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Filed under: Technology, GM, Earnings/Financials

GM Ecotec engine General Motors has announced that it will invest a total of $483 million in its Spring Hill, Tennessee powertrain facility by 2012. The news comes as GM continues to move toward building more fuel-efficient engines. The automaker says that the next-generation Ecotec four-cylinder engine, complete with direct-injection, will be built in the Spring Hill plant. Those funds will also go toward bringing back a total of 483 workers that have been idle since last year.

In 2009, the company laid off 2,000 workers at the Spring Hill facility as part of its restructuring efforts, though 800 of those individuals relocated to other GM plants around the country. Even so, that didn’t do much for the economy in Maury County, Tennessee. According to the Associated Press, the locality has one of the highest unemployment rates in the state – 14.5 percent in July.

Until now, the future of the Spring Hill plant had been more than a little uncertain. The facility was originally designed to produce Saturn vehicles, but was reworked to produce the Chevrolet Traverse to the tune of $600 million. GM then pulled Traverse from the plant last year.

[Sources: Associated Press via Google, General Motors]

General Motors invests $483 million in Spring Hill facility, rehires 483 workers originally appeared on Autoblog on Fri, 17 Sep 2010 13:01:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Filed under: Truck, Safety, Technology, Work, Chevrolet, GM, GMC

Last week, PickupTrucks.com held one of its periodic load lugger shootouts where it brings together the heavy haulers from General Motors, Ford and Chrysler to see which pickup truck is the top dog. After running acceleration tests at Milan dragway, editor Mike Levine and the crew moved the fleet of nine trucks to the GM Proving Ground in Milford, MI. During towing evaluations on the 7.2 percent hill, Levine discovered an issue on the Chevy Silverado 2500 while the gas-engined 3/4 ton truck was towing 10,000 pound trailers up the hill.

The GM trucks incorporate a hill-hold feature into the stability control system. Hill-hold is supposed to detect when the vehicle is on an incline with the brakes applied. When the driver releases the brake pedal, the valves in the stability control unit retain the pressure in the brake lines for up to 1.5 seconds. Once the timer expires or the driver applies the accelerator, the valves release the brake pressure.

During testing, Levine discovered that the system was not holding the pressure on the 7.2 percent hill for any of the GM trucks and notified the engineers on hand. Oddly, a later test found that the system was working properly on the steeper 16 percent grade. GM engineers investigated the issue with engineers from system supplier TRW and found an incorrect calibration value in the control software for the accelerometer used to detect inclines. This prevented the system from correctly detecting the smaller hill.

The code was corrected and updated software began rolling out to the production line this past Monday, July 19. The same software update is also going out to dealers so that trucks in stock on lots and in for service can also be updated. GM is still considering whether to issue a recall or a technical service bulletin for trucks that have already been delivered to customers.

[Source: PickupTrucks.com, TRW]

GM discovers flaw with HD pickup hill-hold assist, fast-tracks fix originally appeared on Autoblog on Tue, 20 Jul 2010 18:03:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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