GM-VOLT : Chevy Volt Electric Car Site

When I entered my garage for my third day of driving my Chevy Volt, all seemed well. I had plugged the car in the night before after making a quick run about 9PM.

However, when I got in and booted up the car (I still prefer saying that to starting) I was met by a surprise. It still showed only 9 miles of EV range were available. Apparently, I hadn’t pushed the charging coupler in hard enough. Even though there is a green light and horn chirp confirmation when charging commences, I probably ran into the house without waiting for it.

This had happened to me several times during the year I drove the MINI E, and when it did my heart sank each time as I had to take my backup car for the day. But with the Volt, all was well. Though I had to burn gas, going about my day’s driving was not going to be any kind of problem at all.

In fact, I figured I’d use the opportunity to see what kind of gas mileage I could get on my significant highway-mostly drive to work.

After leaving home, the car switched to engine mode after 7 miles, and then I reset the MPG meter. As usual the switchover was silently feathered in.

I arrived at my first destination, 15.7 miles from there with a very respectable 45.5 MPG. This was at 49 degrees using 72 degree cabin ECO conditioning and at mostly highway speeds of around 65 MPH. I drove somewhat conservatively but not extremely so at all.

The next leg back to my office was another 7.4 miles at mixed city and highway conditions. I arrived there having completed a total of 23.1 miles in charge-sustaining mode for a final fuel efficiency of 42.8 MPG (not including the EV miles).

Though I had installed and configured the iPhone app, I hadn’t yet configured the plug-in reminder text alert. Needless to say, after this experience I set that up.

Another first happened. On this particular morning journey a fellow driver on the road finally noticed and acknowledged the car and gave a friendly tap of the horn and wave. I felt a bit of pride. People were recognizing this American car, that I played a role in birthing, as a hero of sorts.

In my office I showed the car to two women who work there, one of our nurses and a billing person. They were completely blown away by the design and the interior, and even more amazed by the iPhone app. One reflected how this was a car like no other, and they didn’t even get a chance to drive it.

Another person in my office parking garage came over while I was taking out the charger to see the car. He knew about it and recognized it, and was very interested and asked a lot of questions. I gave him the little flyer that GM provided a stack of, making us CAB members a sort of a group of traveling salespersons. Not that I mind.

I charged the car at my workplace at 120-v from 9:30AM to 4:30 PM during which time it accrued 25 miles of EV range. My return trip home included a stop to see my daughter in her gymnastics class and a stop at a restaurant for dinner with my family. After 23.6 miles the engine came on and I returned home for a total of 30.3 miles and 168.1 MPG.

For the entirety of this day that I had not gotten an overnight charge, I drove a total of 60.4 miles, 30.6 of which was electric, using 0.72 gallons of gas. Total fuel economy for the day was thus 83.9 MPG.

For the three days I have driven the car 183.2 miles and acheved overall 176 MPG.

Today I will be traveling down to Montclair New Jersey, about 30 miles, to meet up with the other three New York Volt CAB members and any GM-Volt readers who happen to make it to Tom M’s restaurant. Our own Dave G will be coming and will take some good video for us. It should be a lot of fun, I hope you can make it.

Here’s the address:
Naunas’s 148 Valley Road, Montclair, NJ

A number of important GM related news items recently broke that are worth recognizing.

General Electric Commits to Deploying 25,000 Electric Cars
The first was an announcement from General Electric that the company plans to deploy 25,000 electric cars into its global fleet by 2015.

It will acheive this goal both by converting half of its global fleet of 30,000 cars to electric and by purchasing electric cars from autmotkers.

Its initial purchase will be 12,000 Chevrolet Volts from GM. Cars from other automakers will be added as they become available.

“Electric vehicle technology is real and ready for deployment and we are embracing the transformation with partners like GM and our fleet customers,” said GE Chairman and CEO Jeff Immelt. “By electrifying our own fleet, we will accelerate the adoption curve, drive scale, and move electric vehicles from anticipation to action.

GM CEO Dan Akerson said, “GE’s commitment reflects confidence that electric vehicles are a real-world technology that can reduce both emissions and our dependence on oil. It is also a vote of confidence in the Chevrolet Volt, which we will begin delivering to retail customers by the end of this year. We are pleased that the Volt will play a major role in this program, which will spur innovation and benefit our companies, our customers, and society as a whole.”

Dont worry about GE taking all the Volts away from consumers. “It’s between now and 2015,” says GM spokesperson Rob Peterson. “So the volumes are manageable.”

Cruze Eco Officially Gets 42 MPG Highway

GM also announced that its Chevrolet Cruze Eco model had been given an official fuel economy designation by the EPA. The $18,995 sedan received an impressive 42 MPG on the highway, and 28 MPG city, the highest of any non-hybrid vehilce on the roads.  These impressive numbers are only for the manual transmission.

GM points out this compact car’s fuel economy is better than the Ford Fiesta sub-compact, the Honda Civic, and hybrids including the Ford Fusion, Toyota Camry, and Nissan Altima hybrids.

The Cruze Eco achieves its success though a combination of aerodynamics tweaks similar to the Volt that give it a CD of .298.  It is also mass optimized and uses the efficient 1.4 L turbo Ecotec 4-cylinder engine which can produce up to 138 horsepower.

“Chevrolet Cruze continues to redefine the compact segment, offering class-leading standard safety features, upscale amenities – as well as hybrid-like fuel economy without the price,” said Chuck Russell, vehicle line director. “The Cruze Eco is in a league of its own and will challenge perceptions of the efficiency available in a more affordable non-hybrid.”

Opel Ampera Pricing Released

Finally GM announced pricing on the European version of the Chevrolet Volt known as the Opel Ampera.  The car is identical from an engineering perspective though exterior design as mildly different, and tailored to the Opel brand and the European market.

Unfortunately for them, our European brethren will have to fork up quite a few Euros for the pleasure of Voltec-based driving.  The car will start at 45,900 Euros which translates to almost $59,000 dollars.  There is a 19% value added tax (VAT) in Germany which brings the cost to 36,050 Euros or about $49,000.

Online reservations started on Thursday on opel-ampera.com.

Living with the Volt Update

In my second day of driving the Volt, my love for the car grew stronger.  It’s really an amazing car.   Solid, sleek, satisfying and brimming with technology and real-time connectedness.

I began the day with a charged battery reading 36 miles of EV range.  I reached my first destination 22.7 miles away with 15 miles shown remaining.  My office was another 7.5 miles and I got there with 7 miles EV range remaining.  I was able to charge at 120-v at my office from 9:30AM to 5:00 PM and when I left for home, 33 miles of EV range remained.  I made it home for a total daily drive of 59.3 miles with 4 miles of range left, and never burned any gas.

Thus for my first two days in total I drove 122.8 miles using .32 gallons of gas, or 384 MPG.

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DON’T MISS the NJ Volt Meetup with myself and three other CAB members and our Volts. It will be on Sat 11-13 at 11AM here: Nauna’s Bella Casa 148 Valley Road Montclair, NJ 07042 www.naunas.com

On Wednesday November 10th, I had my first full day of living with the Chevrolet Volt. I would like to take you through it as if you were there.

First for those who asked, no I didn’t sleep in my Volt the night before, but when I awoke in the AM I was sure very excited and looking forward to going out to my garage and getting in it.

On my arrival there, I found the car had successfully fully charged while it was plugged in overnight. The display showed charging time was complete at 11:15 PM; I had plugged it in to the 240-v charger in the fully depleted state at 5:15PM.

The night before I was unsuccessful at activating my OnStar/MyVolt.com/iPhone app system. I spent some time talking to an OnStar operator, and we were able to determine the car’s OnStar ID number, and the VIN number was on the car, but there were apparently several captured test fleet Volts attached to that ID, and the operator wasn’t sure how to connect to mine. As of this writing my GM liaison is still “working on it.”

When I booted up the car, that’s really what it is like turning it on though quicker, the battery showed I had 36 miles of EV range. That was determined based on previous driving behavior in a miles per kwh estimation. The car at that point had 133 mpg lifetime efficiency which was based on the more than 1200 engineering validation miles GM had put on it prior to my delivery.

The first leg of my journey was from my home to the first hospital I work at. The actual distance was 22.8 miles, and when I arrived, the car showed 15 miles of EV range were left. That drive took place mostly on the highway at 70 + MPH. Outside temperature was 49 degrees, and I kept the cabin at 72 degrees using ECO mode. Comfort mode setting indicated it would drain twice as much power if I had chosen it.

The car was a charm on the highway. It was more than fast enough to deal with all types of merges, entrances, and passes, and handled very sprightly. I looked to see if anyone stared or noticed the car, and interestingly I didn’t see one person do so.

The second leg of my journey was from my first hospital to my second hospital. Upon arriving there I had traveled a total of 32 miles, and the display showed 6 EV miles remained. I spent most of the morning rounding at that hospital, and had no place to charge the car. After that I drove to my office and plugged in at 120-v via the portable charger at 12:15 PM. At that point I had travelled 34.4 miles and the display showed there were 3 EV miles left.

I left the office at 5:15 PM, and over the five hours of 120-v charging the car had accumulated 21 miles of EV range.

The ride back home was pure highway and in the high 60 MPH range. The engine turned on 18.4 miles later.

At that point, I spent some time analyzing the sound of the engine on the highway and the roads. It could be heard and felt but wasn’t at all unpleasant, it was muted and subtle. In fact I really had to strain and focus to analyze it.

One could feel the RPMs matching the accelerator for the most part although with a slight delay. The engine became most noticeable (highest revving) above around 67-70 MPH. I didn’t push it beyond that level on this drive. The engine turned off gently, and without a shudder whenever coming to a stop, and stayed off below 30 MPH. It could be heard revving back on at 30 MPH.

Thus mostly its behaviour was predictable which is what once would expect, and felt cognitively comfortable.

I arrived back home having traversed a total of 63.5 miles and having achieved an effective 200.7 MPG for the day.  Back calculating revealed that I had achieved 33.8 mpg in the 10.7 miles spent in charge sustaining mode.

If I had spent the whole day at the office which I often do, I would have had enough time to charge such that I wouldn’t have used any gas. If I had a 240-v charger at work, the same would have also been true.

I found only minor issues. The front end ground clearance is very low.  This is needed for aerodynamic efficiency.  Going down a steep decline, such as my driveway, however, even at a crawl still led to scraping on the road.

Also when pulling into a parking spot up to a wall, when letting off the brakes and gently re-applying them to creep to the wall, I found they had to be hit harder than I anticipated, making me slam them a bit for fear of hitting the wall.

I think these two idiosyncrasies are just minor variants I will just need to get used to in that they are different than the last car I was driving.

Overall, as you might imagine it was a spectacular  experience. I very easily connected my cell phone to the in-car bluetooth system which worked flawlessly. It also automatically pulled my contact list off my iPhone and into the dash which was a terrific surprise.

The car apparently has a significant vocabulary of voice commands I haven tapped into yet. I also haven’t programmed the garage door opener, the radio, or interacted with the on on-board hard drive.

Much more to do and see…

Also my fellow Volt CAB member Eric Rotbard who is also in New York has published his first 24 hour impression with the car in the GM-Volt CAB Forum.  Check it out!

And a reminder to anyone who is interested, we are having a Volt meetup with myself and the other three NY CAB members, and our Volts, at Tom M’s restaurant in northern NJ (Nauna’s Bella Casa at 148 Valley Road Montclair, NJ 07042) on 11/13 a from 11am to 2 pm.  Register below.

Enter your information below to register for the Volt Meetup.

We are finally in that long awaited month of November 2010, the month the Chevy Volt will enter retail production. Yet despite all these months and years of discussion and the full engineering of the car and its performance being recently laid bare, there is still no official EPA label for the car.

We believe the EPA may still issue an 11th hour label, though in the past GM has said it will launch with a temporary label if necessary.

I had the chance to recently discuss the Volt’s fuel efficiency with Doug Parks who is the Volt vehicle line executive.

Parks says for EV range, “we are saying 25 to 50 miles.” He notes that the EPA will test the car and then reduce the efficiency by essentially a fudge factor. “When the EPA runs their test, they get a number and they will cut it by 30 percent, and that will be our label number for EV range,” he said.

Park explains this 30% rule has been developed over time and is applied to every car. “There is an unadjusted number and then they cut it by 30 percent,” he said. “They’ve run tests overtime and they’ve gotten down to this 30 percent.”

To this date the EPA “is still in testing with this car,” he said.

Parks also explained why GM moved from the previous single value of 40 to a range. “There’s one thing about this car that we’re certain, if you tell everybody a number, no one will get it,” he said. “It depends on the driving, the climate and the terrain. We can say around a number but not an exact number, it’s going to move.”

Parks also believes people will regularly get more than 50 miles of EV range, but not less than 25. “We’re saying 25 to 50, but I guarantee some people will get more than 50, some will even get sixty,” he said. “If you go out there and drive 85 miles per hour and hammer it and pay no attention, you might get 25, but hopefully no one gets 25.”

Parks admits despite GM’s insistence on a range, the EPA will still only release a single number. “Let’s say we get an official EV range of 37 miles,” he said. “If they test it at 52 then they cut it by 30 percent it will be 37.”

He believes people may just complain the resulting EPA figure is too low. “We’d love to have people complain to the government ‘hey my car gets way more than that’,” he said. “Usually for the EPA, it’s the other way around.”

Charge sustaining fuel efficiency will be treated similarly.

“When you get to fuel economy, we say mid to high 30s,” said Parks. “We’re trying to under promise and over deliver.”

Parks thinks this will be the official EPA result, though perhaps higher. “We’ll get our label for the car, there will be the city and the highway and the combined, and they’re going to be in the mid to high 30s.”

“Maybe we’ll get a 40,” he added hopefully. Asked what types of values he has been seeing in testing he said ,”we see some people getting 45, 48 miles per gallon.”

Parks believes the official label will wind up having a lot of information. “We think the’yre going to give an EV range, a total range of EV plus charge sustaining, and then they’ll do a traditional city, highway, and combined fuel economy when you’re in charge sustaining mode,” he said. “In addition we do think they’re going to work in an MPGe, and probably have one of those numbers in EV mode and a different number in charge sustaining mode.”

He admits the labeling process has been very challenging.“We spent so much time with these guys trying to adhere to what they want to do and also help try to tell our story, ” said Parks. “One of the difficult things about this car is its so hard to put a single number on it.”

For those who don’t know, hypermiling is the process of using extremely efficient driving techniques to maximize fuel economy in a vehicle.  This procedure works best of course in hybrids and EVs when with such cars much kinetic energy can be recaptured in the battery and re-used to motivate the car forward.

Key strategies include pulse an glide wherein a brief acceleration done in a very gradual fashion is followed by the longest period the terrain can accommodate of coasting.  One makes great effort to never apply the friction brakes if possible, to adapt to the terrain and to avoid any stops.

I had the chance in the last 10 miles of my 200 mile Chevrolet Volt test drive to trial some mild hypermiling techniques and see how much fuel economy I could get in the car in charge-sustaining mode.

I didst know ahead of time the area I was driving, but it turned out my 10 mile course was relatively flat with a  few mild inclines and declines.  There were several stopping points and mostly the stated speed limit was 45 MPH.

The Volt was already running in range-extended mode when I started the effort.  I had to use the air-conditioning because it was so warm outside, but set the interior temperature to 76 F using the auto ECO mode, and kept the windows closed to maximize aerodynamics.  I also had two passengers in the car, each well below 200 pounds.  I weigh 145 pounds.  There was a few pounds of luggage.

The Volt is well suited to hypermiling due to its extreme aerodynamics.  Downhill grades were great as you could feel the heavy car slice through the air picking up speed, and mpg, rapidly.  The brakes are very easy to feather and the accelerator is super-responsive allowing for tiny pulses of acceleration.  It turns out sport and normal mode use doesn’t not alter efficiency, it’s just that the pedal map has a sharper ascent in sports mode.  Maximum power is equal.  I did the drive in normal mode, and used the low speed for motor braking and shifted back into drive for coasting. The low speed just sets the regenerative braking drag to a higher force.

There were only two problems I encountered during my hypermiling effort.

First, the generator would occasionally go on seemingly at random.  Whenever the battery state of charge dipped below its threshold (20 to 25% SOC) the generator would  kick on.  As soon as it did, of course the mpg woudl rapidly decline. Fortunately this did not happen often but undoubtedly the fact that the air-conditioner was on contributed to it.

Also the efficiency ball  dash gauge did not give a very fine resolution to see if minor pedal movements affected instantaneous mpg. Also, instantaneous mpg is provided at all.  These are two feedback items I would like to have.

Overall I was able to arrive at my destination 10.1 miles later with a fuel efficiency of 51.9,as the photo above proves.  I did not recklessly or annoyingly and kept right at the speed limit most of the way, though my accelerations were slow.

My passenger observed my effort as follows:  My co-driver did a 10-mile stretch of aggressive hypermiling—windows up, no AC, slooooow acceleration, coasting whenever possible—and got above 51 mpg. Driving normally, I got 37.1 mpg over a 38-mile stretch that included some two-lane highway.

GM is officially stating the Volt gets fuel economy in the “mid to high 30s” and I think that will be true for most average drivers.  The actual number is still under determination by the EPA, who will hopefully issue it prior to launch.

The Chevrolet Volt is amenable to hypermiling techniques and I believe the average person should easily be able to achieve mid-50 mpg economy with effort and mild temperatures.  Expert hyperrmilers should be able to achieve numbers considerably higher than that.

The Chevrolet Volt is a groundbreaking, technologically disruptive vehicle that defies old standard EPA labeling rules.  Despite the fact that Volt prototypes have been running for well over a year, the EPA remains uncertain on how to label the car.  Though we may all have our own ideas, the way the EPA chooses to construct the label, and what values it includes, may have a significant effect on consumer opinions and eventual purchase decisions.

The same holds true for Nissan’s plain battery electric car.  Obviously in both cases the traditional highway/city mpg won’t do.

GM hopes the EPA can produce a label prior to launch, and EPA spokesperson Cathy Milbourne told the New York Times the label will appear “shortly.”

“Right now it looks like there’s going to be a lot on the label,” said GM vice president Tom Stephens. “They’re trying to figure out what are all the variables that customers are going to see out there.”

Recently the EPA announced it was considering changing the labels on all cars, but those won’t come into use until 2012 model year cars are available.  The 2011 Volt needs a label now.  The EPA’s Milbourne did confirm the EPA would still be using standard highway and city cycles to measure the Volt’s performance. This includes a battery of five tests that sum to 43.9 miles.

To be accurate the EPA must include battery efficiency, charge-sustaining fuel efficiency, and expected gas and electric use over time. Other considerations are expected fuel cost and even miles per gallon equivalents of fuel plus electricity.

“There are going to be new and unique numbers to classify the new and unique behavior of this car,” said Volt powertrain chief engineer Pam Fletcher. “We need to talk about electricity usage and we need to talk about gasoline usage and we need to figure out the best way to do that.”

Fletcher conceded, as most media test drives have confirmed, the Volt will get “some kind of combined fuel economy that’s in the mid- to upper 30s,” in charge-sustaining mode.

Though the label is still forthcoming, the EPA has apparently already decided on some level how they will classify the car.  Their website lists the Volt as a “plug-in hybrid” and the LEAF as an “electric car.”

Source (New York Times)