The EV conquered one of the most challenging off-road trails in North America with little more than a scrape here and there.
TheRivian R1Shas completed the daunting Rubicon Trail, making it the first production electric vehicle to do so. EVs like the Pininfarina Battista and Rimac Nevera prove that all-electric powertrains can keep up even with the fastest ICE-powered cars. Now, it's Rivian turn to champion EVs and their unique abilities.
"Crossing the Rubicon Trail in a more sustainable way than it has ever been done before makes me hopeful for the future of off-roading," said Matt Trainham, Rivian director of vehicle testing.
The Rubicon Trail is one of North America's most challenging off-road trails. Even the flagship variant of the Jeep Wranglerwas named after it. The feat was more impressive because the Rivian R1S was running on stock 34-inch Pirelli all-terrain tires from the factory.
Rivian installed a few modifications to help the EV in case things got bad, including a set of steel rock sliders, front tow hitch receivers, and a roof rack carrying a spare wheel and tire.
The excursion started at the Loon Lake entrance at 7:45 AM on Monday, August 7, with an 80% state-of-charge. After two days of crawling on rocky surfaces and creeks, the EV finished the 12-mile trail at the Tahoma staging area around 3:30 PM on Wednesday, August 9.
The EV only had 10% remaining charge, but it was enough to reach a nearby Level 2 charger. Many didn't expect the vehicle to finish the trail, let alone do so with some juice to spare.
Making the crawls seamless was the use of a unique quad-motor setup, which makes 835 horsepower and 908 lb-ft of torque. Two pre-production quad-motorR1Tpickups from the Rivian team supported the first leg of the trip. The remainder of the trip had a modifiedJeep Wranglertrailing the EV.
Rivian concluded the R1S experienced no mechanical failures or tire changes except for a few bumps and scrapes.
"I'm hugely impressed by the R1S' clean run," said Chris Bassett, director of the Rubicon Trail Foundation. "Aside from some homebuilt EV crawlers, this is the first fully-[electric] vehicle through the trail, and definitely the first production EV. Very impressive on stock tires, too."
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