Updates and Raw Opinion - Chace Barber Returns and Goes Hard

Voice Of GO(r)D is pleased to welcome back to the show Mr Chace Barber, one of the founders and very public face of Edison Motors, the British Columbia based manufacturer of diesel electric hybrid trucks.

In this discussion, Chace updates us on Edison’s move to Golden BC and fills us in on why they won’t be making trucks for the American market anytime soon (Hint - the EPA and US DOT are mewling cabbages) which leads into some extended editorializing from Mr Barber you typically wouldn’t hear in Edison marketing videos. I’m happy to be an outlet! Chace also answers a few of my questions on regulation vis a vis truck design for a chapter to be included in the book.

Since recording this episode, Edison was given an interesting warning from Tesla regards a humorous piece of marketing that Edison has been using since they started. Given everything else we know about the Big Cheese at Tesla, and his KayFabe public Brolationship breakdown with the President this past week, it should come as no surprise that Tesla really do have something lodged firmly up their rear ends.

@_edison.motorsTesla told us to stop #edisonmotors

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If you missed any of my previous interviews with Chace, here they are in chronological order -

And this one here is a photo-essay from when I met Chace and Topsy in Person awhile back at a small truck show near Vineland, Ontario. I convinced the Paddock family to send their old Hayes Clipper to the show and juxtapose the past and future of Canadian Heavy Duty Truck Manufacturing, and I got some great photos of that despite the rain.

You can find Chace and Edison all over the internet -

https://www.tiktok.com/@_edison.motors

https://x.com/EdisonMotorsLtd

https://www.youtube.com/@EdisonMotors

https://edisonmotors.ca/


In the intro I mention an article that I was asked to provide comment for by a new (to me) Canadian online Business Magazine called The Logic. They’re a subscription based magazine but if you sign up via their website you get three free articles a month so head on over and check this out -

https://thelogic.co/news/forestry-logging-autonomous-trucks/

Some snippets -

Deep in the wilderness, where the roads are covered by evergreen needles, a semi truck cab carves a path through the snow, slowing as it approaches a one-lane bridge. The only warnings of the gully ahead are two black-and-orange striped signs. A wrong move and the truck careens into the gulch below.

The situation would be anxiety-inducing for a human, but this truck cab is driving itself. It’s using a system developed by NuPort Robotics, a Toronto-based autonomous-driving startup. Right now, it’s just a test run—but one day, Canada’s north could be criss-crossed with self-driving trucks hauling huge loads on dangerous roads.

It’s the type of challenge that could be a coup for people like NuPort Robotics CEO Raghavender Sahdev, as the tech industry strives to prove that AI can make a difference in the physical world. The company already hauls freight for companies like Canadian Tire and has been in talks with several forestry companies to try and drum up more business. They’re looking for help, he said, to relieve driver fatigue, determine which complicated maneuvers can be automated, and which, like strapping logs to trucks, must be done by humans. NuPort is also testing how the technology reacts to unexpected issues like a log falling into the road—not the type of thing that’s common on a regular highway.

Gord Magill, a trucker from Hamilton with experience in the logging industry, has been a vocal skeptic, calling automation a “relentless push to make truckers extinct.” In particular, he worries that drivers could actually be in more danger if their focus is encouraged to wander from the road as technology takes over.

Unlike highway driving, logging roads are often unmarked and unpredictable, and drivers have to exit the cab and adjust when loads shift during transit. He’s skeptical of claims that the technology is focused on protecting truckers’ safety, rather than just saving companies money by cutting staff.

“People should understand that trucking is way more than driving,” Magill said. “The claims of the autonomous truck makers, some of them are true, and some of them are fantasy, and some of them are omitting a lot of the complexities about the job.”

The whole thing is worth a read, and I want to thank Anita Balakrishnan for asking me to comment.


I’m writing a book on the fate of the North American Trucker in 2025 -

If you are of means and want to support a starving artist mostly unemployed trucker in this endeavor, I could really use the assistance -

https://www.givesendgo.com/EndOfTheRoad


Questions, comments, suggestions, corrections and Hate Mail are always welcomed and strongly encouraged - gordilocks@protonmail.com