Rivian has good and bad things to talk about. It came up with an electric pickup truck that deserved terrific reviews, and it will build a factory for more affordable cars and has plenty of money in the bank to support all that. At the same time, it has been accused of nurturing a “toxic bro culture,” the residents in the area of its future plant do not want it there, and it also had to raise prices, and it did so in a troublesome way. Alex Guberman revealed the last bad news for the company at the E for Electric YouTube channel: a broken accelerator pedal.
For anyone asking what is so serious about that, we must remember that the R1T is not so old that you could put the blame on age or heavy use. The accelerator pedal broke either because of a production defect or a design flaw. Both situations suggest more units of the electric pickup truck could have the same problem, even if a production flaw would be less widespread than if the error relates to design, which would affect every single pedal.
Guberman was investigating another embarrassing issue with Rivian when he heard about the pedal: influencers, celebrities, and people with connections to the company's executives allegedly are getting their vehicles before people with older reservations. Regarding the broken component, he said he was not aware of any other case and that he hopes this is an isolated situation. In the video, Guberman did not mention if this owner contacted Rivian and what the company’s response was.
We asked him about this, and he told us Rivian fixed it but did not tell the owner what caused the issue – which is our primary concern. The pedal broke “after the rubber sole of the shoe caught the pedal,” and the owner “said that he cannot emphasize enough how lightly the force was used.” Guberman was kind enough to allow us to use the images of the broken pedal in this article.
We have also sent Rivian a message to learn more about both the reservation lines and if the company heard about this broken pedal case. If there are others, that could prompt a recall or a talk with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA). As Guberman said, losing control of the accelerator can be a serious problem. Imagine you need the power to cross an intersection, rail tracks, or rush to safety in any other situation. We’ll talk about this again when we hear from the EV maker. Make sure you watch Guberman's video about the problem below.
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