investment not only strengthens the ties between GM and the city, it demonstrates that Flint continues to play an important role in the resurgence of manufacturing in Michigan and the rest of the United States.”

Opened in 1947 as part of a post-World War II building boom by GM’s Flint Assembly has produced more than 13 million vehicles. The plant’s “View Builds,” as they are called, allow customers to see their heavy-duty Silverados or heavy-duty Sierra trucks being assembled and roll off the line after a series of quality checks by members of UAW Local 598.

“While the plant has received numerous awards for initial quality and long-term durability and reliability, our latest investments in the plant will raise the bar in vehicle quality and customer satisfaction,” Clegg said.

For starters, when the new paint shop opens in 2016, trucks will be painted using a wet-coat process that results in a smoother, more durable finish. The new body shop will be constructed north of the Flint Metal Center, reducing transportation time and handling between facilities.

“This announcement is due to the hard work and dedication of our UAW members in Flint,” said UAW Vice President Cindy Estrada, who leads the UAW GM Department. “This proves once again that when we work together in a collaborative approach, UAW members continue to come up with innovative ways to grow the business, which provides jobs and improves the quality of the products we produce. This is both good for the Company and good for our members.”

Today’s announcement completes the $5.4 billion in investments GM and the UAW announced at the end of April. Since June 2009, GM has announced U.S. facility investments of approximately $17.8 billion, including $12.4 billion since the end of the 2011 UAW-GM National Agreement. These investments have created approximately 6,250 new jobs and secured 20,700 other positions. 

General Motors Co. (NYSE:GM, TSX: GMM) and its partners produce vehicles in 30 countries, and the company has leadership positions in the world's largest and fastest-growing automotive markets. GM, its subsidiaries and joint venture entities sell vehicles under the Chevrolet, Cadillac, Baojun, Buick, GMC, Holden, Jiefang, Opel, Vauxhall and Wuling brands. More information on the company and its subsidiaries, including OnStar, a global leader in vehicle safety, security and information services, can be found at http://www.gm.com.

2015 GMC Yukon Denali Start Up, Test Drive, and In Depth Review

Hello and welcome to Saabkyle04, YouTube's largest collection of automotive variety! In today's video, we take an in depth look into the 2015 GMC Yukon Denali!

Pickup Packs by Highway Products

The Pickup Pack™ is a unique alternative for companies needing organized storage and lockup security without the cost of a service body and that can be easily installed on your pickup in a few hours.

Pickup Packs™ include a headache rack, two lockable low side boxes, a flat or dome center hatch, and a removable ladder rack. Other options include gullwing saddle box and an HPI Truckslide™.

Learn more at http://www.highwayproducts.com/pickup...

Equipment Positioning Critical When Towing Equipment With Pickups

2014 Silverado towing rear_BS26003Load placement key to keeping within factory towing guidelines for a safe tow

One of the biggest mistakes pickup owners make in towing is exceeding the truck’s hitch tongue weight.

This leads to overloading the truck’s rear suspension, creating significant handling, braking and potentially serious  business liability issues.
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Moving a piece of equipment, such as a 9,000-pound Bobcat compact loader, six inches forward or back on a tandem-axle equipment trailer can change the tongue weight 600 pounds.

So load positioning is critical if you want to be in compliance with the pickup manufacturers’ towing guidelines.

Every pickup has a set limitation on how much tongue weight can be placed on the hitch (noted in the owner’s manual), and every hitch shank has a load limit (noted on the shank) as to how much it can safely support.

The two capacities ratings are not always equal, but the lowest number always takes precedence.

For instance, the majority of ½-ton pickups only allow 500 pounds of tongue weight while ¾- and 1-tons with 2-inch receivers generally max out at 1,200 pounds.

The newer HD pickups with 2 1/2-inch receivers may be rated to support up to 1,700 pounds tongue weight.

Weigh-Safe Hitch shows tongue weight right on the hitch ball mount for accurate reading.

Note: Vehicle manufacturers also require 10- to 15 percent of the trailer’s loaded weight on the hitch ball.

So if you are towing a loaded trailer that tips the scales at 9,700 pounds, you should have between 970 and 1,115 pounds on the tongue (hitch ball), with 12- percent being ideal as that gives you a little leeway toward being too heavy or too light.

Too little tongue weight leads to trailer sway — and too much adversely affects the pickup’s braking and steering.

The easiest way to ensure tongue weight is set in accordance to the pickup manufacturer’s requirements is to use a scale such as those offered by Sherline or using a built-in hitch unit from Weigh-Safe.

Sherline’s scales are capable of reading tongue weights up to 5,000 pounds, although the 2,000-pound-capacity model is sufficient for most pickup trailer towing applications.

The easiest, fastest way to check tongue weight is to use Weigh-Safe’s adjustable-height drop-shank system. It has a built-in scale that shows tongue weights up to 1,500 pounds.

Sherline scale accurately measures trailer tongue weight.

Using Sherline’s scale requires placing the scale under the trailer coupler and slowly lifting it with a floor jack into the coupler until the jack is supporting the weight of the trailer tongue.

For both weigh systems, read the dial on the scale. If the weight is too high or too low, adjust the position of the load or equipment on the trailer until the number is correct.

If a piece of equipment is going to be hauled on the same trailer all the time, it’s good to paint or mark the trailer bed to indicate where the bucket edge or a tire needs to be positioned to keep that weight balance correct. – Bruce W. Smith




By Bruce W. Smith

Source: http://www.hardworkingtrucks.com/equipment-positioning-critical-when-towing-equipment-with-pickups/?utm_source=daily-responsive-1&utm_medium=email&utm_content=07-24-2015&utm_campaign=HWT&ust_id=e2e69cf73e

GM Paving Way to Smarter and Safer Driving at All-New Active Safety Test Area

22 crash-avoidance technologies offered 

on 2016 Chevrolet, Buick, GMC and Cadillac models 

MILFORD, Mich. – Chevrolet, Buick, GMC and Cadillac will offer 22 different active safety technologies across their 2016 model year U.S. lineups, ranging from driver alerts to those that automatically intervene and assist the driver in critical situations.

Safety engineers will develop and test these and other safety technologies for products around the world at GM’s new, 52-acre Active Safety Test Area at its Milford Proving Ground near Detroit. The $14 million facility officially opened Friday.

“Our comprehensive safety strategy of helping customers before, during and after a crash continues,” said Jeff Boyer, vice president of GM Global Vehicle Safety. “GM historically has been a leader in the development and testing of safety technologies, and applying our deep knowledge and expertise to prevent crashes from happening in the first place.”

Examples of available crash-avoidance technologies for 2016 GM models include:

• City Speed Front Automatic Braking: If the vehicle is traveling at a low speed and the system detects that a front-end collision situation is imminent while following a detected vehicle and the driver has not already applied the brakes, the system automatically applies brakes to help reduce the collision’s severity. The system may even help avoid the collision at very low speeds.

• Front Pedestrian Braking: If the system detects that a pedestrian is directly ahead and a collision is imminent, and the driver has not already applied the brakes, the system alerts the driver and, if necessary, automatically applies the brakes to help reduce the collision’s severity or avoid the collision.

• Rear Camera Mirror: Compared to a traditional inside rearview mirror, this rear view mirror display provides a wider, less obstructed field of view to assist when driving, changing lanes, and checking for vehicles and traffic conditions.

• Night Vision: Provides the driver an infrared night vision image of the area lit beyond the headlamps that highlights and provides alerts to detected pedestrians or large animals.

• Curb View Camera: When in Forward gear during low-speed maneuvering (e.g., parking),  this system provides the driver a view of the scene immediately ahead of the vehicle on the vehicle’s center stack display to help the driver avoid low-speed collisions into nearby objects, such as curbs, poles, and parked vehicles.

“The technologies we are developing and testing at this facility are available to our customers across our GM brands,” said Cynthia Bay, director of Active Safety Electronics and Controls. “Front Pedestrian Braking will be offered on the 2016 Chevrolet Malibu, and the lowest-priced Chevrolet we offer in the U.S. – the new 2016 Spark – has available Lane Departure Warning and Forward Collision Alert.”

The new Active Safety Test Area concentrates the company’s active safety testing into one, state-of-the-art site. It features:

• A 16-acre dynamics pad for testing a variety of robot-controlled and automated vehicles.

• Highway simulation with six lanes, on/off ramps, controlled lighting and road signs that represent specifications around the world.

• A parking test area with different curb types and landscaping detection.

• Pedestrian test area with a 90-degree traffic intersection and specially designed rig for accurate dummy movement.

• Simulated tunnel with walls and posts.

• A building for observation, indoor testing, hoists for test preparation and a robotic control station.

Bay said the facility is ideal for testing vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) technologies, which will be standard on the 2017 Cadillac CTS.

“In addition to helping customers all over the world avoid crashes, many of the technologies we develop and test here are integral to our ongoing V2V communications work and even the development of future autonomous vehicles,” she said.

The V2V dedicated short-range radio communication enables vehicles to “talk” to each other and exchange basic safety data such as speed, location and braking status. It complements existing safety components like radar, camera and ultrasonic sensors; some of the components rigorously tested at the new Active Safety Test Area facility, in a fast and efficient way.

The facility is also used to assess performance in regulatory and insurance industry consumer metric tests, such as those conducted by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), Euro New Car Assessment Program (NCAP), the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS) and others.

“General Motors is committed to setting a new standard for global product safety, and developing vehicles that continue to provide leading safety technologies which can help drivers avoid crashes,” said Boyer. “This facility will accelerate GM’s development and testing of innovative safety technologies.”

General Motors Co. (NYSE:GM, TSX: GMM) and its partners produce vehicles in 30 countries, and the company has leadership positions in the world's largest and fastest-growing automotive markets. GM, its subsidiaries and joint venture entities sell vehicles under the Chevrolet, Cadillac, Baojun, Buick, GMC, Holden, Jiefang, Opel, Vauxhall and Wuling brands. More information on the company and its subsidiaries, including OnStar, a global leader in vehicle safety, security and information services, can be found at http://www.gm.com.

OnStar Tops 1 Billion Customer Interactions

Customers reach out via phone, mobile app 

and through their vehicles

DETROIT – OnStar has fielded more than 1 billion requests from customers, who interact by phone, mobile app or embedded cellular service in their cars and trucks.

Launched nearly 19 years ago as an industry-first service that would place a call from the vehicle when an air bag deployed, OnStar today remotely unlocks doors, loads driving directions directly to the vehicle, compiles and sends emails on vehicle health and can aid law enforcement by slowing down a vehicle being pursued.

A customer contacts OnStar every two seconds. That adds up to about 5 million calls a month from its subscriber base of more than 7 million. Add 8.8 million interactions a month from the RemoteLink mobile app and you can see how indispensable OnStar has become since launching on three Cadillac models in 1996.

“OnStar created the original connected car in 1996 and today remains at the forefront of innovation through the services offered in Chevrolet, Buick, GMC, Cadillac and soon, Opel vehicles around the globe,” said Alicia Boler-Davis, senior vice president, General Motors Global Connected Customer Experience.

“The pace at which the brand has reached 1 billion interactions shows the vast customer demand for vehicle connectivity and there’s no doubt our second billion interactions will come even quicker.”

By the numbers, here is what 1 billion interactions looks like:

•    5.5 million Emergency Services delivered, including when Bernadette Holzer was driving her Chevrolet Equinox in Tionesta, Penn., triggering an Automatic Crash Response and OnStar’s Crisis Assist service helping Jacqueline Teeters avoid a tornado while driving from Houston to Dallas.

•    156 million RemoteLink Mobile App requests, including Tysha Gill unlocking her car from her smartphone when her keys were locked inside.

•    More than 270 million Turn-by-Turn Navigation requests, including helping Diana Richard find a gas station late at night when she was traveling from Virginia to Ohio.

•    Delivered Roadside Assistance more than 3.9 million times, including bringing gas to Lixi Cacho who was stranded in a remote area

•    More than 800,000 Good Samaritan calls, including Tyler Andrews from Dallas being named OnStar’s “Good Samaritan of the Year” for helping an unresponsive motorist.

•    More than 390 million Vehicle Diagnostic reports delivered, including helping Debbie Yaeger and her 9-year-old daughter on a drive from Florida to Ohio.

•    More than 350 stolen vehicles slowed down. Mississippi State Senator Terry Burton used Stolen Vehicle Assistance to recover his stolen Chevrolet Impala.

OnStar has even helped deliver babies and works with the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) to track Santa Claus on Christmas Eve.

In honor of the milestone, OnStar has provided loyal subscribers in the U.S., Canada, Mexico and China with a year of premium OnStar service. Top performing OnStar advisors in each market were honored as well.

Before becoming known as OnStar, the original name for the service was Project Beacon. Its goal was integrating wireless communication into vehicles, years before mass adoption of smartphones.

In the fall of 1996, OnStar debuted in the Cadillac DeVille, Seville and Eldorado. The service initially offered Airbag Deployment Notifications, the core of OnStar’s safety and security premise, which progressed into Automatic Crash Response that uses sensors capable of determining the severity of a crash impact and alerting an OnStar emergency advisor to assist. OnStar today responds to more than 100,000 emergency calls every month.

OnStar features have expanded to convenience services such as Turn-by-Turn Navigation, which is used 3.8 million times every month to download driver-requested directions to the vehicle. OnStar also sends more than 4 million vehicle diagnostic emails each month, providing up-to-date checks on a vehicle’s key operating systems.

RemoteLink enables its 1.5 million active users to lock and unlock their vehicle, start the engine and access vehicle diagnostics such as tire pressure and oil life from their mobile devices.

“We need to provide an overall customer experience that will keep customers coming back for life,” said Boler-Davis. “To do that, we need to meet customers on their terms and offer them a variety of choices. We realize every customer is different.”

OnStar services include OnStar 4G LTE, a built-in Wi-Fi hotspot inside properly equipped 2015 and newer model year vehicles. More than 1 million Chevrolet, Cadillac, Buick and GMC vehicles on the road in the U.S. and Canada have OnStar 4G LTE. The service will be available in China and Europe later this year.

New OnStar services include Smart Driver Assessment, through which consenting drivers can get feedback on their driving habits for potential insurance discounts, and Advanced Diagnostics, which includes real-time and proactive vehicle health alerts.

OnStar, a wholly owned subsidiary of GM Holdings LLC (“GM”) that launched in 1996, offers in-vehicle safety, security and connectivity services in Chevrolet, Cadillac, Buick-GMC models, including Automatic Crash Response, Stolen Vehicle Assistance, Turn-by-Turn Navigation, RemoteLink mobile app and 4G LTE Wi-Fi. Along with its affiliate Shanghai OnStar Telematics Co. Ltd (a joint venture involving OnStar and SAIC General Motors), OnStar has 7 million subscribers in North America and China. In 2015, OnStar recorded its 1 billionth customer interaction, topped more than 1 million 4G LTE Wi-Fi equipped-vehicles, and launched in Opel/Vauxhall.

The New 2016 GMC Sierra 1500 Revealed

A drone hovering over the top-secret Milford Proving Ground captures the new design of the 2016 GMC Sierra 1500 for the first time. Available late 2015. Preproduction models shown.