More photos and details of the new Chevrolet Volt have been revealed and this time there are also photos of the interior, and no GM staff blocking our views of the new production hybrid car by General Motors. The Volt was unveiled on GM’s 100th anniversary.
Unlike other hybrid vehicles which use either the petrol or electric engine to move the car, or some hybrids like Honda’s IMA which uses the petrol all the time with no electric-only mode and uses the electric motor only for assist, the Chevrolet Volt runs on the electric motor at all times. The electric motor produces 150 horsepower and 370Nm of torque and gets power from a 16-kWh lithium ion battery (220 lithium ion cells) which is recharged via brake energy regeneration or the internal combustion engine.
The combustion engine (powered by gasoline or E85) only kicks in to charge the battery and because that is its only function it can be tuned to be extremely efficient at this, working best only at a certain RPM range required to drive a dynamo and charge the battery. GM calls this type of hybrid an E-REV or Extended-Range Electric Vehicle.
When you are parked at home, the battery can also be charged via a standard household plug with 120V (8 hours) or 240V (less than 3 hours) output. Charging times are of course less if the battery has not been fully depleted. Based on American electricity tariffs at time of publishing, the Volt uses 80 US cents per day (or 10 US cents per kWh) to charge up for 65km per day of driving. According to GM, running a Chevrolet Volt and charging it daily will use less electricity annually than an average home’s refrigerator and freezer.
The interior features an LCD instrument display and a 7 inch touch screen vehicle information display. All climate and entertainment controls are also touch screen-style with an optional nav system that can use the onboard hard drive for map in additional to music storage, so the Volt’s interior matches its “futuristic” powertrain.
Lastly, here are some figures. The Volt’s wheelbase at 2,685mm is slightly shorter than the Mitsubishi Lancer and Honda Civic at 2,700m. It’s 4404mm long, 1798mm wide and 1430mm tall. It has a 301 litre boot. It rides on 17 inch forged aluminium wheels which are wrapped with specially developed low rolling resistance tyres.
If you think the Volt will mark a turn in GM’s financial records for the next 100 years, think again. GM’s COO Fritz Henderson said that GM is likely to lose money with every Chevrolet Volt sold. In fact, according to Henderson he’s never seen a situation where GM made money with a “generation 1 technology”. GM’s vice chairman Bob Lutz says there is still hope for profit as a huge conservative chunk of figures have been attributed to battery warranty claim costs and if there are not many claims the project could turn a profit.
The Volt will only go on sale in November 2010 (and China in 2011) but 100 production Volts will be built in 2009 for internal test fleets and media test drives. The Chevrolet Volt will be built on the same platform as the upcoming Chevrolet Cruze.
Looking to sell your car? Sell it with Carro.
Good tech breakthrough but there is still no “perfect” EV afterall. Still uses a combustion engine as generator.
Paul Tan says: The combustion engine is used only if you can’t get to a power outlet to plug it in to charge…
this is very good… 8kwh use 65km… 16kwh max travel 130km… for our country electric bill 1st 200kwh cost rm0.218 after that 0.345 n so on… means if every month travel 2,000km… use 246kwh… means around rm60 per month… tats RM0.03/km… wow… much more savings then my ngv RM0.07/km… i will buy tis car at no cost… of cos no more then rm150k… hehe…
Dear indigo,
I think you missed the point. The Volt is meant to be used over extended range. Paul did mentioned E-REV.
GM did made fully electric car 10 years ago. You could google “General Motors EV1”
Anyway,
I did put in my “EV wish list” in one of the articles few months ago, not knowing anything about the Volt yet.
Looks like Chevy Volt did have some of items I listed.
I would look forward another items in my wish list for future modular electric motors and batteries for additional performance and range.
Hopefully some other manufacturer could follow suit.
Loosing money and still making this car? “Green” conscious? They are not Audi AG which can afford to loose money when building cars.
nice, since tehy can produce it now.
its only a matter of time before the japanese take it, reverse engineer it.
improve on it, mass market it. and then it will be affordable to all.
less dependence on oil. woohoo.
mother earth will be so happy. lol.
putting this car on my wish list also.. just what i wanted, futuristic and and effectively a complete electric car :)
cant wait to see what our jap brothers have in store for something similar in near future.
I thougt it was a modified Malibu to receive the new engine.
Salamz and Hi,
This is definitely a good news. It seems majority car manufacturers are opting for their very own version of hybrid and fully-battery-powered vehicles.
Even Proton are planning something as well. This could at least ease our dependency on fossil fuel.
Most importantly, this could ‘teach’ those ‘Oil and Gas Industry’ a hard lesson on “Riba” (increasing the price of oil irresponsibly)! Let those greedy ‘Oil and Gas’ people suffer. God is fair. Your days are outnumbered.
Notice that the price of oil per barrel drops below USD 100! This obviously show the ‘Oil and Gas Industry’ fear on hybrid and battery powered vehicle technology that could jeopardize their business.
I wonder why our government still haven’t adjust our so called subsidy oil of RM2.55/liter. Now we are on reverse, it seems like the ‘rakyat’ is paying subsidy to the government.
Furthermore, on hybrid and fully-battery-powered vehicles; let’s say I own a battery car and I’m staying at a flat or an apartment. Don’t you think I’ll might have an issue on how to charge my car? I don’t think it is feasible for me to pull the plug extension all the way from 10th floor to charge up my battery car park below. It seems like the car manufacturers and the government will need to thoroughly discuss on how to resolve this issue. A well-planned infrastructure is needed to support hybrid and battery cars industry.
Finally, I’m requesting PaulTan.org to discuss on feasibility of buying our usual oil-powered cars against hybrid and battery car based on our present situation. Basically we’re at the transition of a new hype; to proceed with fuel or go for battery. I’m sure we do not want to be caught buying an oil-powered car when all of the sudden hybrid and battery cars prices drops like crazy. Cause I’m planning to buy a new car very soon. Should I wait for hybrid and batter cars to show up? (althought hybrid and battery cars are still at its infancy) When? Or just buy that new Optimus Prime Honda City! Hope to hear you soon!
With Regards,
SY0H
mystvearn said,
September 17, 2008 @ 11:33 pm
Loosing money and still making this car? “Green” conscious? They are not Audi AG which can afford to loose money when building cars.
————————————————————–
just because a company is not making much money, doesnt mean they have to stop development. they always have to continue to move forward, and like all companies today, looking green is the way to go. if they stopped moving forward, they might as well close shop. mitsubishi loses money with every evo they sell as well, but it doesnt stop them making them as it is an icon for the company, and they’re not exactly the richest car company around as well.
LoL @ dropping extension cord from 10th floor. seeing that the chevy volt may not even make it to msian shores, i think you’re better off getting a fuel efficient hybrd, petrol or diesel car for now.
from what i gather, the reason GM says it’ll loose money on every volt sold is because they have taken into account or have included in their forecast the worst case senario where the batteries crap out prematurely.
I think they’re on the right track with this car, as things will only get better over the years with ever evolving battery technology. they would probably make running changes to the production vehicle with upgraded batts.
nice looking car and some nice technology they’re putting in it. for short drive you should be able to run on electric without the need for the combustion motor to work at all, that’s neat. and no worries that you would run out of electricity as long as you have fuel in your tank.
though i’m wondering what if the electric motor break down? can by any chance the car still run using the combustion engine? i mean that would be a big plus for me…
for SY0H,
if you understand how the oil market trading works you won’t be blaming the oil and gas industry for the fuel price increase. and the biggest oil producer in the world are the OPEC members actually….
Most importantly, this could ‘teach’ those ‘Oil and Gas Industry’ a hard lesson on “Riba” (increasing the price of oil irresponsibly)! Let those greedy ‘Oil and Gas’ people suffer. God is fair. Your days are outnumbered.
Notice that the price of oil per barrel drops below USD 100! This obviously show the ‘Oil and Gas Industry’ fear on hybrid and battery powered vehicle technology that could jeopardize their business.
___________________
To SYOH,
Come on, the one that sets the price is the market itself, not the O&G companies. Even those oil reserve speculation is made by the richest people, not the O&G company. SYOH, u really need to learn a lot!
And do you think that hybrid/battery vehicle can cripple their business?? Come on again. Not all country in this world are using the forbidden nuclear to power their country. Most of them still use the old good petroleum based fuel to generate electricity. And since the hybrid/battery car uses electricity, the circle still goes round, means that the O&G companies not even losing a tiny bit of their business!
No, go send your resume to Exxon SYOH!!!!
i hear it weighs like 1.8 tonnes, so why not just save weight and ditch the engine if its rarely used and make it fully electric like EV1? it sounds like GM’s only putting it thee to keep the oil companies happy
abtm, if they ditched the internal combustion engine the volt wouldn’t be laballed an extended range EV now would it? if it was fully electric only, its range would be severely limited, but with the IC engine acting as sort of a “power generator” you can therefore drive long distances without worrying about running out of batt power as it can be charged on-the-go. Perhaps they did think of those who live in apartments on the 10th floor afterall, who can get easy access to a power point…lol.
As my response to this 2 gentleman;
najibest said,
September 18, 2008 @ 9:31 am
ReactiX said,
September 18, 2008 @ 10:17 am
I did send my resume to Shell, Petronas and Exxon-Mobil. I told them in my resume that someday oil gonna be depleted and all those over-paid CEO in Oil and Gas industry gonna have to resort selling “roti canai” or drive hybrid taxis to make ends meet.
I told them it was the Oil and Gas Industry that kills the first prototype Hybrid car about 20 years ago and retard its development. I want to work with them using their abundant resources to produce Renewable Energy Solution in which they would be less world hunger and less world poverty due to the Bloody Oil War by mad man George W. Bush (another stupid oil “CEO” from US) and guess what, I didn’t get the job.
Yes, when I “sarcastically” use the term “Oil and Gas Industry” which is a very common term (the term is not a specific job specification), I’m referring to the whole bunch of them: ranging from the Oil and Gas multinational companies (Shell, Petronas, Exxon-Mobil etc-etc), Support-business, Manufacturer, Refinery, 3-rd party lobbies or middle man (also known as speculators), those rich OPEC owners; Pak Syeikh Arab that drives Mercedes patch with diamonds, and don’t forget all time favorite Fuel-Blood-Thirst-George W. Bush and the rest of the overpaid CEO and Managers… everybody are correlated in this so called high profile Oil and Gas Industry. No one is spare in this delicate industry. And guess what’s is their similarity? They’re all Over-Paid spoil rich kids and don’t care if we hardworking Malaysian have to pay RM2.55/liter.
The only real backbone in the Oil and Gas Industry has always been the hardworking engineers and technicians. Their are the ones who have to dive into the raging Black Sea maintaining the Oil Platforms, doing welding here and there. Brave their way towards the ice-cold Antarctica to look for potential oil field. To the Design Engineers and Draftsmen who have to sit in front of the computer 24/7 thinking on ways to complete their near-impossible deadline. To the man and women whom actually work their ass out. These are the people that should be over-paid. I hope my explaination opens up our mind on “How Stuff Works”. Courtesy of “SY0H’s Discovery Channel”. And not just blatantly say, “its the speculator’s fault”. Speculators are just small part of the industry while the big things always happen behind the closed curtain. For every action there must be reaction.
Notes: Thanks to Oil and Gas Technicians; Bruce Willis, in the movie Armageddon saves the Earth by drilling a hole on the incoming asteroid to plant the nuke. I don’t think those “pretty boys” from the management and CEOs would even know how to drill a hole, except for the ‘other’ hole with their dicks. Hahaha. Have a good day! I rest my case.
can it take corner ?
hmm…
i don think it matters for such a slow car
BanyakMasukWorkshop said,
September 18, 2008 @ 9:17 am
mystvearn said,
September 17, 2008 @ 11:33 pm
Loosing money and still making this car? “Green” conscious? They are not Audi AG which can afford to loose money when building cars.
————————————————————–
just because a company is not making much money, doesnt mean they have to stop development. they always have to continue to move forward, and like all companies today, looking green is the way to go. if they stopped moving forward, they might as well close shop. mitsubishi loses money with every evo they sell as well, but it doesnt stop them making them as it is an icon for the company, and they’re not exactly the richest car company around as well.
———————————–
Think bout proton past few years~ still producing wat.
this is a new transformer, what is it called