General Motors confirmed Wednesday that it will resume its production of full-size pickups starting Monday, but it will keep its midsize SUV plants idled.
GM, like all automakers, faces a global shortage of semiconductor chips used in a variety of vehicle parts that is hampering production.
But the automaker said its Flint Assembly plant, which builds the Chevrolet Silverado and GMC Sierra full-size heavy duty pickups, will return to full production on Monday. It was running on one shift this week.
GM builds its light-duty full-size pickups at Fort Wayne Assembly in Indiana and Silao Assembly in Mexico. Both were idled this week and will restart Monday.
More:GM to temporarily halt most of its full-size pickup production due to chip shortage
But GM’s midsize SUV plants, including Lansing Delta Township Assembly, which builds the Chevrolet Traverse and the Buick Enclave SUVs, will add an additional week of downtime starting Monday. GM also builds midsize SUVs at Spring Hill Assembly in Tennessee and Ramos Assembly in Mexico.
“Although the situation remains complex and very fluid, our global purchasing and supply chain, engineering and manufacturing teams continue to find creative solutions and make strides working with the supply base to minimize the impact to our highest-demand and capacity-constrained vehicles,” said GM spokesman David Barnas in a statement.
On Wednesday, GM also provided some restart dates for other plants that have been idle because of the chip shortage.
- Lansing Grand River Assembly will restart Cadillac CT4 and CT5 production on Aug. 30. It had been scheduled to resume the week of Aug. 16. Production of Cadillac CT4 and CT5 has been down since May 10. There is no impact to Chevrolet Camaro production at the plant.
- Fairfax Assembly will take an additional four weeks of downtime and resume production of Cadillac XT4 only on Sept. 20. Chevrolet Malibu production will remain down.
- San Luis Potosi Assembly (Mexico) will add three weeks of downtime through the week of Aug. 16. It was supposed to resume production Monday. It has been down since July 19. GM builds the Chevrolet Equinox and GMC Terrain SUV there.
Since early this year, the auto industry has had to either idle assembly plants or build vehicles shy of all the parts and wait for parts. The result is thin inventory on dealer lots.
The chips, made mostly in Taiwan, are used in a variety of electronics. They are in tight supply after demand for them rose during the COVID-19 pandemic as people bought laptops and other personal electronics that also use them.
More:Everything you need to know about the chip shortage that’s plaguing automakers
GM also has been building some vehicles without certain chip parts.
In March, GM said it would build certain 2021 light-duty full-size pickups without a fuel management module until the end of the model year in late summer.
In June, GM started building certain full-size SUVs and pickups without the Automatic Stop/Start, the feature that turns off the engine when a driver stops at an intersection and then automatically restarts it when the driver steps on the throttle.
Most recently, GM said it will make some SUVs without a wireless phone charging feature.
Contact Jamie L. LaReau: 313-222-2149 or jlareau@freepress.com. Follow her on Twitter @jlareauan. Read more on General Motors and sign up for our autos newsletter. Become a subscriber.