GM provides update on Volt vehicle and battery development

[cwerdna]

GM provides update on Volt vehicle and battery development — Autoblog Green

Be sure to check out the slides too.

[Vincent]

Excellent. Looks like a giant leap for mass produced lithium ion battery technology is on schedule.

[DaveinOlyWA]

GM hits Volt battery milestone; What’s the car’s magic price? - SmartPlanet

article generated due to ceremony celebrating the first battery off GM's assembly line. i am guessing in house production should drop the price quite abit

[The Electric Me]

Well I'll be Mr.Obvious. To me The Volt will need positive reviews and press upon release. It can't afford a mixed review or negative press. Then, I think it needs to be close to the price of a fully loaded Prius, so in the $32,000 to $34,000 dollar range. Then it has to be a good product. A suprise defect, or a widely publicized problem could sink The Volt quickly.

I think if GM can do all these things, The VOLT could be a revolutionary hit. But Price is really going to be key. $40,000 for an automobile of the Volts size and ammenities will just price it into the range of the very wealthy wanting a toy. It won't get any mainstream traction.

All just my opinon. I'm really excited about the prospects of The Volt and also The Leaf, and probably sooner than we think, Plug-In Prius. The times they are a changing.

[DaveinOlyWA]

i still say its gotta be $30,000 max... otherwise, will be niche product only. the Pri over $30,000 is pretty small percentage here i think.

[DeadPhish]

Yes the pricing will be an auto-limiter in terms of the public having access to it.

There are two other limiting issues right from the start.

1. they are only going to release it for sale in DC, LA and Detroit
2. they are going to roll it out very very slowly according to Lutz with maybe 5000+ units in the first year and 'full production' by 2015 of 50,000+ units.

Then there's the huge issue of battery life/replacement. Thus far no maker including Toyota is willing to say anything beyond 5 yrs on the Li-Ions. Nissan is planning to lease the Leaf batteries. GM has said nothing. Toyota has stated that an owner may have to replace the Li-Ions sometime after 5-7 yrs but it's unknown.

This is a significant 'limiter' to sales, especially as compared to any of the traditional hybrids.

[SageBrush]

Originally Posted by DeadPhish

1. they are only going to release it for sale in DC, LA and Detroit
2. they are going to roll it out very very slowly according to Lutz with maybe 5000+ units in the first year and 'full production' by 2015 of 50,000+ units.

Years of noise for 5000 vehicles ??How Detroit

[The Electric Me]

Originally Posted by DeadPhish

Yes the pricing will be an auto-limiter in terms of the public having access to it.


There are two other limiting issues right from the start.

1. they are only going to release it for sale in DC, LA and Detroit
2. they are going to roll it out very very slowly according to Lutz with maybe 5000+ units in the first year and 'full production' by 2015 of 50,000+ units.

Then there's the huge issue of battery life/replacement. Thus far no maker including Toyota is willing to say anything beyond 5 yrs on the Li-Ions. Nissan is planning to lease the Leaf batteries. GM has said nothing. Toyota has stated that an owner may have to replace the Li-Ions sometime after 5-7 yrs but it's unknown.

This is a significant 'limiter' to sales, especially as compared to any of the traditional hybrids.

That's interesting information to me. Probably explains why Toyota has been conservative with the implementation of Li-Ion batteries. I don't pretend to be anything but an observer but I think a limited, slow release is disappointing. I know from a business standpoint they don't want to produce a large quantity of expensive automobiles that "perhaps" won't sell but I think it's imperative with an "alternative" automobile that it's perceived as being a "real" product with real company support behind it.

I mean Toyota supported The Prius even in it's early years. Kept supporting it until they sold a million of them. I remember seeing commercials for early Prius, back when admittedly I was too unsure of the product, BUT at least I knew Toyota was backing the product and (realisticly or not) I felt if I wanted a Prius I could go down to a dealership and make it happen.

A limited city, almost non-existent release of 5000+....talk about starting things off with a whimper....seems like a mistake to me.

Where did you get this information? Maybe GM want's to keep it's "Start Out with a Fizzle" plans quiet but I've never heard that they planned to keep the release so limited.

[Politburo]

This link is almost 2 years old now... quotes Lutz as saying 10k in first year.

Chevy Volt hybrid to see limited production in first year

[DeadPhish]

Originally Posted by Politburo

This link is almost 2 years old now... quotes Lutz as saying 10k in first year.

Chevy Volt hybrid to see limited production in first year

Yep Lutz confirmed this goal at the recent LAIAS in early Dec. What they aren't going to do is build a lot of Volts ( even if they had the capacity to do so ) put them on the streets and hope nothing bad happened.

The Volt has to be perfect. It has to do everything they've been saying technically. It is going to be a $40000+ toy for the Hollywood Hills crowd.

With a very conservative rollout they can pull them all in quickly if necessary. The owners involved won't be overly put out by having one of their cars in the shop for reworking.