2016 Prius or 2016 Volt...Which should I buy?

We will be interested to upgrade our 2010 Prius5 next year - new car bug.
Our Prius with 60K miles has been wonderful. But after witnessing the Reveal of the Gen4 and all the info/pictures - not enthralled at all. Then saw info/pics of the upcoming 2017 Volt - completely redone ground-up and will be avail spring '16.... hmm.

Will be great to do a side<>side comparo test and drive of both.
Our key factors for new are - hatchback, hybrid, compact+ size, nice fresh styling in&out, good feature/function, interior storage/comfort, reliability, driving comfort.
Our beef with Gen4 right now is the in-out styling, esp the interior - esp when compared to the '17 Volt>>>.

Will Toyota or GM (Chevy,,,,never thought we'd consider another domestic, but...) get our $30K+???

 

I've offered this suggestion before for charging at the workplace and a couple of folks have said it worked for them. Show the employer the approx. daily cost (company electric rates are typically much lower than residential) and offer to donate that (monthly or yearly) to the charity/cause of THEIR choice.

An outdoor 120v plug is all one needs to charge, no special equipment needs to be purchase by the employer (unless they want to!).

 

Not to bang on an already well worn drum, but it's important to get your employer's permission BEFORE you start hanging 12 ampere loads on exterior circuits.

If you work for a large company, it's possible that you have a trendy Environmental Compliance Officer that's looking to make your company (at least appear to be) greener. An carefully worded email to that person might steer the entire company into developing a policy of EV inclusion.
Just remember.....you're asking for something which is alltogether different than being entitled. Also this is going to be a little more complicated than just trying to talk them into ponying up 50 cents worth of electricity. There are cords to consider, electrical safety and load balancing are also going to have to be investigated. It's easier if you do some research ahead of time and give them a finished - or at least a semi-rough proposal that they don't have to think about very much.
In my years of working at big phone, we've lost commercial power in buildings and had at least one non-trivial fire from employees plugging personal crap into interior and exterior outlets. Fortunately for team EV, none of these incidents involved electr-o-cars.
Unfortunately for team EV, there have already been news stories about self-entitled EV drivers stealing electricity.

You never get a second chance to make a first impression.

Good Luck!

 

Very interesting. I just looked for a listing on the causes of fires in the workplace and found this list for non-residential buildings.

U.S. fire statistics

By far the largest reason is cooking which is also the #1 cause of home fires. Anyone ever set the microwave for 50:00 minutes instead of 5:00 and walk off like me?

 

The nearly bad fire I was thinking about was one of those metal 1500 watt space heaters from the 70's that was left on 24/7 by a former employee (under a desk!) because the building was always "so dang cold!" - but you reminded me of another event in the early 90's that was caused by a sweet potato being nuked by an inattentive engineer.
No real damage, but the engineering lab smelled REALLY BAD for about six months and the fire department was aroused at oh-dark-thirty for the call.

These incidents are down on the noise because they're fairly routine, and because regulations have the positive (?) effect of helping to thwart the beneficial effects of Darwinism.
Many people reading this have gone into an office where the coffee pot has been left on over the weekend, or a microwave has had to be replaced because of a popcorn-restroom multitasking failure.
However (comma!) a similar problem involving a BEV would be on the news....not because people hate EVs (it's the drivers, actually!) but rather because somebody zorching a microwave oven isn't.......(wait for it!).........news.

Get permission.
Make sure you know where it's safe to plug the car in.


Stay off the news!
I have a selfish motive here.
I'd like to club up to a PHEV in the next few years.
I currently drive a hybrid, and the ship has already sailed on the public perception of hybrid drivers.

BEV owners still have some rudder input on how that class of vehicle is going to be received by the 90-percenters out there......and much of what is happening is positive this time around!!

 

Taxi cab companies love the Prius since they last 300,000+ miles with very little maintenance. And that is with commercial driving.

The problem I have with the Volt is that it is made by Chevy/GM. Outside of trucks with body on frame construction like the Silverado - what Chevy will reliably last 300,000+ miles? Chevy's are usually on their deathbed by 100,000 miles or so.

The repair bills will eat up any gain you make in fuel economy is my concern about Chevys. And whether or not it can last 300,000+ miles.

Yes, the specs are good on the Volt. But is it made to the quality standards of Toyota? Chevys usually do not have high quality - meaning factory workers that car about how well they manufacture the car.

 

True it's somewhat of an unknown quantity especially being a new architecture. Here's one of the front runners: 200,000 Miles In A Chevy Volt With No Problems | CleanTechnica NOTE: article is nearly a year old so not sure what the current mileage is if it's still in use.

 

Erick Belmer has driven about 267,000 miles in his 2012 Volt so far, almost 95,000 of it on EV, and from what I heard it's still running fine for him. Here's his Voltstats page so you can look at it.

Volt Stats: Details for Volt #2012-07353 (sparkie)

Obviously no car is going to be completely problem-free, but many Volt owners seem quite happy with its fairly high reliability rating.

Unfortunately their marketing department sucks, hence why hardly anyone knows much about it. But for people who have driven them, they seem to like it quite a bit.

 

Hard to say for me, without seeing the Volt in person. The Prius was considerably less expensive (price, insurance, property taxes, etc). For the price of the Prius, I'm able to keep the Leaf as well, and still come out less than the Volt new. I wasn't crazy about being in another lease, so for me the Prius was the obvious choice.

I can't blame them for passing on Android. Google is demanding way too much data (pretty much anything you can get from OBDII) that they don't need. The only thing Apple is pulling is whether the vehicle is in motion or not.

 

Nice AutoBlog Volt review:

 

I think the point that Toyota goes 300,000 trouble free vs GM's less then 100,000 with any vehicle, is fact, yes GM has its lemons and peaches also, but let's not pretend.

 

His wife also has a Volt now.

 

You already owns Prius, if you plan to change then try different car. Volt would be a good choice.

 

Why do you think someone else would know which car you'd be happier with?

 

Yeah, who reads those Amazon ratings, movie reviews, and college ranking guides anyway?

 

Another negative to the Volt. In 10 years Toyota will still be in business, wanna take bets on GM?

 

That is my worry. It would be so nice if Toyota made a PHEV with a Volt comparable EV range. They don't. It's GM that stepped up to that challenge (Huh?).

Can GM change it's corporate mindset of cutting corners to vehicle reliability destruction? If they don't do it with the Volt, they will not do it for any of their vehicles. So far, GM looks to be trying. Would like a lot more real world data to see the full story.

On thing to be aware of. Nearly all of a modern car is made by robots. The workers are keeping the robots supported and fed. The reliability is now a much bigger function of material choice, engineering margin, and automated testing coverage. The lack of long term reliability is now determined more in the design departments and much less on the assembly line.

 

Toyota's choice to "right size" the battery is still a wise one. They didn't sacrifice cost. That meant they could deliver something profitable & affordable without requiring subsides or upgrades. Then when the technology allows, they could deliver a larger range.

GM did the opposite, gambling that they'd be able to have a competitor right away. It didn't work. Yet, they get credit for having made a better choice anyway. Admitting the challenges to meet still, they set a goal of reducing cost by $10,000. That didn't work either. The reduction of $3,500 while improving a variety of things is noteworthy, but still falls short of the need.

It's really unfortunate so many continue to disregard need (replacing the fleet) in favor of arguing specific performance statistics. Selling a small number of conquests without changing loyal customer purchases misses the point.

 

The 2011 Volt was introduced in 2010. It is now late 2015 with the 2016 Volt commencing sales. How many more years are you going to insist the Volt is a failure...while also insisting that a car that is not built and I could not buy if it was built is the flagship of PHEV technology?