Anyone waiting for PIP getting the "itch" to consider a Chevy Volt instead?

op2:

 

Yes, but not that important if you use hybrid mode rarely as many Volt owners will. The Volt will typically spend most of its hybrid mode time at highway speeds where the EPA says the 3rd gen Prius (PiP) is 20% more efficient (40 versus 48 MPG). It would be nice if the Volt got better highway mileage but realistically Toyota sells many HSD hybrid models other than the Prius liftback which get the same or lower EPA highway mileage as the Volt (Prius V, Camry hybrid, all Lexus hybrids).

Yes, the PiP is $2,500 less than the Volt after tax credits. It also has an extra 11.6 kWh of battery or roughly around $225 per kWh at the pack. That's a good price for the extra battery capacity for owners who can take good advantage of it.

Yes, the PiP has slightly more interior space. For my purposes, I only notice the reduced rear seat leg room which is unusually good in the Prius for its general size. On the other hand, 95% of the time I have only myself or one additional passenger in the car so it's not much of a problem.

True. Things that don't exist cannot fail. On the other hand, the Prius will spend more time spinning its smaller motor/generator and all the various parts of its gas engine even when driving in EV mode at speeds less than 62 MPH. In the Volt, those parts will frequently be unclutched and unused when the car is driving without the gas engine running.

These are really disadvantages for the PiP as far as individual owners are concerned. Lighter, by itself, implies higher risk of injury in most crash situations. Faster to complete a charge is just a misleading way of saying the PiP has a smaller battery capacity since both PiP and Volt have the same charging rate. Using less electricity is a disadvantage if it happens because you run out of battery range or the gas engine starts up to provide additional power.

 

Advantages of using battery over 62 mph:

1) Uses less gas (one gallon = 3 full charge for Volt)
2) Feels good
3) Something different

 

It's worth keeping in mind that the 38 kW PiP battery output power value only comes from one priuschat forum member who reports having seen it in a non-public sales staff briefing binder in Japan. The only publicly published value for the 2012 production PiP maximum battery power output is 27 kW, as far as I know.

Even if the 38 kW (or 27 kW) value is true we don't know what it represents. Is it a momentary pulse power for 2 seconds? Maybe 10 seconds? Only when the battery pack is near full? Only available when in "EV City" mode which isn't available in the U.S.? We don't know yet.

 

We already know that hill climbing and accelerating in the suburbs won't require the engine. The early model confirmed that.

What difference does it make anyway? Prius is a hybrid. Adding the plug isn't intended to eliminate gas usage. Heck, if that were a goal Volt wouldn't have an engine.

This is just enthusiast's raising doubt, not joe six-pack who justs want better MPG without paying much more up front.
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What difference does it make? Well usbseawolf2000 seems to have put some effort into presenting us with charts which indicate the power levels needed in order to avoid starting the gas engine and those values come very close to the 27-38 kW level. I'm just clarifying the knowns and unknowns for interpreting the charts. I'm sharing relevant contextualized facts, not misleading FUD.

I'm personally guessing that the production PiP will have at least the same perceived EV power output as the prototype. But, it is worth pointing out that the prototype car you drove had a different and larger battery pack than the production car (although the production car is lighter which means less power needed to accelerate it).

 

I think the arguments about whether a Prius Plug-in or a Volt are better for a particular person are useless to squabble over. Each person has their own priorities and wants and one will fit them better than the other.

Instead, I think it's important to focus on the bigger picture, which is national conservation of energy, particularly of non-renewables such as gasoline.

Certainly, that's a good price for the extra battery capacity, but that isn't the real cost is it? Ultimately, the tax credit comes from taxpayers, which means the nation is paying $5000 more for a Volt owner than a Prius Plug-in. This is mitigated by the fact that Chevy is an American company.

Furthermore, the tax credit for one Volt which gives 35 EV mile capability to one person vs 3 Prius Plug-Ins which gives 15 EV miles to 3 people for 45 miles total. Those 45 miles of EV miles are also more likely to be used.

Also, the Prius Plug-in leverages more private money. The same tax credit leverages $31,645 from a single person vs. $29,500 from 3 people or $88,500. Not to mention more people can afford to pony up/borrow $32,500 vs $39,145.

Finally, what happens after the tax credits go away? The Volt will have difficulty cutting its price since a large chunk of it is the cost of the battery. If the battery range decreases, it looks less appealing compared to the Prius Plug-in. The Prius Plug-in will simply have lower package models and drive the base price down.

Whether an individual is ok with the trade-offs between a midsize and compact is simply personal preference. The real point here is that all other things being equal, a compact should be more efficient than a midsize. Both in terms of MPG and MPGe, the Volt is less efficient than a Prius Plug-in.

I find this logic faulty. The hardest wear and tear on a traditional ICE is caused by starting at low RPMs using a small starter motor. Both cars have large electric motors which start the ICE at comfortable RPMs. Prius taxis have already proven that the engine can last much longer. Running the ICE less has marginal benefit.

This is incorrect. It is the size of the car that matters, not the weight and a midsize is safer than a compact.
http://www.edmunds.com/car-safety/are-smaller-cars-as-safe-as-large-cars.html
Note also that crash test ratings are compared between other cars of the same class.

I would argue a lighter car is more nimble, so the Prius Plug-in has both the safety of a midsize and is possibly easier to avoid an accident in.

Finally, a heavier car will cause more damage b/c there it has more potential energy at the same speed. This means the Volt could cause more injury to the occupants of the vehicle it collides with or more property damage, everything else being equal.

I think it's clear the Prius Plug-in has less EV range. The point here is that the Prius Plug-in uses less electricity to travel a mile. Which also means that it takes less time to charge based on distance.

Ultimately, I think the Prius Plug-in will sell in larger volume and allow the nation to drive more EV miles than the Volt using less electricity per mile. More profit on the Prius Plug-in will allow Toyota to spend more on R&D to improve and enhance it more quickly than competing vehicles. The end result is uncertain, but right now the Prius Plug-in looks like it is in a good position.

 

The SUV weight compact Volt is a danger to the rest of "normal weight" vehicles on the road. Ever thought of that?

I listed price (not cost), weight, volume, time (recharge) and energy (electricity). They are interrelated items but those are 5 different categories and there is nothing misleading about how they correlate one another.

Not utilizing the entire battery pack is the real disadvantage. You overpaid for the battery and the gas powertrain. The added weight, volume and complexity drags everything else down. Using both powertrains is the real advantage.

 

It matters to us enthusiasts. John's point was it doesn't matter to average Joes.

You are the one raising FUD about 38 kW battery power. In the SAE 2010-01-0831 paper, the prototype PHV battery was described to have around 40kW.

 

One could make the argument that 10-15 mile PHEVs should get the same flat tax credit as a Volt or LEAF regardless of battery pack size. The present tax credit is a battery subsidy, not an electrified vehicle subsidy. It is intended, in theory, to bring large scale manufacturing of automotive traction batteries to the market sooner than would otherwise happen and also to speed up R&D innovation. Scaling the subsidy with the vehicle pack size enables a broader set of vehicle design options and their differing battery cell designs to market at competitive present prices. The goal is bring down effective battery prices quickly enough so that vehicle prices do not increase significantly when the subsidies are phased out.

Providing a range of BEV, EREV, and 10-30 mile PHEV vehicles provides options to allow individual owners to choose the vehicle that works best for their commute pattern.

The Volt and PiP (Prius) are very similarly sized cars. The Volt is almost classified as mid-size (the Chevy Cruze is mid-size) and the Prius is not far from being classified as a compact. Actually, the Volt is 1.5 inches longer than the 3rd gen Prius.  Weight is a major component in the physics of vehicle collisions. The Volt weights around 600 pounds more than the PiP. It's almost the weight of an SUV as usbseawolf2000 likes to remind us.
 
There is a website which crunches the numbers on all of these factors including the various crash scores from the government and insurance industry. It's called informedforlife.org. They give an overall crash safety score of 44 to the Volt and 55 to the 3rd gen Prius. Smaller scores mean better crash safety. The Volt score is within the top 9% of all vehicles listed in their report. Presumably the PiP will do slightly better with the added battery weight.

See pages 3 and 17 for the Volt and Prius scores:

http://www.informedforlife.org/demos/FCKeditor/UserFiles/File/MasterSCOREalpha0119(1).pdf

They explain their scoring system in detail on their home page.

 

Although your point about 3 times as many being able to take advantage of the same opportunity is a great one, that question is the best.

We've already had several examples in history where next generation expectations proved much more challenging than expected... IMA, BAS, Two-Mode. Not delivering enough of an efficiency improvement combined with not enough of a cost reduction is a very real problem.

Focus may be on the immediate situation, but it's that next step which will really be bittersweet. How in the world will Volt appeal to the people who would otherwise just purchase a Malibu or Cruze?
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Take a look, one car is classified as midsize while the other is Scion tC size.

http://www.fueleconomy.gov/feg/Find.do?action=sbs&id=31767&id=31618&id=31357

 

If Prius PHV qualifies for $7,500 tax credit, the standard trim would start at $24.5k. That will have the highest chance of succeeding in massive scale battery production.

It is a failure in whoever wrote the bill, to envision battery tanks succeeding instead of a well balanced affordable Prius PHV type.

 

Joe six pack wants neither a Volt nor a Prius, they are happy just driving by in their pick-up trucks shaking their heads at us, shaking our heads at them.

 

Gwmort, I don't know the purpose of your summarization, but this is the kind of performance I look for in a car or brand for my money!




http://www.jdpower.com/news/pressrelease.aspx?ID=2012008

 

I added a mid-size 2012 Chevrolet Cruze to the comparison.

http://www.fueleconomy.gov/feg/Find.do?action=sbs&id=31767&id=31618&id=31357&id=31315

You will see that the Volt is classified as compact even though it's combined interior and luggage volume (the basis for this classification) is only just 2 cubic feet smaller (108 versus 110).

Here's the table for volume sizes and how they relate to vehicle classifications:

http://www.fueleconomy.gov/feg/findacarhelp.shtml#epaSizeClass

As you can see, compact is 100-109 cubic feet and mid-size is 110-119 cubic feet. The mid-size Prius and Cruze are respectively 116 and 110. The compact Volt is 108.

In exterior size, perhaps more relevant in a crash, the Prius is 1.5 inches shorter than the Volt and 5.5 inches shorter than the Cruze. In any case, what really matters is actual crash test results and their relative ranking with other safety factors. It is clear that the Volt does very well and probably somewhat better than the Prius.

 

Well then, joe coffee.
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Interesting that the Prius is a "Compact" in this list.

 

Note, however, that the Volt was not considered as part of this survey.

Also, they think the Prius is a compact car.

 

It just occurred to me to check the Fuelly.com entries for the Lexus CT 200h which is a compact car (nearly sub-compact) with the 3rd gen Prius HSD 1.8L gas engine and hybrid transmission.

Of the 49 cars listed for 2011 and 2012, I did roughly similar or better than 77% of them with my own annual average hybrid mileage of 42 MPG in the Volt driving 6,000 gas-only miles (out of 16,000 total miles).

Overall, the 2011 CT 200h cars got an average of 42.0 MPG and the 2012 cars got 39.3 MPG.

Of course, the CT 200h isn't a Prius or PiP even though it uses the same engine and hybrid system and even though it gets worse 0-60 MPH and quarter-mile performance than the Volt. The point is that the Volt's much maligned hybrid gas mileage is at least adequate for the limited use that it is typically used for.