Volt could break 100 mpg ceiling if EPA approves

[DainBramaged]

The Chevrolet Volt could be on its way to being the first mass-produced vehicle rated at 100 mpg or more.

To ensure that happens, General Motors is asking the EPA to declare the Volt an electric vehicle for regulatory purposes. GM spokesman Rob Peterson said the California Air Resources Board has given the Volt preliminary certification as an electric.

A government rating of more than 100 mpg would give GM invaluable marketing ammunition and would be a boost for company compliance with fuel economy standards. Peterson confirmed the request today.

Loops vs. formulas

Normally, a vehicle is run on an EPA test loop, consisting of both city and highway driving, to measure tailpipe pollutants and provide data for calculating fuel economy. But for electrics, which have no emissions, the government uses a Department of Energy mathematical formula to translate energy use into some equivalent of miles per gallon of gasoline.

Using that formula, the limited-production all-electric Tesla Roadster, for example, gets rated at 244 mpg for the government's corporate average fuel economy program. Tesla officials say they look forward to being able to sell the fuel economy credits they will accumulate, even with limited sales.

The Volt is a plug-in electric hybrid, which GM calls a "range-extended" electric. Due on the market in late 2010, the Volt will be designed to go 40 miles on all-electric power. Then a small internal combustion engine would kick in to extend the range.

It appears unlikely that the government test loop could be used to accurately measure Volt emissions and fuel economy.

Removing all doubts

Simply declaring it an electric would remove any doubt.

But one government official, who insisted on anonymity, said declaring the Volt an electric would not paint a true picture. If a motorist forgets to plug in one night, then the car would run the next day using the 1.4-liter gasoline engine to generate all the electric power for the drive motor.

Peterson said if the Volt is certified as an electric vehicle, engineers could then optimize the powertrain's calibration for testing against that classification.

The Society of Automotive Engineers would not classify the Volt as an electric vehicle. SAE defines a hybrid as having two energy sources, such as gasoline and electricity. The Volt has both.

GM has not said how many miles per gallon the Volt would deliver when it is running on its gasoline engine. But the size of the Volt's fuel tank and the range GM says the vehicle can travel points to a gasoline-only fuel economy of between 35 and 50 mpg after the car's first 40 miles on pure electric power.

(printed in total, subscription only) http://www.autonews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080926/ANA02/809269969/1186

[Massacure]

1. My current car gets infinite miles per gallon -- all I have to do is push...

If you put exactly one gallon of gas in the volt and use no other source of power, I guarantee you it will not go 100 miles.

[DainBramaged]

3. want to bet?

see ya in 2010

[yodoobo]

5. It'll go 100 miles

But its still a GM product so the trim parts will be falling off in 4 years and major components will start failing 6 months out of warranty.

That's not to say it'll be defective. Its a GM product - planned obsolescence is an integral part of the design so that you'll be in the show room again once the loan is paid off.

For many years, this strategy has worked. It has made GM a huge company and kept workers employed. Unfortunately it requires suckers to keep buying their garbage.

http://www.yankodesign.com/2008/05/30/yanko-design-profiles-gms-designer-in-chief/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Planned_obsolescence

[DainBramaged]

33. Prove it

libel


An untruthful statement about a person, published in writing or through broadcast media, that injures the person's reputation or standing in the community. Because libel is a tort (a civil wrong), the injured person can bring a lawsuit against the person who made the false statement.

defamation


A false statement that injures someone's reputation and exposes him to public contempt, hatred, ridicule, or condemnation. If the false statement is published in print or through broadcast media

[yodoobo]

36. Prove 20 years of personal experience on a forum?

nah, not really interested.

BTW, that personal experience that includes being an ex-employee,a GM consultant, a father that retired from GM and a brother that still works there (at least till his plant closes next year).

Look, I can see that you are heavily invested with GM. That's very understandable. We can agree to disagree and I wish you nothing but good luck.

[DainBramaged]

37. Then quit bashing MY company and MY livelihood,

you are typical of so many DU members, bash GM, and then back off when cornered. If you aren't happy earning a living in America, go overseas, they'd love to have you and your 'experience'.


I don't believe a word you write. And nice first impression.

Bye. we're done, and it's too bad GM let's people such as yourself take money from them (if that isn't bullshit).

[yodoobo]

38. Best of luck to you.

[Omaha Steve]

34. We bought a 91 Caprice in Nov. 94

It had 38,000 miles. We still have it with 138,000 miles. It doesn't use oil. It is a clean car except the spot where somebody smacked it while it was parked. No major problems or ill timed break downs EVER. But people that don't know how to care for cars might think otherwise. Quality oil at regular intervals, fluid changes, and annual check ups do wonders. Try taking care of your stuff. You must have missed my post last week. I still have a 57 Chevy I've owned since '75. The last car we bought was a Nissan. THE ONLY reason was because at the time our son in law (feeds our daughter & granddaughter) was a salesman for them at the time. He is now in a different field. We will again be a big three only family again.

And quit knocking American workers. It is the middle class that pay the most taxes in this country. Or do you think the USA is a bad place to work & live?

OS

[DainBramaged]

35. My current ride is a 95 Cavalier, 112,000 miles, one owner, 29MPG COMBINED

and nothing has fallen off or failed. I replaced the struts, battery, muffler, and air intake because I WANTED to.

American quality, not transplanted garbage.

[ned2012]

2. This is great news!!!

Finally, an American car gets to lead the World in fuel effeciency.

[DainBramaged]

4. Welcome to DU Ned2012

:hi:

I hope you mean Obama in 2012.

[DainBramaged]

30. Goodbye Ned, too bad you didn't know how to play with others

:shrug:

[Orsino]

6. Gaming the system.

Begging the EPA to lie so GM can get the biggest, most impressive numbers possible when/if they unveil the car.

[yodoobo]

7. yea thats what I got out of the article

In the end, the car will do, what the car will do.

But the interest seems to lie in rigging the numbers to make it look better.

That's not engineering, that's marketing.

But I'm sort of ok with that. Sort of. Marketing is important too.I'm a huge critic of GM. Their policies, their engineering, the way they treat their employees, and it shows up in their product. But I really can't fault them for wanting to paint their product in the best light possible. That's something that anyone would do.

And while I have no doubt that VOLT will be a crappy as every other GM product (probably more so because its a rush job), the product is important in the sense that it'll be a huge force in driving the industry forward toward cleaner products and away from gasoline.

[Name removed]

10. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[tkmorris]

12. I'll agree with you......

As soon as you explain to me why GM put a known faulty engine in my Lumina and refuses to take any responsibility for it.

[DainBramaged]

13. For the same reason Toyota refuses to honor warranties for sludged up engines

if you have a gripe about your 10+ year old Lumina, I suggest you take it up with GM, not me.

[tkmorris]

25. Did I say Toyota was better?

No, I did not. I've never owned a Toyota, I wouldn't know. Although I will say that I see an awful lot more 20 year old Toyota's tooling the motorways than I do Chevys.

I am just tired of seeing you mindlessly defending American automakers without acknowledging any of the awful business decisions they've made over the years. I'd like to see them healthy, happy, and dominating the markets but they are NOT going to do that until they start actually listening to the consumers who consider buying their products.

For the record, that Lumina died with just about 100k on the odometer. That could be worse I suppose but later I discovered that they KNEW that engine warped heads and manifolds, it was an engineering flaw, and they just decided it would be cheapest to keep selling it anyway. I have also owned an 84 Chevette and an 88 Cavalier. You want to defend those two piles of craptastic failure? I am sick to death of buying GM products that turn out to be piles of junk. Perhaps if you had invested as much money as I have in their cars and had the same measure of frustration when they inevitably fail before their time you might be considering a different brand as well.

[DainBramaged]

28. Well if you're tired of seeing me defend my company, do like I just did

click that big red x and then it will be all better. Oh and one last thing, get a newer car, quit bitching about old shit. NOTHING fucking lasts forever.

Goodbye.

[Toucano]

18. Exactly. n/t

[Name removed]

29. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[gravity]

8. To be fair, the test don't accomidate the plug in capabilties

If the EPA test the car while it uses only its gas engine, then the Chevy Volt's fuel economy will be understated.

[DainBramaged]

11. exactly

[DainBramaged]

9. We'll see, would you say the same if god Toyota did the same thing?

Probably not, DU would be awash in "LOOK TOYOTA HAS A 100MPG car, I'M BUYING ONE TOMORROW".

[Orsino]

17. Why wouldn't we? n/t

[Rosco T.]

14. One Very Important Point.. it's 'internal combustion engine' is NOT CONNECTED TO THE WHEELS

it's used ONLY to charge the batteries. It does NOT move the car (directly)

[DainBramaged]

31. Some people just don't get it, or just can't read

[hulklogan]

15. A more important number would be how many miles it can travel on one tank of gas.

The EPA test numbers are less than accurate in almost every case. GM will have lots of angry customers when they're forced to put a 100 mpg EPA sticker on the car and it gets less than that for long distance commuters.

[CRF450]

19. Bullshit, In my experience thats been completly the opposite.

When your not in comstant stop and go traffic, any auto can easily beat their rated fuel milage. My 01 Trans Am is rated 19/28, I actually average around 22-23mpg and have reached 31mpg on the interstate. Keep in mind this is a high performance car with a 350hp v8 and a 6 speed manual. The same holds true for the new Corvettes, EPA has rated them 26mpg HWY when in so many cases they have easily reached 30+mpg.

[Paulie]

20. Yeah, the 6th gear is a killer

it's a 0.5 overdrive. That's why a lot of new automatics are throwing gears at the mileage problem. :) :) :)

[CRF450]

24. In 6th gear, 65mph is close to 1400rpm.

It has to go more than 60mph for it to avoid luggin the engine in 6th.

[DainBramaged]

21. I took a 2008 Impala SS to the GM auction Thursday

BIG car, BIG horsepower (305) front wheel drive, 4 speed automatic. 26.8 MPG COMBINED for a 382 mile trip. And it will comfortably seat five people and lots of luggage. The V6 version has been getting 4 MPG better w/252 hp. So what's that about Japanese cars being efficient? American cars aren't given a chance in the market or here. Oh,it uses regular fuel too.

[CRF450]

23. When it comes to econo cars, imports have had us beat for a good while

Everything else, wheather its a full size luxury car, SUV, truck, sports car, mid-size car etc etc... The domestics get comparable fuel milage or a little better in some cases, new Silverado's are rated better for fuel milage compared to the Toyota Tundra. My Dodge Dakota gets the same fuel milage as a Tacoma that setup the same way, crew cab, 4x4. (despite them having a 4.0 v6 to the 4.7 v8 in mine)

[DainBramaged]

27. Perception is everything

A 4 cyl. Malibu gets 34+ REAL WORLD Highway MPG with the 6-speed automatic, yet all the Toyota lovers claim their pathetic Camry gets better mileage, and they have no proof to back it up. A Grand Prix GTP V8 gets as good mileage as a Camry V6.


Blinded by marketing.

[hulklogan]

32. I never said the EPA numbers were higher or lower than real world results

just that they were not accurate. Why the bullshit?

[carlyhippy]

16. nice...now...are they going to make it affordable for us regular joes?

Carly

[DainBramaged]

22. The House/Senate bill includes a $5000/7500 tax credit for the first 250,000 built

http://blogs.edmunds.com/greencaradvisor/2008/09/house-passes-bill-that-would-give-buyers-of-volt-other-plug-ins-5000-tax-credit.html


The Senate passed a tax extender bill that includes the plug-in electric drive credit that EDTA has been working to move since the beginning of this Congress. Specifically, it provides that plug-in electric drive vehicles with batteries of at least 4 kWh qualify for a $2500 credit. An additional $417 is provided for each additional kWh, up to $7500 for vehicles up to 10, 000 lbs; $10,000 for vehicles up to 14,000 lbs; $12,500 for vehicles between 14,000 and 26,000 lbs and $15,000 for those over 26,000 lbs. The value ramps down in value after the number of vehicles sold in the U.S. reaches 250,000. The credit expires at the end of 2014. http://www.electricdrive.org/index.php?tg=articles&topics=127

[pokerfan]

26. economically it's pretty damned good

If Chevrolet's $0.02/mi number ($0.10/kW-hr) is right.

Assuming gasoline at $3.60/gal, the Volt is 6X more economical than a vehicle getting 30mpg. That is like getting 180mpg or paying $0.60/gal for gas.

Of course, this says nothing about the environmental cost of the electricity, of course. Nor does it factor in the $40K (?) initial cost or other operating/maintenance costs. It also assumes purely electric (non hybrid) operation.

But it is promising no matter how the EPA rates it.