Sales of the GM Volt.

[Fusion]

How'd they get those numbers?

50 miles max @ 4 hours charging time with the 240V adapter
I think 50mph is a good combined average speed = 1 hour of driving on batteries.
8 hours of sleep per day = 16 left = 3 drive/charge cycles and an hour left for food.
150 miles is the distance you can reach in one day.

In order to make sure the battery pack would last ten years and 150,000 miles (240,000 km) expected for the battery warranty, the Volt team decided to use only half of the 16 kW·h capacity to reduce the rate of capacity degradation, limiting the state of charge (SOC) up to 80% of capacity and never depleting the battery below 30%.

They say a charge costs 1.50$ = 4.5$/day = 4500$
1000 150mi trips = about 4 years (not counting weekends) of possible driving on batteries (guarunteed batt life mileage) after which you should theoretically buy a new $5000? battery = 9500$

A pretty efficient car can do 33mpg @ 3.50/gal = 15.9$ per 150 mile trip.
If you could only do the same 150mi, 250 days per year = 3977$ x 4 = 15900$ + est. 3000$ for a ~20% gas price increase over 4 years
(not counting maintenance)

But the Volt costs 16 grand more than the average people mover, give or take, so you're actually 6500 in the dump at this point...

[rwh11385]

150 miles is the distance you can reach in one day.

A Volt could be driven 10X that in a day pretty easily... with a co-driver

[Vedubin01]

A Volt could be driven 10X that in a day pretty easily... with a co-driver

this needs a chart... and no freaking way! 1150 miles in a 24 hour period. Good luck with that!

[priapism]

Wut? People do that all the time. I know a guy that did that on a Hayabusa a few weeks ago.

[KenC]

Wut? People do that all the time. I know a guy that did that on a Hayabusa a few weeks ago.

It's brutal but can be done. I did Jackson Hole to Portland in one stint. It's ~1100mi.

[rwh11385]

Wut? People do that all the time. I know a guy that did that on a Hayabusa a few weeks ago.

It's brutal but can be done. I did Jackson Hole to Portland in one stint. It's ~1100mi.

He's hard of thinking.

this needs a chart... and no freaking way! 1150 miles in a 24 hour period. Good luck with that!

A friend and I drove across half the country and back in a couple days in a 24ft straight truck. It wasn't fun but 1200 miles in a Volt in a day would be a breeze comparably. (Heck, Cannonballers did 2800 miles in under 36 hours)


The point is that the limitation of the Volt's ability to drive X miles in a day is not it's batteries or charging rate, but rather simply the driver(s)'s ability to stay away and traffic laws... because it can be refilled with liquid fuel like most every other car but the BEVs like the Leaf. The simplistic and flawed logic of the email misses the underlying concept that his math only supports the Volt vs. the Leaf, although he ignores the statistics that most Americans live within a commute that could be done EV-only. Obviously if someone was to drive 150 miles a day and not just once in a blue moon, they wouldn't benefit from a Volt since it's value is running on electric-only for the majority of its travel, and a traditional hybrid is only really strong with stop and go. Long highway journeys would be best fit to an efficient diesel like a VW or a small gas engine like the Fiesta, Focus, Cruze, etc. But at least a long-journey in a Volt would possible, even if its primary benefit would be reduced, versus a battery-only vehicle.

[Fusion]

I was only counting EV time, i know it gets further, but then you're even more in the negative numbers running on fuel.

I don't buy the "it's for short travel to work" approach. You can carpool a save tons of money.

150m/day could easily be done by pizza delivery guys in a larger city for example, or any other courier service, taxis etc. So not necessarily long distance.

There's pretty much no way these cars can be efficient on your wallet.

[rwh11385]

I was only counting EV time, i know it gets further, but then you're even more in the negative numbers running on fuel.

I don't buy the "it's for short travel to work" approach. You can carpool a save tons of money.

150m/day could easily be done by pizza delivery guys in a larger city for example, or any other courier service, taxis etc. So not necessarily long distance.

There's pretty much no way these cars can be efficient on your wallet.

Oh, I forgot where in any basic understanding of analysis you just decide to "not buy" facts, reason, or reality. (Beside, of course, on Fox News) Maybe that's the difference between you and me, I don't just make shit up to "prove" an opinion.

http://nhts.ornl.gov/2009/pub/stt.pdf

Table 3: Daily Vehicle Miles Traveled in 2001 was 32.73, 2009 was 28.97 miles

What's stopping you from carpooling in a Volt?

Why focus on outliers like delivery or for-hire transportation? Those aren't the majority of drivers and obviously better suited for parallel hybridization since they both stop and go, mostly in cities, but far past the current range of battery power.

'They pretty much can't be efficient on your wallet... because they don't make sense for pizza boys, hence they can't be economical for everyone' isn't logic... it's just plain stupid argument. That's like saying a certain chair can't fit a 500lb man, so therefore it is worthless to everyone.

[Fusion]

Ok, great, so the majority can save $3.50 a day.
16000 / 3.5 = 4570 work days or 18 years. Just to "pay off" the price difference.

[rwh11385]

Ok, great, so the majority can save $3.50 a day.
16000 / 3.5 = 4570 work days or 18 years. Just to "pay off" the price difference.

At least look at Edmunds, or my, analysis, instead of again just making numbers up: http://www.r3vlimited.com/board/show...&postcount=329

[tjts1]

Assuming the price of gas never changes. I mean everybody knows that gas today costs exactly the same as 2 years ago, 5 years ago, 10 years ago... right?

[Fusion]

Than why not just buy a full EV?

[rwh11385]

Than why not just buy a full EV?

Are you new here? Range. Americans don't want a car they can only drive for 30 or 50 miles, and IMO extended-range EVs with a serial hybrid gas/CNG/diesel/jet engine is the best solution. (Eventually batteries will be able to store many times more energy in the same space and weight but still have to worry about conditioning / memory) The Volt was the first of PHEVs but just the tip of the wave of what is to come, and will benefit from being the early mover.

http://www.wired.com/autopia/2012/03/infiniti-emerg-e-ev/

The Emerg-E, a name that sounds like a powdered concoction you’d mix with water to ward off colds, is a mid-engined, range-extended electric sports car.

It uses two 201-horsepower electric motors, one driving each rear wheel, for propulsion. They’re fed by a lithium-iron phosphate battery pack good for an electric-only range of 30 miles. Beyond that, the Lotus 1.2-liter, 46-horsepower three-cylinder engine drives a generator to keep juice flowing to the wheels for a total range of 300 miles.

Infiniti says the Emerg-E will make 737.6 pound-feet of torque, good enough to get the car to 60 in 4 seconds and then, if you’re really in a hurry or being chased by cyborg bears, all the way to 130 mph in 30 seconds.

[priapism]

The Volt IS an EV.

[rwh11385]

The Volt IS an EV.

It's a PHEV, not a BEV... what Fusion alluded to by saying "full EV", i.e. one that is cheaper due to not having an IC engine to extend its range past charging capability...