The Colorado Springs Gazette final

GM will restart limited Bolt production to make loaners for owners with recalls

General Motors is restarting the plant that makes its Chevrolet Bolt electric vehicles for a limited time to make courtesy loaner cars for the 140,000 Bolt owners affected by global recall.

On Tuesday, GM said that starting Monday, it will bring back the 1,000 workers at Orion Assembly in Orion Township, Mich., to start making 2022 Bolt EVS.

Orion, which is a one-shift plant, has been shut down since Aug. 23 so that GM and its battery-maker LG Electronics could find a fix for 2017-22 model year Bolt EVS and EUVS, a compact SUV body style of the electric car, for possible fire risk. GM has confirmed 13 Bolt fires since last year with minor injuries.

GM and LG starting fixing recalled Bolts this month by installing five new battery modules, essentially an enhanced battery pack, in them. GM spokesman Dan Flores said the new cars will have defect-free batteries.

“We are prioritizing customers based on their charging behavior and the dates on which their batteries were produced. We’re a couple weeks into completing customers repairs and things are going smoothly, but obviously the focus is to ramp-up volume and repair more vehicles as quickly as we can.”

LG Electronics, a division of LG Chem, said it will reimburse GM for $1.9 billion in costs and expenses associated with the Bolt recall due to manufacturing defects in battery modules.

Flores declined to provide details about the battery-production dates that will get priority or other factors that will influence which Bolts will be pulled into dealerships for repairs first.

“We are prioritizing customers based on their charging behavior...”

Dan Flores, GM spokesman

BUSINESS

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2021-10-27T07:00:00.0000000Z

2021-10-27T07:00:00.0000000Z

https://daily.gazette.com/article/281956020996030

The Gazette, Colorado Springs