Video: Taxpayer takes Chevy Volt's powertrain for a ride
By Thomas Ricker 
posted April 29th 2009 7:11AM
posted April 29th 2009 7:11AM
See that? This dowdy looking sedan is the very symbol of hope for GM and perhaps the US auto industry as a whole. Although this Volt prototype is technically a mule -- an engineering hybrid that crosses the body of a Chevy Cruze with the Volt's Voltec powertrain -- it still gives "an 80-plus percent representation" of what the Volt's electric driving experience will be like. Or so says GM exec, Tony Posawatz. Our greasy sisters over at Autoblog took the Volt-mule for a spin. Their take?
Overall, the electric drive system in the mules performed as advertised and GM appears to be well on its way to meeting a November 2010 Job 1 date.Too bad hope doesn't pay the bills. Hit the read link for the full story including a novice's guide to prototyping automobiles. Video overview after the break
GM sure know how to frustrate people.
FACK YOU GM!
A piece of that car belongs to me! I paid for it... I am entitled to ripping it off and taking it home...
Nubs!
This was needed when gas was $4 a gallon. Today, the Hummers are back on the road.
I do like the Chevey Technology Inside on the side - like Intel Inside and Intel isn't hurting for money too much!
Should be enough there to get flamed all day! :D
Oh dear god! I wish we ever got $4 a gallon over here in Europe! That'd be a GIFT!
oil prices will skyrocket in about 6 months and will keep on rising simply because demand far exceeds supply, I think we can expect 200USD a barrel in 1 to 2 years.
Its still needed to lower our dependence on foreign oil.
Let me rephrase that:
This should have been released when gas cost too much for us to be able to support our extravagant driving habits. Today we are going back to those bad habits.
@loocas,
You can also look at it differently. Heavy taxes on fuel in Europe make us experience changes in the world oil price much less. And per driven kilometer people pay about as much in Europ and America btw., just a case of people driving different types of cars.
The good news for countries which have low taxes is that all the developments in fuel efficiency have been done for them btw.
4$ a gallon???
If you calculate it in Eurosper Liter you would be at 0,79 €/Liter.
We have prices about 1,25 €/Liter and you think 4$ a gallon is high?....lol
Beastage, even with OPEC constantly cutting the production of oil there is continually an excessive supply. This has been the trend ever since oil got to $150 a barrel. At which point it became worth the consumer and businesses interest and time to not consume as many oil based products. Granted I don't believe this will continue, but it does show that our need for oil is abstract at best. Specially with alternative energies zipping along as they do. Imagine having your roof covered in solar panels and charging your car every night with them.
@Bene
Congrats?
Considering your socialist government is now reliant on that exorbitant 'petrol' tax, they'll need a new way to collect it before it disappears.
Let us know how a government GPS tracking unit works in your future electric car.
Bene, we don't look at prices under a foreign government to determine what is expensive or not here. You aren't the center of the universe. $4 is more per gallon than Americans are willing to pay...based on our own finances and free will.
Epic fail. Sorry, but there isn't a nicer way of saying how big of a flop this will be, and it still won't do much to shore up GM's finances.
We have a fortune-teller.
Though the Volt doesn't sound perfect, I think it will leave a mark on the industry and get many consumers excited for electric vehicles. I doubt there will be an epic fail.
just because gas comes back down in price doesn't mean that we should necessarily go back to old habits..the environment is still the issue at hand and technology like this is needed desperately
Like the majority of the US population cares?
Come to Europe, comrade ;)
Yes, please - go to Europe. I don't want your hippie environmentalism, I don't want your Pruii and I don't want your Volts. I quite enjoy my Hummer. Feel free to make all the eco-cars you want, but when you people start passing laws trying to force me into your silly cars, you've gone too far.
I sense a mob mentality growing against GM. Not that I'm against it or anything :p
These vehicles should have been in development back in 1974 during that first gas crisis.
How come Toyota came out with these first? GM is a day later and a few million short.
Workers lose their jobs and the executives, for years, were taking home millions.
Good riddance Pontiac. Good riddance Oldsmobile. I do hope the Volt is a success, but it is a bit late.
If this is suppose to be a show piece of the technology they could have at least put alloy rims on it that don't make it look like a POS.
This is a test mule, not a show car. It's about refining the technology in the platform.
I think you mean to credit your environmentally non-greasy sisters at Autoblog Green.
Too bad hope doesn't pay the bills
nice work.
Hope doesn't, but printing money sure does...
"Wii would like to save the world."
And you misquoted -- the Cruze-Volt mule is an 80% representation of the final powertrain, not the entire vehicle.
Tony C,
It's not a misquote. He says in the video, "80-plus percent representation of what their battery electric driving experience will be in a chevy volt."
Thomas
once voltec becomes popular and mainstream along with other competitors watch electric prices go up.
No question. California can hardly power its air conditioners and data centers in the summer. Imagine the load of charging a few million cars every day/night on top of that.
@ Nate
Surely the Government of California (and by that I mean the citizens, since they elect their own government) is adequately prepared for the increase in electric vehicles.
After all, didn't California lead the US in calling for EVs? Like way back in 1990 when they started the ZEV program?
I would certainly hope that a state that has tried to dictate emissions specifications to the auto industry would have already created the infrastructure required to support the automobiles it demanded - otherwise, what was the point?
Two words: Rolling Blackouts.
Oh yeah, and two more words: Budget Crisis
http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/02/17/california.budget.crisis/index.html
I thought it was established that those rolling blackouts were caused by Enron purposely limiting the supply of electricity to drive up the price.
They did, it was called the EV-1 and despite popular theory it was a colossal money-loser.
Hope may not pay the bills, but it got a nation of mostly white people to vote a black man into the White House.
Anything is possible.
Its funny how most people forget he's half white ;) But you do have a point.
Yeah, maybe they voted for the white half.
In Africa he would be considered white.
If that's what the future of cars looks like...there will be no more joy in driving :(((
Tax credit or not, I think I'll hold off on the first gen of mass-produced electric cars. They're just not clicking with me yet. Maybe a motorcycle's in my future.
So Honda makes the Insight, which looks exactly like the Toyota Prius. Chevy makes the Volt, that looks exactly like a Honda Civic. I think it's high time Chevy gets involved and makes a hybrid that looks like a Ford Focus.
Man... I need more coffee.
This looks a lot like an 09 Honda Accord.
http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3303/3486261166_fc055b6d6f.jpg?v=0
This is not the Chevy Volt. It is the Chevy Cruze. The is car available in Europe and will be available here next year replacing the Chevy Cobalt.
A Ford hybrid that looks like Chevy Cobalt.. Like anybody reads these anyways.
The volt will go to market, but not before GM goes to bankruptcy court.
It's not the car that's hard to make, it's the battery. The batteries of today need to advance by 15 times ..yes .. FIFTEEN .. for electric vehicles to be an adequate replacement of gasoline engines.
Meanwhile, there is comparatively very little money being spent of battery research ... which needs a Manhattan style project.
You're joking right? All I heard was how "Hope" was going to take care of all my bills, now you say it won't pay the bills?
Even though Engadget would like to think so, electric cars are not going to gain 50% market share when the Volt comes out.
GM is going to have to do a whole lot more than build an electric car to stay afloat.
Sure, its romantic (to you) to think this car will be the savior but it's not logical.
GM will not have to do anything to stay afloat but the bare minimum that the government requires them to do in order to get government money. GM has become a federal experiment and the government will pump whatever money they need to pump in order to not let it fail. If they let GM fail, they are letting their ideology fail and they will not allow that. It's pretty sad but when you have the government firing and replacing CEOs of private enterprises (especially when it has been made clear that the biggest issue is not with their management as much as it is with their Union deals) you can expect anything.
The sooner they can put in production some kind of "green energy" car, the sooner the government will subsidize that car and shove it down the taxpayers' throats. After all, the government knows what's good for you right?