GM extends crossover downtime as pickup production resumes Monday

DETROIT — General Motors said it will restart production at its full-size pickup plants Monday, as scheduled, after downtime this week due to the global microchip shortage.

Throughout the chip crisis, GM aimed to keep production of high-demand pickups running, opting to idle crossover production instead. But in late July, the automaker began intermittently pausing production at its three pickup plants, in Flint, Mich.; Silao, Mexico; and Fort Wayne, Ind.

Flint builds the heavy-duty Chevrolet Silverado and GMC Sierra pickups. Silao builds the Cheyenne for Mexico, along with the Silverado 1500 and Sierra 1500 light-duty pickups. Fort Wayne builds the Silverado 1500 and Sierra 1500.

“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, including full-size trucks and SUVs for our customers,” GM said in a statement Thursday.

AutoForecast Solutions estimates that 5.8 million vehicles have been cut from automakers’ worldwide production plans. It forecasts that 7.1 million vehicles eventually could be eliminated from production plans because of the chip shortage.