No hybrid race between Toyota, GM, exec says

I for one (apparently literally here) think the volt concept shows a lot of promise. Driving for an extended range on pure electric propulsion should sound good to any hybrid or environmental enthusiast. Personally I am fare more interested in pure electric vechiles than I am hybrids, and the volt will be much closer to the former than the latter. I am not in the least surprised in the staggering amount of money being spent on the car, it will after all be the first production car of its kind and is bound to have specific developmental costs that wont be necessary in future cars to use similar technology.

As fare as battery life and performance go, I doubt it is going to be as bad as I see speculated here. I think most likely the primary function of the ICE in the Volt will be to generate current to run the electric motor, not necessarily recharge the battery. After all it makes no sense to go home and plug the car in if the ICE already re-charged the juice you used during your commute. More likely the ICE will maintain a minimum SOC for the battery to prolong its life, and supply electricity to the electric motor to propel the car when the battery gets to low.


I for one will consider these vechile when it arrives, depending on the state of other electric propulsion vehicles that should becoming available around that time.

 

The Volt concept does show promise. GM's Precept showed promise. How did GM leverage the Precept's R&D to advance the Volt's production timetable?

Lutz is correct. There is no hybrid race between GM & Toyota. One party did not come to the track.

 

In the first generation of hybrids in the US, Toyota and Honda were in exactly opposite position. The first Insight does not look like any non-hybrid car yet it failed. The first Prius looked like an Echo.

It was major improvement in every dimension from THS to HSD, packaging and utility of the Prius that made it a success. I don't buy the "unique look sells" argument as it is more like an excuse for Prius success to avoid acknowledgment of HSD superiority. That argument is like saying people buy Prius just because a few celebrities drive them. The credit is given to the celebrity while ignoring how good the car actually is.

IMA did not improve much and the shortcomings and trade-offs due to limitation in the hybrid system (added complexity to existing architecture) were obvious in Civic hybrid when compared to the Prius.

HSD has proven to be scalable from ICE displacement of 1.5L to 5.0L. IMA will be stuck at 1.3L. Insight I 1.0L and Accord 3.0L were failures. Insight II will continue to have 1.3L IMA. Perhaps, CR-Z will change that.

Although I don't see technical scalability limitation in E-FLEX architecture, I believe the price will limit it from reaching the market. Since series hybrid cost a lot more due to powerful electric components, increasing power will multiply.

 

the insight failed because it was a 2 seater which simply placed to many limits on its customer base

 

Packaging is more than just the appearance. Prius grew in size from a compact to midsize just by the improvements from the same powertrain (1.5L) and made itself larger than the Civic hybrid. It was done by changing the whole car package from a sedan to a hatchback.

Most won't know the technical improvements but a test drive is enough to convince them. The acceleration, MPG and extra cargo/rear leg room advantage over Civic Hybrid or the Classic Prius does not need technical explanation. Seeing is believing right?

If you think about it, 03 Civic Hybrid was suppose to be THE classic Prius killer. 03 HCH was larger, handled better and got the same or even better MPG than the classic Prius. IMA's ICE grew from 1.0L (Insight) to 1.3L. IMA MPG from Insight dipped due to the larger size and usage of steel frame instead of the exotic light weight aluminum. At that time, IMA seemed to be the superior system with lower manufacturing cost.

All that changed when the 04 Prius arrived with a huge leap. Using the same but improved powertrain with 1.5L, Prius became larger than the HCH (crossed the compact boundaries into mid-size) and 2 seconds faster from 0-60 (more in passing power) -- all of that while getting better MPG and slashing hybrid premium by half! If that is not the state of the art breakthrough, I don't know what is. To say that people are buying Prius for the unique look is not only accurate but is also discrediting / ignoring this state of the art breakthrough.

E-FLEX in Volt has a great potential like HSD but I am concern about the cost. Volt will use the first generation of E-FLEX and their #1 priority should be reliability NOT range. 2nd generation #1 priority should be cost and refinement. 3rd generation #1 should be cost and performance. HSD is 11 years matured and went through 3-4 generations already. GM is in the same race but 11 years and 3 generations behind.

 

I would like to modulate the above claims a little. There are quite a few of us owners of both the NHW11 and NHW20s. This group is a lot more repectful of the classic than what I see above. At no time did we feel that Honda had a better hybrid. Still don't, but this is not a criticism of Honda in any way. Prius drivers that are really concerned about the Prius power when stomped are not the Prius drivers that really work at mpg optimization. 0-60 times are not what sold the NHW11 and does not sell the NHW20. One area where the NHW20 really fails is that it has not been saving gas since 2001. The NHW11 has that title and is not giving it up. Other than that, I lke the post. The last paragraph is good thinking.

 

I did not mean to disrespect the Classic. I used words like "supposed to" and "seemed to". In fact, I have a lot of respect in the Classic Prius. It was the Classic Prius that got me interested in the whole hybrid world. I have "The Prius That Shook The World" book about the insider story of the Project G21 that gave birth to the Prius. The Classic Prius emission was superior to the original HCH which showed where the priority between Toyota and Honda were.

Honda still can not catch up to the leap that 04 Prius made with the HCH II. Soon, Honda will introduce another improvement in their IMA with Insight II. My bet is they may be able to match 04 HSD Prius efficiency this time around. We have no clue about the next gen Prius but have some hint about the progress they made in their following hybrids (Highlander Hybrid, Camry Hybrid all the way to LS600h). Electric motor have gotten smaller and more powerful by spinning faster. This was made possible by introducing the Speed Reduction Unit (second planetary gearset). Believe it or not, Camry hybrid's 140hp MG2 is smaller than Prius' 67hp MG2. The power density of the Power Control Unit (inverter) had multiplied nearly 5x in LS600h. This means, they can cut the size down to 1/4th in the next gen Prius. I am hoping they find a way to operate the PCU at the temperature of the gas engine. This way, there won't be a need for two separate liquid cooling systems.

I mentioned 0-60 numbers because it is one of the attributes to the efficiency. MPG can be a trade off with lower / higher 0-60 acceleration, etc..

I am not sure if I follow you. NHW20 (04) is more fuel efficient than NHW11 (01). There are more NHW20 sold and on the road. Therefore, NHW20 would've saved more gas by now?

 

It was more of a "respect your elders" humor post. I get 50 mpg driving the 2001. Way too good to put to it to pasture yet. One of the more important changes (from my point of view) was in reliability. Battery, Inverter, and Transaxle failures are truly rare on the NHW20.

 

I have stated a number of times I like the concept, not sure if I did in this thread or not.
The thing is, GM has had a few good concepts which they never brought to market.
On top of not being confident the Volt will ever be made available in numbers, I am looking at their expected release and looking at a number of pure EVs coming out at the same time.
Yes, the Volt technology is better than what we have today. But I fear it will be second best when it finally comes to market.