New EV tickers on this site: http://www.chevrolet.com/volt-electric-car/

Nothing in the data suggests many people don't plug in. You If you look at the voltstats daily milage graph, it seems its more like people have long commutes and or/ volt owners that drive on more long trips.

And that spreadsheet for PIPs is quite different than the sample on fuelly where PiP owners only average 67mpg overall vs the 84 in the spreadsheet. Both are still too small a sample on which to draw any solid conclusion.

 

Saving depends on what I might drive otherwise.

1995 Honda Del Sol; I averaged about 34-35mpg summers, 30-32 winters. I Could not afford what I really wanted back in 95.. replacement ICE cars might have included z4, TT quatro, mitia, subrau WRX.

I test drove and considere a Prius (with or without a Plug), and would not buy one. The Volt met my fun to drive with the greenness I wanted. I also considered a Leaf, did not like it. I might have waited until the Model S, but its much more expensive.

 

That was 5 years ago, what still applies now?

And how does that apply to plug-in advertising?

For that matter, what is the purpose of the advertising?

Is Volt a halo vehicle until the next generation is rolled out or will mainstream sales volume be a goal for next year?

 

I think that UK ad is the same video portion, but the voiceover in the US conveyed a different message. I remember the background video and the US version said something to the effect of...'what if the air were clean again'. and so on. this was from 2004. looks like the UK ad aired in 2007? interesting that at that time (2004 ish, when I bought my Gen2), there was the 80% cleaner than a gasser advertising that i remember, both print ads and TV. I think the English accent-version seems to add the 1 ton C02 line. just my recollection. and no one cared about the pollution aspect of hybrids...as today I doubt many "new" prius drivers (V, C, whatever model) really know the emissions ratings. it gets x MPG above my old car and that's $$$ in the bank.

 

That's a huge change from a 2,295 lbs to a 3,781 lbs car. If Prius c were available 2 years ago, I would think it'll be a good choice for you.

That's how an automatic transmission shift gears. Instead of connecting to another planetary gearsets,Voltec connect to MGs and/or ICE. Whenever you engage/disengage clutch(es), the gear ratio between the wheels and/or ICE/MGs changes. That constitutes mechanically shifting gears.

When the disconnected ICE engages to the planetary gearset with a clutch, that's shifting a gear (Neutral to Drive).

 

Ford did a study in the US which found that hybrid drivers did not give a crap about CO2, but did about using less gas, spending less on gas, and having fewer unhealthy tailpipe emissions, in that order.

Toyota may have done a similar study in England and found that they don't give a crap about unhealthy emissions only co2, but I doubt it. It looks like a case of false advertising that may not have even motivated people to buy the car. Sales of prius in England are quite low compared to the US or japan.

 

No, a conventional automatic shifts between a number of different fixed gear ratios which is why you hear and feel the engine revs suddenly change.

The Prius and Volt "shift gears" electrically by varying the power balances between the electric motors and possibly the engine. The Volt additionally uses clutches to detach components such as the smaller motor and gas engine from the planetary gears when they are not needed. That does not change the mechanical gearing ratios and the driver does not typically hear or feel a sudden and distinct "gear shift".

 

Have not driven one, but I doubt I would find a "C" acceptable.
In 1995 I could not afford a nice car and the del sol was a reasonable comprise -- at least it was a convertible as was so light the 1.4L was still fun. I can hardly imaging a car I would choose over the volt. Even though I can now afford a BMW or even a 911, i still chose the volt. Now if the Model S existed 2 years ago, well maybe.

Well okay then.. if that is how you define shifting gears, then anytime one starts/stops/changes an element of a epicyclic gear, it is shifting the ratio and thus Prius CVT also shifts gears. There is no difference in ratios between an item being at 0rpm and clutched out of the system. Just semantics about what shifting means. In the HSD when the ice if off, its at one ratio, when its on, its another overall ratio.

 

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The Cruze is a money (profit generating) maker for GM. That is good news. Hopefully the profits from the Cruze will help fund R & D budget for the Volt. BUT, I must also remember that GM has a HUGE fanacial obligation to fund its' pension fund.

DBCassidy

 

Yes the crappy engine is an issue - only 36 MPG. Could this choice of engine used been subject to time and budget contraights?

Perhaps, as a shareholder in GM, might the question be: what am I getting for the Volt product with my vested interest and tax dollars used?

DBCassidy

 

With 61% on EV and 39% on gasoline, I would bet there is an upswing on the gas miles as well.

Volt's 37 MPG gas engine throws away 8.8 kWh (vs 50 MPG) every gallon it burns. 2013 model has a slight increase in EV range and that should help a bit but the recharge time and electricity consumption go up as well. What's needed is a more efficient gas engine that runs on regular gas.

Volt was hyped to cover 80% of the miles with electric. After 2.5 years with real world data, 61% is the reality.

The concept of using electric miles first then extend the range with gas engine (EREV), turned out to be not ideal. Every EV miles includes the gas engine and the gas tank piggyback riding. What's needed to be ideal is to use the gas engine and the battery in synergy.

 

What is the source of your claim it was claimed the Volt would yield 80% of the miles being electric. Please cite a source.

Maybe you are confused with the statement that 78% of the user drivers, drive less than 40miles on a normal day
(e.g. How Did GM determine that 78% of Commuters Drive Less Than 40 miles per day?)

But that statement does not implies 78% of the miles will be EV.. because many people will take some long trips, which often will be lots of miles and almsot all CS. Miles on a normal day and overall miles can be, and generally will be, different. The Utility factor, i.e. expectedEV usage for a 35mile battery is about 60%, and anyone expecting a large deviation from that was simply not paying attention to the data.

A more efficient gas engine would be nice, but is not critical. Despite the lower MPG_CS, the Volt still has an overall better MPGe than any car other with a gas engine.

The only time that gas+battery is better is when one does not have enough battery, and I posted links to papers supporting that conclusion. If you can show some published study that supports your point of view that blended is better, please provide citations. If not please quit posting unsupported opinions that are based on non-science.

 

The only time that gas+battery is better is when one does not have enough battery, and I posted links to papers supporting that conclusion. If you can show some published study that supports your point of view that blended is better, please provide citations. If not please quit posting unsupported opinions that are based on non-science.

How about 3 -4 million Priuses that have been sold? Common sense say Toyota must be doing something right. Of course you will probably refuse to acknowledge the above sales figures.

Yep, that is an impressive number of blended systems in everyday use. That you have to admit!

DBCassidy

 

I never expected 80%, but did expect more self selection. The 61% on on star is close to what you would expect from that chart of a random selection of cars. I expected the numbers to fall more in line with voltstats 70% ev miles. I'm not sure if lack of choice of different ranges might be behind self selection, or it was a naive idea. I wonder if when the energi's come out self selection will get them greatly above the 40% electric miles in the chart. From a utilization point of view that small percentage of miles would make one think that at 25 mile range or lower, blended mode won't greatly effect utilization.

On the gas engine efficiency, I certainly don't think 40mpg highway is bad at all, but.... It seems there is some pretty low hanging fruit when it comes to improving that CS efficiency. The engine choice on a $30K+ car just looks wrong if its not more efficient, and I hope voltec 1.5 will correct this.

 

Self-selection is in an interesting concept.. but also need to put it in context. On what criterion did they self-select. The 61% is, I think, actually just a tad below the expected random sample. But its an average and hence not robust to outliers which is its why the average on voltstats.net is 126 but he median is 170+. There are a few people with lots of miles and lower EV which brings down the average.

People with long commutes, might still be self-selecting and choosing volt (over say Prius) for the power and styling even if they are only getting 30% EV. But even at 30% EV they would be averaging something like 55-60MPG overall..
If you sort voltstat total miles,, you'll find that tof the top 20 cars in terms of milage, only 4 have > 61% EV and some are way under. Consider the top milage person, Volt Stats: Details for Volt #2011-00176 (Dru's Voltera) who is only 25% EV but still had 10K EV miles. If you are putting on 35-40K miles a year,its hard to charge enough to have grate EV%.. But those same people have huge numbers of total miles which shifts the average down. 40K miles like Dru is 4x what I drive so what he does has a much larger impact on the total EV%.

 

I expected those high daily mileage drivers to self select away from the volt. I would expect the car to depreciate quicker in these high mileage situations, while the benefits of the volt versus say a focus, sonata, prius, or jetta tdi would be reduced. As the numbers of volt drivers go up, we will see if the percentages of people getting sub 50% EV mileage goes down. Those are the ones that I was not expecting, but future data will tell.