GM-VOLT : Chevy Volt Electric Car Site

On June 12th I took delivery of MINI E #412. As of now I have driven the car over 1200 miles. Though this site is about the Chevy Volt, and that is the car I hope to drive one day, as an advocate for the electrification of the automobile I took the opportunity to get a hold of an electrically-driven car as soon as I could.

The MINI E is a small prototype car with spartan creature comforts, seating for two, and absence of any significant storage potential. It is purely a commuter car.  It handles briskly and has a lot of power considering its 205 hp electric motor and small size. BMW has reduced immediate takeoff torque presumably to increase range, though they haven’t officially commented on it.

The 35 kwh lithium battery is said to deliver 100 miles of range. My daily commute is 26 miles each way; mostly highway driving with a smattering of suburban flow. I have found my true range is actually 70 miles. This is due to mostly 65MPH+ highway driving and the continuous compelling temptation of the immediate silent electric blast available from a stomp on the accelerator.

In short, I enjoy the car immensely, and derive great satisfaction from driving without gasoline and on US-made electricity. From a practical standpoint, there isn’t all that much difference between driving this car and a conventional one except that it is quieter, smoother, and quicker.  It does make hybrids like the Insight and Prius seem like a thing of the past with their sluggish responsiveness and use of gas.

However, in support of GM’s raison d’etre for the Volt, range anxiety is definitely an issue. This has been especially true because even though BMW installed a 240v/32amp charger in my garage, the connector cord UL certification was delayed so all this time I’ve depended on a 12a/120v charger. This charger can only recharge the car at a rate of about 3.3% (3.3 miles) per hour, so it takes 30 hours for a full charge.

I was able to get my office parking garage management to install an outlet for me and let me have the electricity for free, but I’m only there for 4 to 6 hours on some days. The car is only in my garage about 12 hours. So considering my daily driving needs of about 60 miles I’ve had to cut it close from time to time, and not be able to drive that car at all some days.

Here is a range anxiety experience I wrote on my sister site AllCarsElectric.com:

I was leaving my home with around 60 miles of range, knowing my drive each way was 27 miles. I knew I could charge all day at my office so I figured I’d be OK. When I got there though, I found life had other plans. It turned out a power transformer supplying my office building and the whole block had gone down and my building was in a blackout. We couldn’t open the office so I had to return home. Nice surprise vacation right? Not so much. I had to figure out how to get home with about 35 miles of range left on the car, all highway and much of the way uphill.

I had to leave the windows closed to minimize aero drag and kept the AC, radio, and even plain fan off to minimize draw. I painstakingly feathered the pedal keeping the power line as close to neutral as possible. I snailed along the highway breathing sighs of relief for every little downhill I could regen on, all the while visions of being towed danced in my head. At my lowest point the mileage read 3 probably when I was about 6 miles out, but with regen and a prayer I made it home.

I have also developed a resourcefulness for grabbing every little charge I can along the way. Sometimes for a few hours I park in the hospital parking lot where I work. I’ve discovered these lots have 1 or 2 standard outlets in certain locations, and I usually grab a few miles of charge (see photo above). This is no big deal since mine is the only electric car in the lot, but what if there were several?

In conclusion, driving a pure electric car is fun and satisfying, but the infrastructure is non-existent, and range anxiety is real. People driving pure EVs will wind up getting towed from time to time. And until universal widespread fast charging is available, in my opinion the Volt represents the best near term solution.

Tom Stephens is GM’s VP of product development, the position formerly held by Bob Lutz. In a new interview with Reuters, Stephens provided some insight on GM’s electric vehicle plans.

Stephens intends to be aggressive about staying ahead of the competition when it comes to delivering an electric car to the masses. “I can tell you that I won’t lose one day in terms of customers being able to walk into dealerships and actually purchase a plug-in,” he said.

He also believes the market is ripe for such cars. “I think there’s pent-up demand for the technology,” he said.

Stephens confirmed GM is working hard to be sure the Volt will deliver customer satisfaction right out of the gate despite the first generation’s lack of profitability. “My job is to get it out there and get it right the first time but then get it cost-effective so that we can do a huge number,” he said. “If I had to go with my first generation, we couldn’t really pencil a business case.”

“Any new technology is expensive, but if you get to the second or third generation you find that the cost goes way down,” he said.

Stephens also confirmed that work on the plugin-hybrid SUV originally slated to appear as a Saturn VUE remains on track, but wouldn’t confirm which brand or vehicle will get the drivetrain.  Outside sources have told GM-Volt.com that this program may remain more symbolic than full production. At this point GM has only committed to bringing these vehicles to fleet testing.  Other sources have suggested the plug-in SUV will be a new Buick crossover that hasn’t been revealed.

And in the first public admission of such, Stephens indicated that GM might consider launching a pure small EV.  He did not confirm a program for such a car exists yet, though previous leaked reports have indicated the possibility.

Source (Reuters)

In late June, GM completed the production of its first true to form Chevy Volt prototypes called integration vehicles.  We were given a brief video description of what it was like to drive one by the car’s chief engineer Andrew Farah.

GM granted an interview with Farah to Automotive News who got some new nitty gritty details.

Farah was asked what it was like to step on the accelerator while the engine generator was running. “You get immediate response from the foot pedal,” he says. “Because the Volt is always driven electrically, you don’t even notice the difference there.” He also explained for the first time that at that point “the gasoline engine’s rpms then follow.”

Farah noted that because the engine isn’t directly connected to the foot, “it is one of the things we continue to tune.” He said “there is an expectation of what happens when you put your accelerator to the floor in the way the car sounds and feels. We’ve got the feel.”

“We’ve got the feel of a sports car,” he said. “The sound part and the way the engine plays into that perception is one of the areas we have to work on.”

Asked about vibration, noise, and harshness Farah said “we still have some work to do,” but that during his ride he was “very pleased with the first steps.”

“It was great,” he added.

Farah noted that the team is using “liquid applied sound deadener” and that in the front of the dash and glass there is “packaged-in sound suppression items,” that are also being tuned to perfection.

Farah says that during EV driving he is not aiming for the car to be “Cadillac library quiet,” because it might be “disconcerting” to drivers. He is focused on minimizing wind noise and conducted road noise.

He said transition from computer model to real car went very well although not absolutely perfect. He noted the team had a minor “interference with the instrument panel that we didn’t expect.” But that was corrected and “off we went.”

Asked if the car feels heavy because of the battery at its center, Farah said there are advantages and disadvantages to it. An advantage he explains is that the battery “lowers the center of gravity of the car” which is good from a handling perspective. However, he added the weight is not without detriments, but that his team is “taking the best of the advantages.”

In terms of what work lies ahead at this point Farah said “This is really just the beginning of all the final tuning. We are at the 50 percent point. Fundamentally, we’ve got everything directionally correct, but now we’ve got all the tuning yet to do.”

Source (Automotive News)

Only 35 days after GM entered bankruptcy protection, a Manhattan judge late Sunday issued a ruling allowing GM to sell its best assets to a government backed “new GM.”

This ruling came after 3 days of the court hearing objections from a loosely formed and apparently ill prepared group of dissident bondholders, union retirees, and other.

This ruling was the critical lynchpin for the formation of a new company that will be freed of its former tremendous debt, excess brands, and dealerships. It is expected the deal can close by the end of the week allowing the new GM to emerge.

The new GM will have lower leverage and a stronger balance sheet, which when combined with a lower break-even point, will allow it to reduce its risk, operate profitably at much lower volume levels, and to reinvest in the business in the key areas of advanced technology and product development. GM’s subsidiaries outside the United States will be acquired by the new company and are expected to continue to operate without interruption. – (GM statement)

Judge Gerber wrote his 90 page ruling as though he was a surgeon, “Bankruptcy courts have the power to authorize sales of assets at a time when there still is value to preserve — to prevent the death of the patient on the operating table.” Indeed in the buildup to this event, many have predicted this so-called 363 sale would be a quick surgical bankruptcy.

This ruling is a success for the Obama administration who determined this process could still be successful despite the massive and complex nature of GM.

GM is currently operating on $19 billion in government loans, and after the sale is completed and the new GM emerges, an additional $30 billion in government funding will be provided to see the new company off into its fuel efficient future.

The new GM will be 60 percent owned by the US Treasury, the UAW would get a 17.5 percent stake, the Canadian government about 12 percent and GM bondholders about 10 percent. The judge has issued a 4 day stay until the sale can be closed and thus is likely to happen by the end of this week.

Fritz Henderson will remain CEO and Edward Whitaker will be the chairman of the board of directors.

“A healthy domestic auto industry remains vital to the global economy and we deeply appreciate the support the U.S., Canadian and Ontario governments and taxpayers have given GM, and the sacrifices that have been made by so many. This has been an especially challenging period, and we’ve had to make very difficult decisions to address some of the issues that have plagued our business for decades. Now it’s our responsibility to fix this business and place the company on a clear path to success without delay,” said Henderson.

The new company will be called NGMCO, Inc., and an IPO is expected in 2010 along with the Volt.

The electric car marketplace is very young and yet to truly emerge.  I would liken it to the Internet in 1992.

At this point there are a few players that are trying to distinguish themselves and aim to claim certain market segments.

One such player is Henrik Fisker, the founder of California-based Fisker Automotive. His company has designed and built the rather stylish Fisker Karma which is set to debut in Spring 2010.  The car, like the Volt, is also an extended range electric vehicle (EREV), with 50 miles electric driving range and a gasoline range extender for longer distances.  It is a 4-door sports car that will retail at $87,500.  It is also powerful, using two 201 hp electric motors and going from 0 to 60 in 5.8 seconds.

Though Tesla is also based in California and sells a stylish electric sportscars, Fisker doesn’t want people to confuse the two companies.  “The full-electric car [like the Tesla Roadster] is a niche market. Plug-in hybrids have a much bigger market,” he says.

Fisker expects to be able to sell 15,000 Karmas annually and has contracted a plant in Finland capable of producing 20,000 per year. But even at low volumes Fisker thinks he will be successful. “We have a new business model,” he says. “At 5,000 sales, we can make money.”

Obviously the market for $87,000 cars isn’t limitless.  Fisker says he also has a plan to build a “lower in price, a mass market vehicle with high volume using common components with the Karma.” And with such a car in production, “there’s no reason we can’t eventually produce hundreds of thousands of cars a year,” he says.

Since the Fisker is using the same EREV design strategy as the Volt, and will offer a low priced variant in the future, you would think Fisker sees the Volt as competition.  Not so he says, why? “Its a Chevy” says Fisker.

Somewhat ironic in his put-down of the American iconic brand is the fact that the Karma’s gas engine will be sourced from, that’s right, General Motors. For range extension, the car uses a turbocharged 2.0-liter Ecotec® direct injection (D1) gasoline engine. So the Karma may actually be partly a Chevy on the inside after all.

Source (HybridCars)

The Volt is GM’s effort to leapfrog the Prius, and ever since this site began, Toyota has publicly remained very conservative about plans to produce plug-in cars.

Previously they have only openly committed to produce about 500 plug-in Priuses for global fleet testing by the end of this year.

According to the Japanese newspaper Nikkei, that’s all about to change.

Toyota has now committed to mass producing plug-in hybrid cars in 2012. These cars will apparently be plug-in hybrids, not pure electrics or EREVs. The company intends to produce from 20,000 to 30,000 in the first year. They are expected to be able to drive from 12.4 to 18.6 miles on battery power alone. Of course like most plug-in hybrid designs, the gas engine could operate even within that range when needed for power.

Toyota has already well-established a joint venture with Panasonic for the production of lithium-ion batteries to power these cars.

Toyota is also said to want to price the car similarly to the Mitubishi i MiEV 100 mile range pure electric car which has already gone on sale in Japan. That vehicle costs $47,800 before subsidies.

Thus Toyota has now joined the growing list of automakers hoping to mass produce electric cars. Though the EREV design of the Chevy Volt may be the most logical, there will clearly be some very significant competition of all types in a few short years.

And so it is clear on this Independence Day that this country’s freedom from oil may fast become a reality.  Happy 4th of July to all.

Source (Reuters)