The new electric Hummer will debut next month to eventually do battle with the Tesla Cybertruck, if and when that latter vehicle materializes. GM had previously hinted one of the Hummer’s tricks would be crab-related, and now we get to see it in action a little bit.
Four-wheel steering, of course, has been around for decades. GMC likely imagines some off-road uses for its implementation on it for the Hummer, and parking, too, because this thing will be massive.
Here’s a short teaser GMC released today showing the four-wheel steering—what GMC calls “crab walk”—in action.
This will all hinge, for me, on just how much that rear wheel (and front wheel for that matter) actually turn, since a complete 90 degree turn would allow for a straight line going sideways which, if I saw a car doing that would give me the same feeling I felt when I first saw a Harrier jet land vertically. I fear this will only be diagonal, however, as the video suggests.
I’m also assuming the electric architecture possibly gave engineers some new options when it came to the rear wheels moving, and surely they probably also move opposite the front wheels to decrease the turning radius. Or at least having that latter feature would make this four-wheel steering setup a bit more practical.
That’s because, as it is, I’m having trouble trying to think of practical uses for this crab walk that aren’t just silly party tricks. Which is fine! I’m sure the Cybertruck will have its fair share silly party tricks as well, and this is the kind of thing I could imagine a hypothetical Hummer buyer (this thing will be expensive) showing off to their friends. Which, itself, is the whole point of buying a Hummer in the first place. As it was back in the aughts, when sales of Hummers peaked. They sold 71,524 of these in the US back in 2006. What a time it was to be alive.