How Your Car Compares to the Chevy Volt

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To drive a volt strictly on gas says the article but I don't think that is the case. The Volt will operate between 90 and 50% charge on battery, topping a LION battery off and depleting it will yield less charge cycles than charging it to 90% of actual capacity. Furthermore, a LiOn battery will have its optimal life in terms of calendar years if stored at 50% charge which is a level the Volt (as the GM press material says so far) will never be allowed to dip below. SO if you don't want to have to swap the battery out for the longest time possible (I don't think a 25% total age gain from baseline is unreasonable given industry experience with Lithium Ion Batteries total 13 years of service) you might not want to ever drive the Volt in electric mode to reduce battery cycling as much as possible.
Tom F. I feel is shortsighted and I am beginning to think Toyota has people on the dole scouring the internet for anything pro Chevy Volt to then disparage it. Either that or Toyota Fan-boi-dom is more prevalent and fervent than I thought.

Rchi of WA 8:13PM January 12, 2010

GM's E-car attempt is admirable, but certainly saying it gets 230mpg is exaggeration at best and outright lying at worst. Still, the idea that the car can run on electricity for 40 miles is a good one since so many people drive this amount or less in a given day.
Real world use would likely have this car running the generator frequently, and if the generator is minimized you likely will have a fairly slow vehicle - so if you are going to accept a slow vehicle, then why not make a car with a 50hp diesel engine barely able to make 80mph on level ground but capable of 50-60mpg in real world driving.
New diesels are more efficient than gasoline engines, diesel fuel takes less energy to produce and the emissions can be minimized to outdo that of the typical gasoline engine per mile/hp/etc. Problem comes in getting the public to accept slower cars/diesel engines/smaller(or lighter) cars... we all want our land yachts and a rocket motor with 3X the required horsepower in case we are invited to a drag race.
so if you care about ecology while wanting to retain our level of cultural sophistication please push for 1. Enforced higher CAFE standards (make all cars get better mileage) 2. Mandatory move to hybrids/alternate fuel cars over a 10-20 year timeline and 3. Reasonable elevation of pollution standards for both cars and power plants so the changes do not affect worldwide pollution or business negatively. TTFN

J Weintraub of FL 9:51AM December 15, 2009

If one uses the 4 cents/mile as the writer suggests for the Volt, then by comparison my Prius, @ 50+ mpg, costs me only 5 cents/mile with a typical $2.50 price per gallon of gasOLINE (not GAS since there are vehicles powered by GAS these days), or even 6 or 7 cents/mile with higher gasoline prices.
Although the Volt may have great potential SOME day, I will gladly settle for my Prius at almost half the purchase price and for its hundred(s) (of) miles of capability that one can easily drive on any given day, to say nothing of the inconvenience of recharging the Volt every night or the impossibility of doing so in a condo or apartment building.

Tom F of GA 9:26AM December 15, 2009

you are stuped

bob of 8:43PM November 15, 2009

It's bad enough that for years people talked about "zero-emissions" electrical cars without even talking about the fact that the pollution is just emitted somewhere else. Now some people are trying to get past that. If we are going to have this discussion, let's get the basics correct. You can't rate a car in terms of kilowatts per mile as the article says; it should be kilowatt hours per mile.

Ron Fink of MA 10:56AM August 29, 2009

GM's numbers about the electrical use are hogwash. 40 cents to propel a car 40 miles? Let's assume cheap .05 per kwh electricity so you'll get 8 kwh of energy for your 40 cents. One horsepower is .75 kw. You will get less then 11 horsepower for an hour for your 40 cents. A riding lawnmower uses that much. You aren't going to move a car 40 miles for that. Small cars currently run about 100 hp. I know the hp calculations are different, but not by a factor of 10. If I was really good in physics, I would figure the energy required to move a car 40 miles. I am not but it doesn't take much to just know that a car isn't going to run for 1/8 the cost on electricity vs. gas. If electrical energy was that cheap, you would never see factories using their diesel generators to beat the power company.

Mike of VT 4:00PM August 28, 2009

Others beat me to it in correcting your erroneous statement
"the Volt won't be so impressive when powered principally by gas. The small engine is likely to be underpowered, with the huge battery amounting to a lot of dead weight when it's not propelling the car. Buyers shelling out $40,000 for the Volt--the expected sticker price--could find it more of a wheezer than a Wowmobile if most of their driving is on gas."
The Volt will ALWAYS run directly form its electric batteries, though after 40 miles or so, depending on driving factors and other loads, the gas generator will repower the batteries.
The car would still run the same if the batteries were repowered by flywheels (you need two countervailing flywheels to prevent counter-rotational forces against the car. http://www.flybridsystems.com/index.html), compressed air (which alone, now powers cars over a hundred miles: http://zeropollutionmotors.us/), fuel cells (see the production model Honda FCX), etc. so if GM really wants to come out of bankruptcy as America's innovative car company, they have a variety of "hybrids" to choose from.

Scott Baker of NY 3:07AM August 28, 2009

I guess we will just have to wait for GM to tell us what MPG the Volt gets when running on the gas engine . I am rather suspicious -- Why is GM hiding this crucial piece of information from us ? .
Sadly the price of $40,000 puts this car WELL out of the range of most of us .

Donald P. of OH 1:29PM August 26, 2009

Yes That is incrediable gas mileage , But You have account for Summer & winter rates Each state region has thier electricity range and time when Electric rates go high to low We tend to use more electric in The Summer months People take more showers or baths. Air conditioners run more too It varies region to region . So the New Chevy VOLT is really cracked up Cause it does cost to buy one $40,000.00 Who would finance that 10 % down would $4000.00 Even If I was millionare I would n't buy one in heart beat I don't believe I would even buy Pruis I would buy Toyota YARIS and the late model 2007. It cheaper to buy later model car plus It does account more gasoline milage There are products on the Market and online to have save on gasoline milage. That, I am willing to invest in help save at least 20 % and gain MPG People now, are also keeping their vehicles longer times. On the average time now is almost 8 years.

John E. of NJ 8:02PM August 24, 2009