So, I'm actually considering putting down a $1000 deposit on a Rivian SUV (R1S is their boring model name). I would appreciate thoughts on what we've seen so far.

https://rivian.com/r1s

It has room for 7, sized in-between mid-size and full-size SUVs, gets over 700 horsepower, and has a 300 mile range. The middle version (performance-focused, as opposed to economy or range for the high and low models) is targeting 0-60 times of 3.0 seconds. Check out the cool tank-turn video. It appears to have most of the features I'm seeking, and the launch version is priced at $77,500 ($70k, including the $7500 EV credit). They are backed by Amazon, Ford, and others, and appear to be well-capitalized, initially at least. They estimate late 2021 delivery. On paper, I'm convinced this will be just what I'd like for my first electric vehicle, BUT there are potential issues:

• Unclear what options will do to the out the door price. I can see leather ("vegan" leather is standard), wheels/tires, towing package, and other luxury features ending up costing another $10-20k.
• It's a first-time offering from a brand new company - launch dates, reliability, service, parts, etc. are merely guesswork for something with this clean sheet design.
• Another family member has stated that it looks toy-like and comical - I think it looks like a cleaner version of a Range Rover, but taste is a personal issue.
• It's likely the company will IPO or be acquired in the next few years - that adds another element of future risk.

OK, Automotive Board, give me your opinions...

I would be worried about build quality for the first several years.

First time release issues... See Fisker

Fisker

What's the charging network like? This is Tesla'a big advantage.

If you really believe in the R1S, wait for the IPO and invest your $70k purchase price there. Had my parents done that in 1982 instead of spending $2400 on an Apple ][e, they would have an extra half million sitting in the bank.

lb3 said:

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If you really believe in the R1S, wait for the IPO and invest your $70k purchase price there. Had my parents done that in 1982 instead of spending $2400 on an Apple ][e, they would have an extra half million sitting in the bank.

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I understand investments, sport - I'm asking about the car. What do you think of the way it looks, the specs, performance expectations, your opinion on whether or not they can deliver, etc.

By the way, I actually invested in Fisker (the new company, not the old), and will probably invest in Rivian once it becomes available. I fully expect some of these EV companies to wash out, but I consider these to be speculative investments with discretionary money.

I don't like the truck and think it's expensive (of course I think F150s are obnoxiously expensive). But I do think they have enough backing to deliver on initial preorders.

As for the looks and performance specs... Looks are always personal and ever evolving.The CyberTruck looked like and April Fools joke that needed to be killed with fire when first unveiled and hundreds of thousands of 1980s blade runner fans signed up for pre-orders. I've even gotten used to the looks after seeing it all over the internet.

Performance is competitive with anything that will likely hit the market in the next 5 years so if you like it, no need to wait.

CastleRock said:

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Isn't there significant speculation the entire company is vaporware?

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I'd say you're thinking of one of the others, like Nikola (definitely vaporware so far), NIO, or Fisker. Rivian has raised billions from reputable backers, so they aren't on a shoestring budget at this point. They have working prototypes that independent journalists have driven. But your point is valid - shoot, until Tesla actually delivered their first volume model, it was very much touch-and-go for them. Elon Musk (stupidly) acknowledged recently that Tesla was 4-6 weeks away from bankruptcy at one point during the Model 3 ramp-up.

I think a 77k electric truck is a tough sell when Tesla is going to put out the CyberTruck with 300mi range and 4.5s 0-60 for 50k. 3500lb payload and can tow 10k lbs.

And the big thing is the charging network with Tesla.

On a daily basis, you want to keep your electric car between 80% and 20% battery charge. So that 300mi range on the Rivian or Cybertruck is really 180mi on a daily basis. That's also if you don't hammer the throttle, which is fun as hell.

How fast will the Rivian recharge? Where will it recharge other than your house? Most of the level 2 chargers you see out there will add about 25mi per range in an hour. At a Supercharger, a Model 3 can get 75mi in 5 minutes. The new battery system will be even faster.

There are lots of places you can charge a non-Tesla. There aren't a lot of places you can charge them quickly. How often are you going to want to hang around for two hours to get another 50mi of drive time?

lb3 said:

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I don't like the truck and think it's expensive (of course I think F150s are obnoxiously expensive). But I do think they have enough backing to deliver on initial preorders.

As for the looks and performance specs... Looks are always personal and ever evolving.The CyberTruck looked like and April Fools joke that needed to be killed with fire when first unveiled and hundreds of thousands of 1980s blade runner fans signed up for pre-orders. I've even gotten used to the looks after seeing it all over the internet.

Performance is competitive with anything that will likely hit the market in the next 5 years so if you like it, no need to wait.

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I agree with you on almost all points. It certainly is expensive, but it's roughly in line with some other options I'm considering. I am also susceptible to being wowed by the latest technology, so that's a point against me.

On design / look - So, in your judgment, does the Rivian look closer to a Range Rover, or a comic book car? I still haven't remotely warmed up to the Tesla truck look, but I hope it's a hit, for my hometown's sake.

While I think the 4 independent motors (one for each wheel) sounds cool, I'm not sure this method will stand the test of time, either.

lb3 said:

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If you really believe in the R1S, wait for the IPO and invest your $70k purchase price there. Had my parents done that in 1982 instead of spending $2400 on an Apple ][e, they would have an extra half million sitting in the bank.

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If you had invested $2400 in Apple stock in 1982 you would have closer to $20 million today.

I had a deposit down on an R1T for about 9 months. Decided I didn't want to deal with all the problems associated with a startup company, new vehicle without infrastructure, etc ... the vehicles look cool though

The Rivian R1S does remind me of a Range Rover in profile and it actually has a better ass end than most vehicles on the market.

The front disturbs me however. The headlights just give it an awkward looking face to me. If you're going to anthropomorphize the nose, it needs to look cute, happy, strong, or aggressive, not stupid. The 'new' Beatles look cute, and the current mustang has an aggressive snarl, the Rivian has a void expression to me. It's the bimbo of truck faces.

As ugly as the CyberTruck is, the more more I see it the more it's ugliness fades and it's attributes grow. But the Rivian just keeps drawing me into those weird eyes and air intake/bumper mouth and I can't seem to get past that.

There is a concept in video games where blocky or cartoonish characters can be quite endearing but as they become more realistic, that endearing quality diminishes until they start to become almost lifelike.

Minecraft:

Tomb Raider:


The Evil Within:

Most of these are never going to leave the burbs.

I think there's significant market for a $77k mall crawler.

Well, here goes nothing!!!

I put down the $1000 deposit, believing that they (with Ford and Amazon's backing) will make good on their refund "cancel at any time" policy. I will get a configurator "soon", and I will get some "gifts" in the mail (small model of vehicle or custom coffee mug, maybe?). I'll try to let you know how the process goes.

Reminds me, a couple weeks ago I saw a guy pulled over on the roadside on I-10 with a Tesla and a bunch of solar panels set out, while he sat in the shade nearby.

I wonder how long he was there.

MouthBQ98 said:

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Reminds me, a couple weeks ago I saw a guy pulled over on the roadside on I-10 with a Tesla and a bunch of solar panels set out, while he sat in the shade nearby.

I wonder how long he was there.

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Oh - he's still out there, if he's awaiting a full charge!

It was somwhere around Ozona. Makes me wonder how they do roadside assist with EV with no power? It's not like they design swappable battery packs. Is there a rapid boost charge feature to get you to the nearest charge station?

I bleed maroon said:

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Well, here goes nothing!!!

I put down the $1000 deposit, believing that they (with Ford and Amazon's backing) will make good on their refund "cancel at any time" policy. I will get a configurator "soon", and I will get some "gifts" in the mail (small model of vehicle or custom coffee mug, maybe?). I'll try to let you know how the process goes.

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They will refund the money. I got my deposit back within about 24 hours of requesting. The reservation "gift" I received was a concept drawing of an R1T

'03ag said:

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Most of these are never going to leave the burbs.

I think there's significant market for a $77k mall crawler.

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But Mom's mall crawling people mover is also usually the car that takes the family on trips. I'm guessing that even families that can buy an 80k Tahoe or Rivian aren't flying private to every soccer, baseball, and cheer tournament that is over 100 miles away.

Guitarsoup said:

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'03ag said:

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Most of these are never going to leave the burbs.

I think there's significant market for a $77k mall crawler.

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But Mom's mall crawling people mover is also usually the car that takes the family on trips. I'm guessing that even families that can buy an 80k Tahoe or Rivian aren't flying private to every soccer, baseball, and cheer tournament that is over 100 miles away.

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I think most of them are two car households that will solve this problem another way.

The car market is huge. It doesn't have to work for every household to be a huge success.

Guitarsoup said:

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'03ag said:

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Most of these are never going to leave the burbs.

I think there's significant market for a $77k mall crawler.

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But Mom's mall crawling people mover is also usually the car that takes the family on trips. I'm guessing that even families that can buy an 80k Tahoe or Rivian aren't flying private to every soccer, baseball, and cheer tournament that is over 100 miles away.

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I agree with this - it was a real reason why 300+ miles of range is important for me. My 3 regular road trips are 180, 220 and 250 miles. Anything more than that, I'm flying anyway.

However, I have considered an Austin to Santa Fe trip, and this would be a difficult trip, at the very least. I don't know if I can hold my breath for 45 minutes in Lubbock. Looks like stops in Sweetwater and Santa Rosa, as well.

MouthBQ98 said:

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It was somwhere around Ozona. Makes me wonder how they do roadside assist with EV with no power? It's not like they design swappable battery packs. Is there a rapid boost charge feature to get you to the nearest charge station?

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When I was in Japan in the infancy of COVID-19, I went to the Nissan Crossing showroom in Ginza, Tokyo.

They showed a gigantic battery power pack that you could use do recharge a disabled electric car. This thing looked like a giant "Pelican" type case that was maybe 6ft wide, 2 ft high and 3 ft deep with an electrical lead coming out of it. I'll see if I can dig up one of my pictures and post it here.

'03ag said:

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Most of these are never going to leave the burbs.

I think there's significant market for a $77k mall crawler.

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If you watched the videos on the linked web site, you can see the clientele they're after.
Folks who "Vegan" leather would appeal to who have a lot of disposable income.

I bleed maroon said:

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Guitarsoup said:

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'03ag said:

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Most of these are never going to leave the burbs.

I think there's significant market for a $77k mall crawler.

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But Mom's mall crawling people mover is also usually the car that takes the family on trips. I'm guessing that even families that can buy an 80k Tahoe or Rivian aren't flying private to every soccer, baseball, and cheer tournament that is over 100 miles away.

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I agree with this - it was a real reason why 300+ miles of range is important for me. My 3 regular road trips are 180, 220 and 250 miles. Anything more than that, I'm flying anyway.

However, I have considered an Austin to Santa Fe trip, and this would be a difficult trip, at the very least. I don't know if I can hold my breath for 45 minutes in Lubbock. Looks like stops in Sweetwater and Santa Rosa, as well.

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I was just having this conversation last week.

Living in Los Angeles, it's the Las Vegas problem.

It's 272 miles from my house to the Las Vegas Strip.

Especially with Governor Newsom's recent push to stop selling gasoline powered automobiles in California by 2035, you're going to be getting a lot more demand and thus competition for any kind of roadside recharging stations on "The 15" between LA and Vegas.

If I have to stop somewhere and recharge other than In N Out Burger in Barstow, it's going to be a problem. But, if I can load up at my house and drive 300 miles to Vegas without having to recharge, that's ideal. Given average travel speed, acceleration, air conditioning, etc., the marketing numbers on that range probably need to be closer to 400 miles before full electric vehicle adoption is practical.

If you plan ahead, you can get the famous Burbank - Las Vegas low fares on Southwest Airlines but, if you need to take a last minute Las Vegas road trip, you need to be able to do it on a single full charge.

This of course assumes that the Casinos in Vegas will adapt and offer a sufficient number of charging stations once 20% of the vehicles on the road are electric. Right now the number of electric vehicles on the road is probably less than 1%.

For the OP. On their website, they do have a lot of job postings and the company appears to be legitimate.

They appear to have most of their corporate Engineering and Design in Irvine, CA but I don't know where their Manufacturing is.

As we know, Elon Musk and Telsa famously took over the plant in Freemont, CA that has been developed by GM + Toyota (I think it was) to produce some sort of electric car, or alternative fueled car, or hybrid or something like that. I know Toyota recently moved a lot of their corporate stuff from SoCal to the DFW Metroplex. But that didn't involve any manufacturing.

So, I don't know if Rivian would have to build their plant from scratch, or what. That certainly will be come a problem for them getting to scale / mass production.

The delivery date they're advertising for the first models is August 2021.

Based on my experience working with software, working with start-ups, there's a very good chance that date will slip and the first few models delivered will likely have a lot of bugs that require fixing. So, to EMY92's point, I would expect a lot of service calls, software updates, recalls etc. on the early models.

To give you an idea of how bad it could be, there's a famous Radio Talk Show host called Tom Leykis who was an early Tesla Model S owner. He loves the car but, he put $40K down and it was about 18-24 months before he got a car delivered. Maybe longer.

When I used to listen to him regularly 5 years ago, he also talked about two other major problems he had with the car. The first one was finding somebody to insure it. That was difficult since he was an early adopter a lot of auto insurance companies didn't know how to insure this new electric car. The other major problem he had was getting his vehicle repaired after a collision. It was very difficult for him to find anybody who could or would work on this brand new vehicle.

HollywoodBQ said:

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I was just having this conversation last week.

Living in Los Angeles, it's the Las Vegas problem.

It's 272 miles from my house to the Las Vegas Strip.

Especially with Governor Newsom's recent push to stop selling gasoline powered automobiles in California by 2035, you're going to be getting a lot more demand and thus competition for any kind of roadside recharging stations on "The 15" between LA and Vegas.

If I have to stop somewhere and recharge other than In N Out Burger in Barstow, it's going to be a problem. But, if I can load up at my house and drive 300 miles to Vegas without having to recharge, that's ideal. Given average travel speed, acceleration, air conditioning, etc., the marketing numbers on that range probably need to be closer to 400 miles before full electric vehicle adoption is practical.

If you plan ahead, you can get the famous Burbank - Las Vegas low fares on Southwest Airlines but, if you need to take a last minute Las Vegas road trip, you need to be able to do it on a single full charge.

This of course assumes that the Casinos in Vegas will adapt and offer a sufficient number of charging stations once 20% of the vehicles on the road are electric. Right now the number of electric vehicles on the road is probably less than 1%.

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Rivian claims they will have a 400 mile range version as part of their lineup. I don't doubt it, but it may be a year or more later - not worth the wait, for me at this point, as my minimum requirement is 300 miles. Performance (acceleration and handling) will also suffer, due to the added weight of the batteries.

Update on my process:

1. The Rivian reps I have talked to (1 by phone and 1 by chat) have actually been very helpful and responsive. Picked up on the 3rd or 4th ring, and seemed equipped to answer basic questions, and followed up quickly on issues where they needed management input.

2. The Launch version sold out a couple days before I placed my order. The rep said he'd try to squeeze me in, if management approved (they did not, I found out two days later). The differences between launch and regular is early delivery (mid-2021 vs. early 2022), badging, launch green color availability, and a free wheel/tire upgrade.

3. The standard wheel/tire combo (21") is the best for range. The off-road ones (2 options) reduce range and provide noisier/rougher ride, as you would expect. The two "performance" tire options improve handling, at the expense of range and ride, once again, as you would expect. I am inclined to stick with the base tires, which makes the Launch version really unneeded. They told me I could probably still get the army green color and badges on the 2022 model, if I did a special request. I won't need it.

4. The air suspension is standard with the "Adventure" package, and is adjustable from less than 9 inches to around 15". Nice feature for ingress/egress. An onboard air compressor is also included.

5. Additional options are "to be announced", as I suspected. The features I'd be interested in, if not included, are: heads-up display, real leather seating, hands free tailgate, wireless charging, towing package, and additional seating colors (mocha/brown, please?). If priced reasonably, I might be convinced to spring for frivolities such as massage seating, upgraded stereo, side and rear sunshades, etc.

6. Test drives are supposedly going to be available sometime in 2021, but we'll see if that's only in California or Michigan. I'll definitely want to experience the interior look and quality, along with the handling with the standard tires.

7. It seems like they're more focused on the truck, in terms of promotion and features/specs/colors, etc.. The SUV is a bit of an add-on. I think this focus will prove to be backwards over time, but I get that they are hyping being the first EV truck to market.

I'm still not certain I'll follow through - the wait till 2022, recharging strategy, and uncertain option pricing are my biggest hangups right now. Other than that, I still like the vehicle in concept.

Thanks for the detailed explanation.

If you wind up getting a test drive in SoCal, let me know!

Following. Any updates?

Just two more weeks

Keep us posted - thanks!

Holding out for a Nikola Vapor myself.

OK - here's a blast from the past. My Rivian R1S is finally on its' way to Texas (hey - it's only been 30 months of waiting). How I got here:

- I gave up on waiting for the Rivian and bought the Jeep Grand Cherokee L last October. I'm happy overall with the Jeep.

- When Rivian raised their prices, I was among the many thousands who canceled our order and took the $1000 refund. After the outcry, after Rivian backtracked and said they would honor the original price, I got my spot back in line, without any deposit.

- We test drove the Rivian 8-10 months ago, and overall liked it.

- The wife has decided to sell her 5 year old BMW sedan, and drive the Rivian. We figure if she hates it, we'll just resell it or trade it in on something else.

- As near as I can tell, to get a comparably equipped R1S today, we would have to spend about $15k more (not to mention waiting in a new line for months/years?).

- We changed the color combination from a personal preference of blue with white interior to a white with black interior, to expedite an easier resale, if necessary. Also, I will be able to get the $7500 tax credit, even if we end up selling it later, according to my research.

I have many other observations, but thought I'd see what questions anyone has about Rivian and the process...