The Alpha WOLF™ Electric Truck

[F-150 Prius]

This caught my eye on youtube today.
"Yet another EV startup" with a car and a pickup. Both look good and they're mocked up some cool models.
It's apparently on display at the Petersen Automotive Museum till mid-November 2021.

Available late 2023 (free to reserve.)
https://www.alphamotorinc.com/

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[astricklin]

Rivian is the closest to deliveries and there's really no guarantee that they'll make it through fulfilling pre orders without going under. Sure they have the money and the backing to make it to production but there is still a long road ahead of them.
Any other ev startup, I'll get interested when they are actually producing vehicles.

 

[shutterbug]

Rivian is the closest to deliveries and there's really no guarantee that they'll make it through fulfilling pre orders without going under. Sure they have the money and the backing to make it to production but there is still a long road ahead of them.
Any other ev startup, I'll get interested when they are actually producing vehicles.

History is littered by efforts to establish a new car name plate. Remember Delorean, Sterling, Saturn, Scion, Smart and many others. And most of those were new name plates for established companies. I think only Lexus, Infinity, and Acura had staying power in the last 25 years. Tesla has been around less than 10 years, so it's too early to tell.

 

[corradoborg]

Alright, fine. I’ll reserve one of these, too.

 

[F-150 Prius]

Rivian is the closest to deliveries and there's really no guarantee that they'll make it through fulfilling pre orders without going under. Sure they have the money and the backing to make it to production but there is still a long road ahead of them.
Any other ev startup, I'll get interested when they are actually producing vehicles.

Rivian has infinite funding and backing from Bezos. He could double his investment in them every month for a year and not notice it.
They're not going under. They're going IPO. : )
They have 100,000 pre-orders from amazon and real orders $1000, not $100 reservations from the likes of me. They called me to ask about details for me to get ready to take delivery before year-end. Fingers crossed. I don't "need" it, but it would be great to have a Rivian replace a Tesla in the driveway.
The long and winding road ahead for Rivian will be traveled by all EV makers: battery technology to increase range tenfold and reduce charging times to less than one tenth.

 

[gorwell]

I'm surprised topgear looked at this.. All information I can see from Alpha Wolf suggest some type of scam.

https://www.autoevolution.com/news/...roduce-wolf-electric-truck-mockup-168280.html

"In the video (embedded to this article), they talk about Alpha Motor Corporations plans as “we,” which implies they are part of the company. Green Car Reports talked to Alpha Motor Corporation and they were told the baristas are part of what the company calls its “Move Humanity” initiative."

The Truck they are looking at isn't even a prototype; It's a mock-up...

They already have 6 lines of vehicles announced....

They have no sources of funding... or even suggest they have any money...

Not sure what the purpose is here, but stay away

 

[goatlord99]

Rivian has infinite funding and backing from Bezos. He could double his investment in them every month for a year and not notice it.
They're not going under. They're going IPO. : )
They have 100,000 pre-orders from amazon and real orders $1000, not $100 reservations from the likes of me. They called me to ask about details for me to get ready to take delivery before year-end. Fingers crossed. I don't "need" it, but it would be great to have a Rivian replace a Tesla in the driveway.
The long and winding road ahead for Rivian will be traveled by all EV makers: battery technology to increase range tenfold and reduce charging times to less than one tenth.

eyeballing a reivian if my F150 is lemoned. kind of spendy, but they seem to be reviewing well.

 

[F-150 Prius]

eyeballing a reivian if my F150 is lemoned. kind of spendy, but they seem to be reviewing well.

I'd suggest putting an order in for a Lightning and see what happens. It's all about lead time.

Sadly, if you're ordering a Rivian now, it's going to be 2023 or later … I think of that as basically irrelevant.

sidenote on lemons and carmakers:

I hope your F-150 is either brought up to 100% or lemoned – I'd suggest getting a new replacement for the lemon (to cut costs) or just plain go get another one.​

I just covered 2000 miles non-stop (well, sleeping one night, 1000 miles per day) in my Hybrid. I just put a half a quart of oil in it after 6500 miles. Zero problems and the weak mpg (18mpg has been creeping up to show 20-22 during this latest trip. I was also maintaining "limit + 7" speeds, often sitting on 85+ mph when traffic was setting that pace, the generator was keeping a freezer at 0ºF and idling while I was sleeping, the bed was packed with heavy gear, the cabin was full – except for space for the dog – and I put 91 in it except for one stop where all they had was 87, but I was down to 20 miles' range.​

​

Put those performance metrics in front of any Pickup EV maker and they'll have to politely concede to the superior vehicle for the job.​

​

The F-150 Hybrid just keeps impressing me. I laugh every time I drive past a Tesla Supercharger and I shudder to think back to my impatience when I was tired of waiting for my truck to be built and was considering an "old" '20 or '19 model (Ford or RAM.)​

​

I don't doubt Ford makes bad ones and people with the bad ones should be able to get Ford to work with them as part of the statistical inevitability of high volume production manufacturing, not as dissatisfied consumers to be "handled" till they stop complaining and take the hit for a product that was not up to quality standards that other consumers enjoy.​

 

[F-150 Prius]

History is littered by efforts to establish a new car name plate. Remember Delorean, Sterling, Saturn, Scion, Smart and many others. And most of those were new name plates for established companies. I think only Lexus, Infinity, and Acura had staying power in the last 25 years. Tesla has been around less than 10 years, so it's too early to tell.

You've mixed in a variety of dissimilar companies, each with histories of very different business fates.

First things first, it seems to me that this Alpha Wolf thing is sketchy at best; not to be compared to Tesla or Nikola or any of the EV startups in-between.

You could say Saturn, Scion and Smart are of a feather – all attempts to replicate the success Toyota achieved with Lexus. The objective of Lexus was the laughable goal of disrupting Mercedes … could there be a more ridiculous objective in the auto industry? … Toyota succeeded. Mercedes had to change and improve as it realized customers were reporting their pleasure in owning a high quality vehicle with "white glove" service. But Toyota is unique. Not only biggest and best globally and in many markets and product lines, but with capabilities in manufacturing that even Porsche was prepared to check their ego and say "please show us how" … would we have high quality paint or fit and finish demanded of Porsche today if they hadn't gone to Toyota last century?

DeLorean is a sordid story. Tesla is the same story, with a different outcome.

Elon Musk modeled himself and Tesla on John DeLorean and the DeLorean Motor Company down to the verb and verse. Elon Musk isn't a dreamer like DeLorean, he's a maladroit "on the spectrum" bright kid with Asperger's who wanted to do something with his windfall riches from selling paypal to ebay.

Musk learned how to do business in an oligarchy. DeLorean did not.
Musk learned how to overpromise and underdeliver while maintaining cult delusions, fanaticism and group psychology disorders . DeLorean tried to build a winged door car in stainless.
Musk built a winged door in metal, and now wants to build a truck … in stainless.

The failure of DeLorean was corporate war, not the failure of the car design and not the lack of customer demand (though I think DMC was unlikely to thrive, its demise was not its own failure.) Crimes were committed and – like the attack on early EV progress with the destruction of the GM EV1 – the (then) giants of the auto industry are to blame. The US Govt is to blame. Not much has changed. Musk has just learned the game, raised the stakes and leveraged social media and stock market cultism alike.
If DeLorean was building a car today, he'd be Musk and Tesla, not Elizabeth Holmes and Theranos.
https://www.newdelorean.com/
https://www.netflix.com/title/81092223

Tesla has "been around" since its founder was working last century on electric vehicles and it build the first Tesla prototypes shown to the public in 2006. I was one of many early customers walking around their basically one building warehouse factory in an industrial suburb and taking a ride around side streets while the engineers took ideas from customers and talked through everything from "saddle" battery bags to swappable battery charging, and gearboxes to racing.
Tesla is 20 years old, can build one million cars per year and could overtake BMW (two million cars per year) as soon as it opens its next gigafactory.

I see Ford as "the next Tesla" if they continue as they've done with the Mach-e and F-150. While Ford stock price and market cap are less than the daily change in the price of Tesla, that's a separate world of financial speculators and taking money from the many to give to the few. What's interesting about Ford is how many vehicles it can build per year across numerous markets with support from a national dealer network, and sold around the world. Tesla don't got that. : )
Ford could build one million F-150 Lightnings, announce and build on million F-150 Plug-in Hybrids, all by the end of 2023, sell all of them with profit margins similar to the existing gas-engined F-150 and become the next Tesla … a solid, reliable, well built, high quality vehicle with local support and nationwide charging for a price people pay today for a gas engined vehicle. Ford has many electric vehicle models planned for the market over the next few years. Where would niche companies like Tesla be, with less than 1% to 2% of the market, if Ford took that next step with their Mach-e and F-150?

 

[Pedaldude]

Alpha Wolf sounds like some crap from an 80's or early 90's video game. I thought the made up names that some of these new companies have come up with were silly but Alpha Wolf is preposterous.

Is it just me, or does it look like an early 80's Hilux?

 

[corradoborg]

Alpha Wolf sounds like some crap from an 80's or early 90's video game. I thought the made up names that some of these new companies have come up with were silly but Alpha Wolf is preposterous.

Is it just me, or does it look like an early 80's Hilux?

The nostalgic look is very intentional. Look at their coupe. It taps into classic styling, too.

I would agree that "Wolf" is a silly name, especially when paired with the company name.

 

[F-150 Prius]

Alpha Wolf sounds like some crap from an 80's or early 90's video game. I thought the made up names that some of these new companies have come up with were silly but Alpha Wolf is preposterous.

Is it just me, or does it look like an early 80's Hilux?

the Hilux is joining the Land Cruiser and Land Rover Defender as a cult classic! : )
and the mullet with shaved sideburns … still a strong lifestyle statement … : )

 

[Sun Devil]

InsideEVs had insightful comments about the Alpha Wolf this week:

 

[Losi]

Alpha Wolf sounds like some crap from an 80's or early 90's video game.

and with this comment, I just saw my entire childhood justifiably thrown into a smoldering dumpster fire of utter irrelevance.

 

[shutterbug]

You've mixed in a variety of dissimilar companies, each with histories of very different business fates.

First things first, it seems to me that this Alpha Wolf thing is sketchy at best; not to be compared to Tesla or Nikola or any of the EV startups in-between.

You could say Saturn, Scion and Smart are of a feather – all attempts to replicate the success Toyota achieved with Lexus. The objective of Lexus was the laughable goal of disrupting Mercedes … could there be a more ridiculous objective in the auto industry? … Toyota succeeded. Mercedes had to change and improve as it realized customers were reporting their pleasure in owning a high quality vehicle with "white glove" service. But Toyota is unique. Not only biggest and best globally and in many markets and product lines, but with capabilities in manufacturing that even Porsche was prepared to check their ego and say "please show us how" … would we have high quality paint or fit and finish demanded of Porsche today if they hadn't gone to Toyota last century?

You missed my point entirely. And Toyota is not unique. Nisan rebranded its American operation from Datsun, and then launched Infinity and Honda launched Acura. And Saturn was successful for a timee, at least until GM decided to re-badge the crappiest European cars not made in France.

Musk learned how to do business in an oligarchy. DeLorean did not.

Delorean's problem was that he produced a single crappy model that barely worked and cost a bundle. It is not at all clear to me that Tesla will be around 10-15 years from now. But yes, it's done better than Delorean.

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