Will the Chevrolet Volt be a failure or a success?

Let me put it differently. Will gas come on in normal operation or not. That is the difference between prius phv/Energi and Volt.

The above question and range are two compromises that need to be balanced with cost.

The tax credit currently favors larger batteries. So if the cost is same - would you prefer 15 mile or 30 ?

 

PRICE, right? That's what the consumer actually pays the automaker. Of course, they are also paying for the tax credit, since the subsidy also comes from them.

COST is what the automaker spends to produce the vehicle itself. Without the tax credit, making a profit would be totally unrealistic since the consumer would be paying far less.
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The strength of hybrid is ability to use both powertrains when they are best suitable to do so.

If you want a plugin hybrid to drive like an EV, prepare to pay extra and take efficiency hit - think Volt.

 

Umm, thanks, but that was only part of my point.
TCO is only one measure. If the volt had 6 seats and you really needed that sixth seat usb, like you really need the middle back one, you would cross the prius off the list. Likewise if you actually want a phev because you like the technology, the prius does not cut it. Now you are talking features. Only initial adopters or people that like technology need apply. This is the market for the volt. These are also the people that buy a tesla instead of a porsche.

Not dense at all, the prius has never led tco. I bought mine because it used less gasoline even though it missed on a lot of features I find important. My friends that have bought cars recently for tco purposes have bought the fit. If you are willing to be in something with not quite the material or handling of the fit you can drop tco further, I think edmunds picked the yaris or versa which are today's geo mmetros. If you want to only hand money to the gas station once a month or less you only have a few choices, and toyota and honda do not compete.

 

I don't think anyone in the press or gm ever said the volt would outsell the prius. Nissan has predicted leaf volumes greater than the prius.

GM is talking about a family of phevs on the voltec drivetrain. They are not talking about the volts selling more than their conventional cars. They fully expect the cruze to outpace volt sales. Now here is john's comment with the oposite pov of em.

I'll leave it to you to decide what a niche vehicle is. Toyota is planning a small roll out of the phv prius, starting with only carb states and production of 20K/year for the first couple of years. 2016 is the key year for the federal cafe standards to kick in. I would be suprised if phev vehicles were greater than 2.5% of the total market then. I believe hv were 2.6% in 2010.

I don't think GM owns a farm, but volt r&d cost them $700M according to GM. They recently sold a parts supplier to a chineese firm for about that amount. To put it in perspecive GM took $50B in bail out money. This does not count things like cash for clunkers or the $1B they took for hydrogen vehicle development. They have paid back or given the government stock for $41B, which means unless the stock goes up, the governement will have given them a gift of $9B. Its too big to fail and it failed. The volt is tiny compared to the other numbers and may eventually make a profit. IDK

 

I think the winner in 2020 will clearly be no gas in normal operation. I do like the configuration of the porsche 918 phev, which gives the user control to lock it in ev, or put it in performance mode where both drives will power it for better acceleration, but switch to ev when this power is not needed.

The other wrinkle about battery capacity is size. I think 20-25 mile range will be a winner because of the bulk of the batteries. There could be packaging breakthroughs though.

 

The battery bulk is a short term problem. The next gen battery will give about double the range for the same bulk/weight.

The actual range someone wants depends on thier commute. Personally I'd want the range in a PHEV that will cover my commute.

 

Coming to OP's question, obviously the answer depends on the way you define "success".

For eg., we can say it has already succeeded. It helped them get the bailout.

From engr POV, it has helped GM learn a great deal about electrification and update the institutional knowledge they gained with EV1.

Now they have a green car that can potentially compete with upcoming plugin hybrids and perhaps some EVs.

For both Volt & Leaf, it is not a question of selling the cars in the first two years - but what happens in later years.

Mass market success for Volt depends on
- gas price
- how quickly Volt can become a 5 seat, family car selling below $30K (post tax credit)
- how well the Volt performs long term in terms of quality
- how well GM can use the technology in other formats to gain volume

 

Two-Mode already did that. In fact, they even demonstrated several plug-in variants of it.

The "success" would be to have taken that knowledge and adapted it to something which could be sold in high volumes at a profit.

With such a high price, the latest turn of events (producing 120,000 next year) makes you wonder what the demand really is... following the expiration of the tax credit.
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I can't see a production jump from 10k to 120k that quickly, not without huge quality problems in such a complicated car!

 

It will be a failure. Just waiting for market demand to "REVOLT" :rockon::rockon::rockon:

DBCassidy

 

You don't find too many people who remember the Apple Lisa, not to mention remember its significance in jumpstarting the Mac.

 

I agree with that most want range that is long as 95% of their driving days. The thing is people also care about the price and bulk. So the sweet spot may be to make it hit where 35% of the people drive, not 75% as the volt targets. This distance can go up as battery tech gets better. My prediction of sweet spot of 20-25 miles is for today. It takes 5 years to design a car. If the batteries capacity grows they can be put in inbetween model years. I think doubling in range for the same bulk is way out there in terms of years, but hey, I will be happy if I'm wrong.

I don't really think many complain about 2+2s versus 5 seats. The GM ceo has challenged the volt team to remove $10K in cost for the gen 2. I think this may severely impact quality. Simply increasing production to 120,000 units/year as gm has announced should help bring costs and price down. Voltec is going to go in other larger cars, I think that takes care of your 5 seat "problem".

I agree there, but remember GM built the volt to erase the memory of crushing the ev-1 and to test technology. It is being quite successful on both counts.

 

As I said the tax credit structure makes price the same (post credit) whether you use a 4 kwh battery or 16kwh.

For each kwh over 5kwh, you can get $417 extra tax credit. This nearly covers the $500/kwh or so battery cost (I guess even cheaper marginal cost).

So, if the bulk can be accommodated, you can sell 13 mile, 20 mile and 40 mile range PHEVs, all for the same price. This is what makes the decision of Toyota to go with 13 mile range PHV a head scratcher.

 

It's only a head scratcher if you presume many who fall under rules of alt. min. tax don't exist. But a car costing $40 is above the average $30K new car cost of 2010. If you can afford the $40K new car, you're likely in the target range of the alt. min. tax. If you're below the range of a $40K car, many won't consider it.

 

Interesting observation. I'll guess marginal engineering investment, time to production, more expensive car suspension and other parts, and fuel economy hit are some the the answers. If Toyota can price the plug-in extra cost over a regular Prius close to the tax credit it will be very smart marketing.

 

I'll definitely consider a 40K car if I can get 7.5K off. I don't come under alt min tax. BTW, leasing is always an option.

 

I think the earlier reasons given don't apply to a mega corp like Toyota and they have had a long time to do this. I still think it is a question of bulk & the desire to maintain 50 mpg in CS mode.

There is one more interesting aspect to this puzzle.

As written, the 7.5K credit applies only to first 200K cars of a manufacturer - whether you use it for 13 mile ev range PHEVs or for 150 mile range EVs. So, which of your cars you want those 200K to be ?

What I'd do is to get the large battery capacity vehicles out of the door early on and see if I can reduce the price enough by the time I hit 200K.

 

You seem to be following the line of an what I consider an unscrupulous toyota dealer, that is spreading this fud. The volt lease company takes the tax credit, and $350/mo for 3 years is quite affordable to those wanting a phev. Would not the test of this thesis be that production slow downs would be coming at gm, instead of the company pulling out all the stops to ramp up production faster than originally inteneded?

 

Or you can take the slightly different tack of toyota owning majority interest in the largest producer of nimh. Vertically integrated corporations do not always move quickly and most evidence says that a) toyota designed the car for the Japanese market and b)toyota's costs for batteries made from primearth at the time of design were significantly higher than the competition.