What is your role in the Volt program?
I head up the team that does all of the propulsion systems for the Volt. That includes motors, power electronics, we don’t do the battery but we work extensively with the battery team to do the integration of the battery, and the EV propulsion system

Are you only working on the Volt?
I am dedicated to the Volt and I heave a team of people that are dedicated to the Volt and I’m extremely enthusiastic about the Volt. We have segregated a team of people that are working on the Volt and the Volt only.

What are you doing now?
The specific stage of the program that we are in, for powertrain, is building on our third level of hardware which is integrated in the the vehicles. We’re doing all of our validation testing on that level of hardware; we’ve got past development where the architecture needs to be, through two generations of hardware we’ve confirmed all of our performance requirements with that architecture.

There are three major areas I’m focused on right now. Making sure that all of our hardware that has been built to date, that third level of hardware is in testing. We are validating all of our parameters for it; durability, that’s the hugest piece, the reliability, making minor fixed to areas that we’d like to improve.

The other major area that we’re focused on is the calibration of the system which is huge, because it’s a very complex system from the perspective of the torque generators we have, the engine, the motors, the power electronics. So we’re tuning all of those systems to make the vehicle fun to drive, to meet all of our efficiency requirements, our drivability requirements, noise vibration and harshness requirements, and we are now entering the phase of program where we will do all of the development for certification. So that’s fuel economy label certification, and that will continue for some months now. We’re going to test per the procedures that are being developed for this program and verify that all of our calibration is tuned in for optimization of the driving experience along with the efficiency of the vehicles. And that’s really the stage that were tuning into now.

In addition the third element that we’re working on is tuning in the manufacturing systems. So we’ve been building our production in our manufacturing plant and we’re right now preparing for what we call pre-production level hardware. That before we build saleable parts we’re going to build pre-production parts in the assembly plant so that its ready for volume. Make sure that our suppliers are prepared for that, make sure that our supplier’s tools are prepared for that and tweaked for quality, our manufacturing plant is tweaked for quality. I was just there last week and walked through all of their systems and systems development to make sure there ready for the production phase.

So those are kind of my three major areas of focus right now.

When you mention the production plant are you talking about Detroit-Hamtramck (DHAM)?
No that’s vehicle assembly plant but ahead of that we’re going to our suppliers and their manufacturing plants for individual parts and systems. And in addition, our drive unit and engine have their own manufacturing facilities that we are walking through and making sure they are ready.

Is GM building its own electric motor for the Volt?
The motor is actually supplied to us but we will be integrating that motor in our drive unit so its encased in our drive unit, we provide tooling, rotating components and all of that which is built in a manufacturing plant owned by GM. We are getting ready to do all of that manufacturing , so the housings, for example we take the castings from a supplier we do all the machining of the housings, the bearing the gearing, all of that kind of stuff.

So you get some of the parts from outside but you put them all together?
Exactly, so it’s a manufacturing step that happens and we send that drive unit and that engine to the assembly plant in DHAM for installation into the vehicle.

Have they done anything at DHAM yet to get ready?
There’s a ton of work going on at DHAM to get ready, and we’ve built our what we call our integration vehicle, and we’re towards the end of that phase. That is being built in pre production operations, however the DHAM team has been very integral in those builds. They have been overseeing the builds they’ve been doing slow builds, they’ve been identifying all issues for their production processes. They’re currently working on tooling for the body. There’s a number of things that DHAM’s doing to get engaged and ready. Because the next phase of vehicle, which is not a saleable vehicle yet, but its our next phase of product, will be built in DHAM so they are getting all of their systems tuned, the personnel trained and ready to go.

When will the first vehicle be built at DHAM?
We’re tuned towards first quarter of next year for that date.

Interest appears to be waning.

Tom Stephens is vice-chairman of GM and is responsible for product development. I had the chance to ask him his thoughts on hydrogen and what GM is doing with respect to development and production of hydrogen fuel cell vehicles

Is the Volt the endgame or is it the fuel cell vehicle?
No. Each of them will continue going forward. My thesis is if you look at what’s going on for energy demand especially in the developing countries, the energy demand is going to continue to grow exponentially and we’re going to have to learn how to utilize energy from all sources if we’re going to have sustainable mobility. We haven’t done that in the last one hundred years. We’ve stayed on petroleum and that’s not a smart thing. It just doesn’t make any sense.

So going forward we are going to break it up

So are you still planning to produce fuel cell vehicles?
Right now what we have is a fuel cell demonstration fleet, Project Driveway, and we’re in one county and we’re going to four more countries and we’re trying to get a lot of customer feedback. We’re doing a lot of work on fuel cells right now to try and continue to move those forward.
At some point in the future we’ll have to decide whether we want to actually go into a production program.

So you haven’t made that decision yet?
No, not at this point. We could do it, but there are a lot of factors. One is our part which is the fuel cell stack and the fuel cell vehicle and how much it will cost. The other part happens to be the infrastructure in order to support the fuel cell and we’ll have to develop both of those.

Right now Germany and Japan are putting in an infrastructure for fuel cells and what we really need is for big US metropolitan cities to decide they want to put in the infrastructure and then it would make sense to go forward.

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Mr Stephens appeared on Autoline Detroit TV today and took some of our questions. You can see the show below:

Dave G’s Comment:

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OK, lets look at how a 70kWh BEV would compare against a 16kWh EREV if batteries were 1/4 of the price they are today.

The CEO from CPI (the company that builds the Volt packs today) puts the Volt’s battery pack cost at $8K. He is also the one that predicts the cost going to 1/4 of what they are today in the next 5-10 years.
http://www.greencarcongress.com/2009/02/profile-li-ion.html

Specifically, he says:
• The ratio of end-of-life to beginning-of-life is 75%.
• The AT application is sized for a 70% depth of discharge…
• A vehicle pack battery pack has non-cell costs such as a monitoring system.

These items together justify a 2.5x premium for the AT application (or approximately $ 1,000/available kWh) …

From a historical perspective over the past 17-18 years the cost has come down by a factor of 15x. In the next 5-10 years we should be able to come down by an incremental 2-4x and we will have to do that to accelerate the penetration of the technology.

So this says that the Volt’s battery costs $8K ($1000/ available kWh x 8 available kWh). We can also use the figure of $500/total kWh, since he says the total to available ratio is around 50% (i.e. 75% of 70% from first 2 points above). That means a 70 kWh battery pack would cost around $35K today. This sounds about right, since we know the 53kWh Roadster battery pack costs Tesla around $23K, and that uses high volume consumer electronic chemistry.

Now if batteries were 1/4 of today’s prices in 6-8 years, then the Volt’s battery would cost around $2K and a 70kWh battery would cost around $9K.

We also know that the ICE range extender (ICE, radiator, exhaust, etc.), costs around $2K. Keep in mind that we are talking about the wholesale cost for GM, not the retail price you or I would pay.

So the Volt’s range extender and battery pack would cost a total of $4K, while the 70kWh battery pack would cost around $9K.

Bottom Line: If battery packs cost 1/4 of what they do now, the 70kWh BEV would still cost $5K more than an EREV-40.. Since BEVs have serious issues refueling for long trips, the EREV is the clear winner for me. I don’t think I’m alone here.

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Below are two hypothetical examples of the cost advantage of the EREV approach.

The first chart compares the EREVs and BEVs based on today’s costs. This takes the very conservative approach of assuming manufacturers of BEVs have managed to drive battery technology costs to comparative levels (red line). The cost of GM’s battery technology is represented on this line. The cost of the range-extender moves the EREV technology slightly off the cost curve. However, even with the added cost of the range extending engine generator, the total cost of the system is still significantly below that of a limited range BEV, and the benefit – in terms of range – exceeds that of adding additional battery costs (pink area).

The second chart, applies the same logic, only this time under the assumption that battery costs will decrease by 50 percent. Again, the EREV approach has a significant cost advantage. However, it’s important to note that cost is just one of the reasons we believe the EREV approach is technically better. There are no compromises associated with an EREV. It offers the benefits of petroleum-free driving while overcoming range-anxiety. When the battery’s energy is depleted from driving in pure electric mode, the engine generator produces electricity to extend the Volt’s driving range to more than 300 total miles. And it can be the primary car for customers from places as cold as Kapuskasing, Ontario to as hot as Yuma, Arizona.

My compliments to Dave for his insightful post.

Boniface explains at this point his team is now looking for fit and finish, gaps and flushness.

He says cars are meant to be seen in motion and this is the first time he can do so with the Volt and thus “its like Christmas morning for me,” he says.

“It looks like a different car to me,” he adds.

He says buying cars is an emotional purchase and that cars are very much a fashion statement.

“We were able to strike a good balance between aerodynamic performance, and those visual cues that excite a buyer,” he says.

He closes by stating the car is “meeting the aerodynamic performance,” that GM had set out for it.

Below the video you can also join in a real time webchat with Bob today at 2PM EDT.

He took some significant questions from readers here and some other sites. Key information is as follows:

Price
GM has never officially told us what the Volt will cost, although about $40,000 is most frequently cited in the press. Lauckner once before indicated we would get an official price about 6 months prior to launch, or May 2010. In this most recent discussion he now refined that to “3 to 6 months prior to start of production.”

Battery Thermal Management
Lauckner confirms the lithium-ion battery will be kept at “20 to 25 degrees C.” In the cold, grid power will be used to warm the battery when the car is plugged in. If that’s not the case the ICE would go on at start to generate heat.

Future Generators
For now the Volt will use a gasoline/E85 engine as a generator, though Lauckner confirmed for the future GM is considering HCCI engines which they have been developing. These are ultra-efficient combustion engines that use extreme pressure rather than spark to completely combust gasoline within the chamber. Other types of generators are not being pursued currently, and he says he “doesn’t see” using a compressed natural gas generator at least in the US.

Acceleration
He confirmed the Volt will do 0 to 60 in 8.5 to 9 seconds depending in the weight of the payload, and that it is even “capable of squawking the tires.” He reiterates is will feel like a 250 HP V6. This exceeds the 0 to 60 time of the Prius (10.5 seconds) or Insight (11.5 seconds), and the 0 to 30 time difference will be far more dramatic.

All Wheel Drive Volt
Lauckner says while developing this variant would be possible, it is “no planned at this time”

Pure EV
Lauckner denies GM has a plan for a pure electric city car.

Charging
He says in order to utilize 220V charging, user will have to have “hard wired 220 connection from a works box to the wall unit,” that will be avaiable at launch.

Battery Warranty
Lauckner confirmed it is GM’s intention to fully warranty the battery pack for 10 years/150,000 miles.

Launch
Lauckner says Volts will not be sold prior to November 2010, though GM employees and “maybe a few others” will be driving pre-production Volts by next summer. Wonder who those few others might be?

ICE Behavior
Several negative speculations were refuted. He says GM plans to make the car seem as familiar and as much like a normal car as possible. He notes when in generator mode, “most customers will be surprised at the refinement of the ICE.” He notes the car will operate at one of several RPM points, and that none of them are “roaring”. He confirmed Volt will get “much more than 30 MPG” in generator mode.

Electrification of the Automobile
“Electrification of the automobile is here and the trend grows stronger every day,” he said. “We remain extremely committed to the Volt and vehicle electrification.”

“We’re the leaders in it today and we expect to be the leaders in the future,” he added.

Other automakers are making cars like the Honda Insight and Toyota Prius, why hasn’t GM placed a strong hybrid architecture into a small sedan and targeted a lower price point, and rather put those systems into big trucks first?

Its not that we have a bias against small sedans. Consideration of those are in our product plans. I don’t have anything specific I can announce at this time.

Its a matter of you choose to do one thing first and the next thing next. The Volt is important to us, because so many components in it we are developing can be used not just in the Volt but to other electric vehicles as well. I think that if the world goes the way of Insights and Priuses, we certainly have the ability to react very rapidly and compete in that segment.

But you know we’re kind of excited about the prospect of electric vehicles as well and at some point we have to decide how to apply each incremental dollar of investment that we make. At least for the past year, year and a half or so, we really wanted to double down on that Volt and get that out in the market and really get down on the path of the electrification of the automobile.

And we’ve done some other things as well. You know about the fleet of Equninox fuel cells we have out, they’re fabulous products as well.

Yes the Prius is a successful product, Honda’s back in the market with an Insight, that product I’m sure will do well also. Its been interesting to me though that hybrids sell directly proportional to fuel prices. Fuel prices are down and Prius sales are down 45%.

Again we don’t have a bias against it, its the kind of business we can get into.

Are you working on any high performance vehicles, like an electric Corvette?
We’re working on a lot of exciting stuff but I can’t go into the details. We’re working on a lot of neat things, a lot of it focused more on efficiency and improved fuel economy as opposed to balls out high performance.

I think people want better prices, so why not make a car with a smaller battery to reach lets say 20 grand?
You’re pretty much describing our plans for Gen 2. Looking to improve efficiency, maintain performance, take cost out of the car and how can we broaden Voltec technology to other vehicles.

Who decides what the future goals are?
The way we did it for Gen 2 is we pulled together the Volt executive leadership like Jon Lauckner (VP of global program development) and Frank Weber (Volt vehilce line executive) and sat down with them to get a vision of where we want to take this car.

What about other models?
We have a future car portfolio planning committee and we’re trying to identify market trends where there may be holes in the market or new markets we can exploit and its their responsibility to come up with cars for those purposes.

And then they’ll ask you if you can do it?
Exactly.

People want a more economical car, and that seems like they way to go.
You’re right on target. We think there’s so much promise in the technology but we’ve got to get the cost down and the volume up and its going to go together.

While in Detroit, I had a chance to ask one question to Ray Young who is GM’s CFO. Ray noted that GM has to submit a plan to the government on February 17th showing its progress on how it will be achieving viability in exchange for the loans that have been received.

A major factor in GM being able to be viable in the future is for them to shed the massive debt they owe bondholders and the retiree healthcare pension or VEBA fund. They are trying to reduce unsecured bondholder debt from $28 billion to $9 billion, and a halve the $20 billion VEBA debt by turning it into equity.

My question to Mr. Young was as follows:

How confident are you that debtholders will accept their haircuts for reduced payments on the dollar, and that the UAW will agree to swap VEBA debt for equity?

On the UAW issue Ron Gettelfinger has indicated that they (the union) will come to the party and support the restructuring of our industry. They also indicated they wont be the only ones coming to the party and we need to make sure other people including the bondholders will too. So therefore we’re working on the different structures as to how to effect a debt to equity conversion or a debt to debt conversion or a capital restructuring of the company. And while its going to be challenging, its not going to be impossible.

We’ve actually got the smartest brains on Wall Street working with us on that. I spent 3 days in NY last week working with these folks and I’m confident we’re going to get something done here. The debtholders understand that this needs to be done and that the government wants this to be done too.

We each had the chance to ask one question. Here’s how mine went:

First I wanted to express to you some of my reader’s and my best wishes to you in these trying times.

Thank you.

It seems the Volt is a very important part of GM’s viability plan and yet cost is high, volumes are low, and profit margins are thin or nonexistent. So I’m wondering how you reconcile the Volt and GMs viability at the same time in GMs immediate future?

Lets face it for a while you have to look at it as investment in the future and we spend R&D money every year and we spend on advanced engineering and advanced design. I think in the very early stages you have to recognize that you have to invest and sometimes the investment cost is higher than the market will bear.

Obviously were hoping for and we will get some good government incentives to consumers for products like the Volt which will help to cover some of that cost shortfall. The other thing is we have to work like crazy to get the cost down. This is where if the EV market in the US grows very gradually it makes the risk of it being unsuccessful much greater than if it can grow rapidly. If it grows rapidly you will see the suppliers investing and people putting R&D into the next generation technology, improving the manufacturing processes and being able to get the costs of the battery down much faster. This is where proactive government policy in this area will make all the difference.

There’s a reason today why most of all of those lithium batteries that we use in our cellphones and computers come from Japan. Its that when it wasn’t financially viable for private enterprise (to manufacture them), their governments were supporting it 15 or 20 years ago. We need to recognize in certain areas that proactive government engagement, clear directional policy, and in some cases support for R&D is going to be critical to move towards energy independence and leadership in battery technology.

Wouldn’t it be a shame to go to this massive effort to shift reliance from oil to diversifying the use of batteries, and we wind up having to buy our batteries from somewhere else.

How is the mule development going?
The big step was when we finalized the mules vehicles at the end of August and delivered those on time at the end of August. These are the Cruze-mules using production-intent components. We wondered how they will behave, is there anything that we have not predicted? But so far as surprising as it is for us internally, we have not found anything that is fundamentally flawed.

You stumble over a hundred small development items, software talking to each other, and functions having to be clearly defined, and triggering points, etc, but there is no fundamental flaw that cannot be developed out of the system in the next two years.

So I say there is a lot of work still, but nothing that will prevent the promise of 2010. We still have development to do, and I don’t know what I don’t know, but at this point, I am confident.

So those production intent parts hadn’t existed before in a vehicle?
We had component tests, individually 6 months before those components went into vehicles. But there is always a difference from when you have a component in isolation to when you put them all together in a vehicle.

So is every component that will go into the final Volt, known, understood and finally engineered?
Finely engineered has different meanings for different people. The design since we are going into the development and validation phase it means that we’ll do adjustments, but we have currently for 80-90% of the vehicle, the component designs are available. These are then the in going components into our mule vehicles.

The next stage of our prototypes called integration vehicles, they are real prototypes, exterior, interior, everything. This is coming next summer. So we are currently working on the designs for those integration vehicle next summer, and when you look at that and you count backwards it means you have to have components in May, and to tool them a couple of months, so it means by January we have to have all the components designs and everything available and finalized.

So you don’t have enough time to observe the Cruze-mules much prior to that next stage?
We have some feedback. You have some learning from these Cruze mule vehicles to finally then finalize these designs and say here we have to do a software tweak or here we have to do some adjustments. There is some learning, but not extensive learning. In a traditional program you would probably test those mule cars for a year or two, but we said we have enough experience to develop this car in such a sort time scale. That is the risk element. We have always said this will be a high speed project and we’ve always openly said we are sharing the risk involved.

Do you oversee the assembly of the mules?
Yes. The mules are built at the tech center. It is a mini assembly plant we call our "prototype build operations." There you see them as the engine and powertrain are loaded into them. We have already tested the equipment, how you do the battery loading in the plant. When you look at the process, you have two marriages. In the assembly plant when the power cube is loaded into the car its called a marriage. In the Volt we have two marriages, the power cube and the battery.

Because we have never loaded batteries from underneath so we wanted to see that process . We had guys from manufacturing engineering came in that had equipment to test to lift 400 pounds with precision and the tolerance is very small. Its on a moving plate, it guides itself into position. and then is bolted into the underbody structure. I would say we now have a very robust process on how the battery assembly will work. What the tech time is, etc.

Are the battery packs also finalized?
We have frozen the design for the integration vehicles for next summer. Not only the external design of the packs but all of the internal components. The cooling system, electronics, the frames, the modules.

The software and the software functionality is defined. But what we call the calibration is still development work. What is the temperature band? When do you cool, when do you heat? All of those things need to be calibrated. This is why we need two winters and two summers on the development work. Basically the software is on the platform. The real development work is on the trigger points. The temperature outside needs to be known, the battery temperature needs to be known. Many many things need to be known.