Reviving a discontinued nameplate is one thing. Building it profitably is another. In an effort to improve efficiency, reduce complexity, and boost quality for the 2027 Bolt, Chevrolet is employing a new batch production process for the affordable EV at its Fairfax Assembly plant.

The new-and-improved Bolt, unveiled late last year, is currently being built in relatively low numbers of between 2,000 and 3,000 vehicles a month. It is produced in batches of 30 identical copies at a time, all painted the same color, and it allows the carmaker to provide suppliers with a fixed seven-day schedule of exactly which models it’s building and when, ensuring parts arrive on site at the perfect time.

Read: Chevy Promised 255 Miles, The New Bolt Beats It Anyway

The logic is mostly about paint. By building 30 identically specced Bolts at a time, the paint shop equipment doesn’t need to be changed or cleaned as often, since all 30 get the same treatment. Seven exterior colors are on offer, so there might be 30 blue examples moving down the line together, followed by 30 red ones, and so on.

Speaking with Auto News, Michael Youngs, director of GM’s Kansas City plant, noted that the factory also keeps clones of each Bolt configuration to easily identify any issues with the models it’s building. If it finds one, the car will be pulled from the batch and replaced by another.

A New Production Process

“It was an idea that we had to look across the enterprise, not just in the plant but to suppliers, to say, ‘How do we make sure we can be as efficient as possible as we launch the Bolt?’ And the concept of batch was born,” Youngs said.

GM will continue building the Bolt in batches like this when the Fairfax also starts manufacturing the Chevrolet Equinox in 2027 and a new Buick crossover the following year. Indeed, the Equinox and this Buick will also be produced in similar batches.

For now, the Chevrolet Bolt remains a small seller for the brand, particularly when compared to the first-generation model, which posted several years of 20,000-plus sales. Through the first three months of this year, Chevy delivered just 791 examples of the 2027 Bolt, meaning it barely outsold the BrightDrop 400 and 600 electric delivery vans.

The classic muscle scene is seriously tribal, but the one thing guaranteed to get GM, Mopar, and Ford fans to unite is a race between a V8 and a modern EV. And that’s exactly what’s served up in this surprising video, where a Tesla Cybertruck ventures onto a drag strip.

In the left lane is a 1970 Chevrolet Chevelle Malibu, and while we don’t know the full details of the car in question, it’s obviously not rocking that year’s base inline-six. It rolled to the line wearing fat sticky rear rubber, aftermarket wheels, and the sort of stance that says this thing doesn’t spend much time below full throttle.

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The biggest factory motor available in 1970 Chevelles delivered 454 cubes (7.4 liters) of displacement, and modern builds on that big-block base can easily generate 500-600 hp (507-608 PS) in naturally aspirated form.

Cybersnooze

We’ve all seen enough EV videos to expect the Cybertruck to hook up instantly and erupt from the line, leaving the Chevelle struggling to get its tires hooked up. A few seconds later, the Tesla would be flashing across the finish with the Chevy trailing behind, its pride in tatters.

But that’s not how it worked out here. When the lights change, the Chevy gets the jump immediately and charges ahead, opening enough daylight to make it seem like the race might be over before the Tesla has fully woken up. For the first half of the quarter mile, the old-school muscle car looks comfortably in command.

Then the Cybertruck gets its act together. Once it’s moving and the motors are fully delivering, the giant stainless wedge storms downtrack and begins hauling in the Chevy at an alarming rate. What had looked like an easy Chevelle win suddenly becomes a blink-and-you-miss-it finish line showdown.

Times Come Second

You’ll need slowed playback to separate them by seeing whose numbers come up first, but the Chevelle appears to nose ahead at the line. In drag racing, that’s what counts. First across wins, even if the stopwatch tells a slightly different story.

And the stopwatch did tell a different story. The Cybertruck completed the quarter in 11.39 at 118.6 mph (191 km/h), that ET and trap speed suggesting it’s the top-spec Cyberbeast, which has a tri-motor setup and 845 hp (856 PS / 630 kW). The Chevelle registered 11.69 seconds at 114.9 mph (185 kmh).

So on this occasion, muscle fans got to celebrate taking an EV’s scalp, but you just know that if the Cybertruck sorted his reactions for a rematch, it would be a different story.

YouTube/@Wheels