Ram 1500 Revolution BEV Concept Is Full Of Party Tricks, But Production Is Another Story

Ram promised a taste of what we could expect from its electric truck efforts at CES 2023, and sure enough, the Ram 1500 Revolution BEV Concept does plenty to stand out. Big, bold, and stuffed full of motorized gadgets, it's the epitome of a trade show concept.

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It arrives, of course, at a time when rival automakers already have their electric pickups in dealerships. Ford's F-150 Lightning has proved to be a sales hit for the blue oval, with demand far outstripping supply. Rivian's R1T was on sale even before that. Chevrolet's Silverado EV isn't in dealerships yet, but has been revealed in production form at least, and Elon Musk continues to insist that the Tesla Cybertruck is about ready to go into production.

The question, then, isn't so much what the Ram 1500 Revolution BEV Concept promises as part of its CES-minded showcase, but how close this all might be to what the automaker can actually produce. Stellantis' electric roadmap is aggressive — and its boasts considerable — but it's the aesthetic and core flexibility of this concept pickup that are most intriguing.

It's recognizably a Ram truck, though clearly distinguished with a new design language the automaker has created with electrification in mind. The concept is built on the STLA Frame body-on-frame architecture — which will also underpin other full-size EVs — and there's the familiar multi-function tailgate and RamBox. However, the switch away from combustion engines has allowed for a rethink in the overall proportions.

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Two electric motors — one for each axle — have been pushed as far forward and back as possible. That allows for a cabin four inches longer than the current 1500 truck, without sacrificing bed length. The front gets a reimagined fascia with a new animated "RAM" badge and "tuning fork" LED headlamps. At the rear, the LED taillamps are also illuminated and animated.

Ram

Show-friendly saloon doors — swinging open on front and rear hinges to leave a huge open space into the cabin — are opened with flush door handles, and there are powered side steps and a powered rear step. Ram has also motorized the concept's charge door and leaned into the burly proportions with 24-inch wheels — with illuminated, self-leveling center caps — shod in 35-inch tires. They support four-wheel steering (with up to 15 degrees of articulation) and ride on adjustable air suspension.

Ram blurs the line between inside and outside, with a powered mid-gate that has jump seats with a removable lower section; that allows them to be placed in the bed, or even outside of the truck. The glass on the mid-gate is powered, too, for a long pass-through that extends into the frunk (which also gets a powered hatch) so that up to 18-foot-long objects can be transported with the tailgate still closed. The Ram Track rail-attachment system spans the bed, cabin, and frunk.

Ram

It's not the only flexible design element. The center console can be used as an armrest or a workstation, or removed completely; the seats all fold-flat or support extended recline. Ram has designed the bottom of the steering wheel so that it can collapse for more knee space when occupants are working, and the roof and sun visors are electro-chromatic with adjustable dimming and integrated roof rails and ambient lighting.

On the dashboard, there's a pair of 14.2-inch touchscreens that also articulate. They can be sandwiched together into a compact mode, or extended for a 28-inch combined view; or, the lower screen can be removed altogether and used as a battery-powered tablet.

It's part of a big push into usable technology, that Ram clearly hopes will set the 1500 Revolution BEV Concept apart from other, production electric trucks. Camera mirrors and 360-degree birds-eye views are par for the course, as is integration with voice assistants like Alexa and Siri, but Ram has also built-in multiple exterior projectors. These can flag the most efficient way to load items in the pickup after they've been measured by the accompanying Ram storage app, or used as a movie projector when you're off the clock.

Ram

Autonomous Level 3+ driving is envisaged — the steering wheel retracting — so that the Ram 1500 Revolution BEV Concept could pilot itself on highways and similar. However, a Shadow Mode, triggered from outside the truck via its built-in personal assistant, can see the pickup automatically follow an operator. Ram suggests this could be used when the EV needs to be repositioned or for short worksite journeys when the driver doesn't want to have to get back inside and operate it manually.

Exactly how far Ram thinks you'll actually be able to go on a full charge is unclear: there's no word on battery capacity for the 1500 Revolution BEV Concept, nor range estimates. All the automaker will say is that 800 volt 350 kW DC fast charging could add up to 100 miles of range in around 10 minutes plugged in. At home, the Ram Charger — an inductive robot charger concept — could automatically maneuver under the pickup and connect.

Just how much of this will make it to the production Ram 1500 BEV expected in 2024 remains to be seen. Still, given the typical evolution of eye-catching concept to more practically-focused series vehicle, it's fair to say a lot of the concept pickup's more high-tech features will likely be set aside on the road to dealerships.

Ram

All Ram will say right now is that the production 1500 BEV "will be the leader in a combination of areas customers care about the most: range, towing, payload and charge time." The styling we see here seems likely to carry over, at least in broad strokes: the side mirrors will probably be bulkier, and the cabin less convoluted, but the core strategy of tapping EVs' more flexible packaging for a bigger interior and more flexible storage remains relevant.

Ram is also teasing more potent versions of the truck — Revolution TRX, anybody? — thanks to the design being made with larger capacity electric motors in mind. That, the automaker says, "offers the potential for future high-performance applications."

Certainly, the Consumer Electronics Show — or indeed any auto show — would be a strange place without ambitious concept cars with nebulous practicality. Indeed, gimmicks are usually the name of the game when it comes to making a compelling show car. A long list of vehicles all claiming to preview "the future of autonomous driving" illustrates that nicely.

Ram

All the same, the time for far-fetched visions of an only partially-potential future seems to have ended, at least when it comes to the electric pickup segment. With rivals already racking up sales and reservations, patience around flights of fancy — no matter how eye-catching — is in short supply. It's time to put up or shut up.

Ram's promise, then, is to drop actual production details in the coming months. The full Ram 1500 BEV won't be launched until 2024; here's hoping it can keep some of the more memorable features from this Revolution concept.