Test Drove a Volt today

With all due respect, who cares? I mean, I don't seriously think this is something the majority of the buying public cares about. Everyone who spends more than 5 minutes looking into it will realize it is a hybrid regardless of what GM marketing says or has said. Besides, who believes marketing anyway? It's not like Toyota is always 100% honest and up-front either

There are things that we will care about:

We will care how far it goes on electric only. For my 10-15 mile daily commute the Volt would work very well and allow me to go days, weeks, perhaps even months burning little or no fossil fuel. So if it is not the most efficient ICE, that will be OK.
We will care about reliability. While GM doesn't have the reputation that Toyota does, I'm going to wait until we have some real-world data before deciding. Perhaps their hybrid technology will be a dog, perhaps it won't.
We will care about cost. At $41K (in the US, God only knows what it will cost in Canada once it is available since we usually pay *significantly* more, and no large federal rebate either) I doubt it will be interesting to me unless price drops a lot.

 

No they just aren't going to sell many in Canada the first couple of years. It is a limited roll out by design.

To those other posters that know gm is lying ...
Oh my god the volt has an engine, gm didn't tell us that. I sure am mad. I am not smart enough to realize that when gm talks about the volt engine, that the engine is actually in the car, or that the car is not targetted at those driving 30,000 miles per year or those that want to hug polar beers

In the interest of disclosure, polar is the brand name of a beer from Venezuela and has no connection to the bear in the leaf commercial.

Full disclosure Venezuela produces oil, and if you hate oil you probably hate Venezuela, even though the country makes some fine rum and beer. Then again if you hate oil and beer you probably hate America. Why are you reading this if you hate America.

No animals were harmed in the production of this message. Please don't drink and drive.

 

Why would GM try to market that way if majority of the buying public doesn't care? Just bragging for green credibility?

 

Just face it all, GM is a liar any way you dice it.

 

Stating what it is in engineering term is dissing?

Beer company can market it anyway they want as long as it appeals their target audience. What if they market beer as an energy drink? Would you consider it "crossing the line"?

 

Most icebergs typically look harmless. The problem is when you start digging for detail. Turns out they've been using the "electric" issue to keep discussions about the engineering itself from emerging.

I find it ironic how they've been making the petty look like a really big deal. Why not twist that very problem they created back on them?

That "Freedom Drive" was a great example of what's been going on. The information we thought it would reveal was the very thing they absolutely refused to share. The goal for CS-mode efficiency was 50 MPG. The reality is only around 35 MPG.

But pay no attention to that.

Take one for a test-drive.
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GM definitely lied, but even I admit that many potential buyers, esp. those who aren't hybrid or tech savvy won't care about whether the wheels can be driven by the ICE. It's not like "ZOMG! I can't buy the car now because I've discovered it's not really a pure serial PHEV! (or the ICE can help drive the wheels!)" I suspect that many other factors that will go into whether someone buys a Volt or not.

Ummm.. The Big 3 used to be composed of GM, Ford then Chrysler. They ALWAYS were the top 3 sellers of passenger car/trucks in the US until a few years ago. I've never known of a single month where Toyota (in the US) has outsold GM. How many GM sells has nothing to do w/their quality, reliability or lack of. I've been monitoring auto sales for years and unfortunately don't have a link to a convenient table for when the Big 3 were the Big 3, but you can see total US sales for a couple automakers at http://money.cnn.com/2002/01/03/companies/carsales/ for 2001.

You can compare these to http://www.autoblog.com/2010/01/05/by-the-numbers-2009-up-and-down-year-ends-down-for-most-editi/ and http://www.autoblog.com/2010/11/03/by-the-numbers-october-2010-trick-or-treat-edition/.

GM was the world's largest automaker for MANY decades yet there were pumping out junk for decades. Go take a look at a Consumer Reports April auto issue or one of their car guides in a bookstore. To this day (esp. if you look at cars more than a few years old), you'll see a large % of GM vehicles that have below average reliability ratings and some w/average reliability and only a very TINY % of Toyota/Lexuses in w/below average reliability and a tiny % of of Toyota/Lexuses w/merely average reliability.

 

They drove from Texas to New York. They did not disclose how much gas or kWh electricity was used or the number of times charged nor the cost of the trip. It was done to show that a hybrid running on gas engine can do it. What was the point? Was it supposed wow away potential Leaf owners?

That event revealed something very important however. One part of the video showed the Volt's highway sub-standard acceleration (60-79 mph). I pointed out that it was slower than the Prius.

It turned out that the Volt that used for the "Freedom Drive" wasn't programmed to have the gas engine directly turn the wheels. I think the decision was made to engage the clutch for parallel operation for the performance aspect of it. They could not have the Volt slower than the Prius. That was a better choice and in turn made everyone (who believed the Volt's gas engine will never turn the wheels) a liar.

 

I agree with that statement but they lost some very "vocal" online supporters. They probably fled to Nissan Leaf. They also lost a huge bragging right that it was purely electrically driven, just like an EV. At the same time, the revelation of the planetary gearset made it more like a copycat Prius with 3 additional clutches "Frankensteined" into a bigger battery pack robbing one rear seat.

 

Yeah, I was very disappointed that GM was so evasive in not at least telling us anything about the mileage they observed.

I didn't know about the latter... if that's true, that might be another reason why they were evasive. It might've significantly affected the CS mileage and wouldn't reflect what customers would see.

 

I guess the point is I really don't care what speculation there was either on GM's part or ours. I don't pay any attention to 3/4 of the marketing BS anyway. Whether GM changed the design wholesale or just tweaked it, or whether they changed their minds or outright lied for some perceived or real machiavellian reason just doesn't matter to me. I care about the cost, reliability, environmental impact etc. and I'm willing to give the Volt a chance based upon what it actually is and does. I hope it is a winner. That is better for us and better for the environment.

 

Unfortunately, what was said was included in the bankruptcy recovery agreement. $40,000,000,000 of our money is in the balance.

Cruze & Volt were supposed to lead the way to a better future for GM... and America. Neither one is living up to the hype. For Volt, you've got a nice ride that is neither as green or affordable as we were led to believe.

Remember, the concern was "too little, too slowly". Will consumers choose to pay more now or be accepting of having to wait for the next generation?
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I understand, not everyone follow the development from the beginning and how things unfolded with many twists and turns. I was supportive of the Volt and even defended the Volt in the beginning. The more I found out about it, the more I got convinced the Volt was part of the pollution and not the solution.

I am not familiar with how electricity is generated in your part of Canada but you seem to be claiming zero carbon footprint. Hydro?

In the US, 51% of the electricity comes from Coal, resulting in Volt emitting more greenhouse gas than a standard Prius. This site shows the breakdown by entering a zip code but it is only for USA.

The Volt can make environmental sense for some states such as California where electricity is generated mostly from renewable source. It would not make financial sense for sure. I would not bet on the reliability of it as well, knowing the chemistry of the battery pack and how deep they are discharging to get ~40 miles. GM admitted that they still have "kinks" to work out to make the battery last 10 years / 150k miles. There is also three clutches to worry about. My biggest worry would be the inverter because I have not heard how much they tested it.

 

Actually, for CA, it doesn't appear to be mostly generated from a renewable source. I put in a couple zip codes that I've lived or worked in before like 95120 and 90024 and I see only 9.4% non-hydro renewables and 17.7% hydro. The rest is all non-renewable, although the 16.5% nuclear won't cause any CO2 emissions.

98052 in WA state has a pretty high % of hydro at 48.6%. I picked a random Portland, OR zip code and it comes up with same hydro %.

 

I never made any carbon footprint claim, certainly not zero. But yes, here the vast majority of electricity is hyrdro. We are a net exporter.

Of course, mileage will vary (pardon the pun) depending on your location and electricity source - today. But I also think electric is the long term way to go. It arguably holds the promise of most efficiency and least emissions. Any research/developments/products that further that are positive - even ones that fail can be lessons learned.

I agree. My one real beef with the Volt right now is price. Of course the same could be said for any Tesla product - current or planned. Yet they don't get the same abuse. My hope is that prices will come down either through an evolution of current products on the horizon, or new ones yet to come.

All valid concerns. And I am admittedly not a bleeding edge adopter. I took 10 years to buy a Prius. I am just asking that we give the Volt a fair shake. Lot's of people claimed the Prius was too complex to be reliable (many still do in ignorance) and look how that turned out. Let's see how it turns out. Let's not go out of our way to make it a self-fulfilling prophesy.

 

With Canadian price premium and if there is no credit this car won't sell more than 3 units until its price comes down. Having a volt in the US after the tax credit is kind of like having a hybrid several years ago. It's partly making a statement, partly interesting for the new owner to own a new tech. But paying $40k+ for it you get none of these concessions, you'd just be stupid. A fool and his money kind of deal.

 

Below is what you said in post #41. You were saying the electricity to power the Volt for your 10-15 miles had little or no fossil fuel (carbon footprint). Electricity can be generated from fossil fuel (Ex: Coal, Gas and Oil).

For my 10-15 mile daily commute the Volt would work very well and allow me to go days, weeks, perhaps even months burning little or no fossil fuel.​

I am not so sure after seeing the DOE report on GHG emission for pure EV. A standard hybrid (like Prius) emit GHG about 270 gram/mile while EV emit about 290 gram/mile. 40 miles plugin hybrid (like Volt) emit about 320 gram/mile. Again, your emission will vary depending on where you live. The graph below is for the average of the entire United States.



For the efficiency, I am also not convince that EV will be better at it. Both the Volt and Leaf use about 250 Wh/mile - the same as Prius.

It will all come down to how efficient the electricity is generated, transported over the power lines and charge the battery. Will that beat the Atkinson cycle gas engine directly turning the wheels?

EVs definitely has the advantage due to the possibility of using multiple fuel sources. I am not sure about it's efficiency and emission resulting from it. You'll also need to consider the control of it. With EVs, you don't have control of the efficiency and emission - electricity provider does (unless you run off solar or wind). You are at the mercy of the power company and government regulating it. I am hopeful that electricity will get cleaner in the future.

It is good and important to have the BEVs and PHEVs running with electricity from the grid. It is bad to promote them as zero emission when we know it takes energy and pollution to generate the electricity.