Any Chevy Volt owners here?

General Discussion
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@jtsananders: the 24% was taking ~13% Saudi, 6% Venezuela, and 5% Africa.

These numbers will fluctuated, but the point is that the foreign oil dependence, while waning now, is not going away. And it being a global commodity, a global market, is not a good thing for the US long term. It means our influence over the price will decline (India’s recent gas price crisis for example), as emerging oil markets like China take over. And our own domestic oil will become to expensive for us, instead sold to the highest bidder in the international market to maximize profit.

And Saudi Arabia “our friend”? Really??! Why exactly are they are friend now? Could it have something to do with profit for protection (and turning a blind eye)? Where did 15 of the 19 9/11 terrorists come from again? Have they cleaned up their act since?

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Could you maybe make 1 post instead of making 10 different ones?

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I’ll try. :slight_smile:

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With respect to oil imports from the Middle East, they can be eliminated in 5 years or so. Increased domestic production, and increased imports from Canada and Mexico can make North America energy independent. If the money spent on the Iraq war had been invested in developing Mexico’s oil industry (with Mexico’s permission of course), they would be exporting enough oil to the US to nearly wipe out those Middle East imports. Add additional exports from Canada, now already the largest foreign supplier, and we have energy independence.

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Energy independence but the price is still the world market price. So given that what difference does it make where the oil is from?

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Saudi Arabia has worked to stabilize the price of OPEC oil and that benefits the USA. Sounds friendly to me. Osama bin Laden was a Saudi citizen until he was exiled for creating and running al-Qaeda. That occurred in 1992, so they’ve been our friends at least that long. Oh, and would you condemn Saudi Arabia because bin Laden was born there? And it seems you found 15 people from Saudi Arabia to demonize. But should the rest of the Saudi citizens be demonized as well? Where they came from is an accident of birth That sounds mighty antisemitic to me. And I don’t like it.

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I guess the perspective that you lack is epitomized by the statement…“it freaken delivers in almost every way…”

Let me list a few it does not for me. It is not even indicated as a tow vehicle by GM… If I spend $40k, it needs to be. It has too little ground clearance. It is only fwd and not awd or rwd and there is huge market for that. It still has ICE maintenance requirements. Yes. It still handles like a fwd car. It is limited in weight capacity and I will volunteer this which in my experience tends to be true with hybrids and EVs.
The vaunted mileage difference deteriorates dramatically the greater the load. It is in my humble opinion, an over priced hybrid . So, being over priced keeps it from being a freaken perfect car too.

I agree with @jt too. Saudi Arabia is acting like any other capitalistic enterprise. No more or less except in one area. The past connection of some of their people to the financial sponsorship of terrorism is paradoxical to me. Isolation is not the solution as they will always be a world market player. Inclusion can be more helpful and long term respect as a future past and present Ally is worthwhile.

But then. We have grown some of our own terrorists too.

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@aventineavenue - Please drop the “the tax credit was my money not yours” nonsense. You paid less taxes than you normally would have because of the tax credit. Using your logic I should just not pay my taxes - “it’s my money”, right? No skin off your nose, right?

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Tax credits for some are another’s loopholes which turn into deficits. Tax credits cost all of us whether they are couched in clean energy technology or Farm and oil subsides. Let’s just not pretend we don’t pay for all of them. I am in favor of this particular one realizing we are increasing the profit margin to GM for Volts by this amount. That’s another debate. But it 's still MY money and support that allows it to happen. And, saying it is not is taking another ones perspective out of the debate…one that is as valuable as Volt buyers.

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@texases
No, using “my logic”, you should educate yourself about what is legal and encouraged by the current tax code, and decide if a consumer or other choice that would lower your rate makes sense for you. Or, just not pay your taxes and get in trouble.
@any hater
It’s not me or any other Volt owner that brought this topic up, it was a snarky, jealous person who wanted a “thank you” from Volt owners. You can forget that, I spent my own money on an upscale vehicle I love, just like bscar2 did. And I used the tax code to help make it happen. Get over it, or work to get the tax code changed if you like. But stop selectively harassing Volt owners because they bought a GM product.

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Re: Saudi Arabia, Venezuela, etc

I don’t want to go too far off topic, so i will come back around to the Volt at the end.

My point is not one of hate or isolationism. It’s smart future planning. Why I am a big support of the broad energy independence plan announce a while back.

OPEC countries still have 70% of the oil reserves, with Saudi leading that group. It is now believed that Venezuela has the largest single reserves.

What the US, Canada, and Mexico has is a tiny fraction in comparison, and much of it harder and more expensive to extract/refine (oil sands, shale)

When our temporary energy boom is over, if we have not reformed our oil based transportation and other sectors significantly, we will again be at the financial whims of these regimes (doomed to repeat history as in the 1970s), who have had cultural issues with extremism and/or anti-Americanism.

So it brings us back to EVs and the Volt, and the President’s energy plan (yes, I am a huge supporter of President Obama, and I hope that this thread will not go political!) In the plan, it talks about the development of a broad range of affordable alternative vehicles, EVs, NG, Fuel Cell, etc. If we put men on the moon in the 60s in a decade, we can do this in a couple!

My ideal choice might be a Volt like EREV with an NG range extender. For now, the Volt works and integrates with existing infrastructure.

But there are plenty of other reasons to buy a Volt, as mentioned earlier, if not the one above.

And yes, I agree with some of dagosa’s negatives about the Volt. All cars have negatives. None of those mattered to me for the Volt.

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EREV with an NG range extender

Sorry, I really meant a biofuel extender; from algae or even garbage for example; maybe some kind of flex-fuel cell that can be developed in time that can take a variety of carbon fuels (including gasoline) within certain specs. Ok, no more post for now, I promise! :slight_smile:

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@dagosa

Sorry, one more, because, missed your quote:

"I guess the perspective that you lack is epitomized by the statement…“it freaken delivers in almost every way…”

…not even indicated as a tow vehicle…too little ground clearance. It is only fwd and not awd or rwd…It still handles like a fwd car."

C’mon, the implication is it delivers in comparison to any vehicle in its class Your personal needs-basis criticisms aimed specifically at the Volt are little more than a straw man argument, because virtually no mid-compacts meet your same criteria.

In other words, no, it’s not a truck, it’s not a CUV, it’s not an off road vehicle, and it’s not rear wheel drives (it handles better in snow than that:) Neither is a Lexus ES-300h. Happy?

Dagosa also wrote:

“It is limited in weight capacity and I will volunteer this which in my experience tends to be true with hybrids and EVs.”

I floored the Volt with over 1000 lbs of men in it (350, 275, 230, and me, 170:) Close to 5000 lbs gross weight. It still launched off the line and pushed everyone back in their seats (them shocked). Yes, under this same scenario my Prius would probably shudder in agony!

As for “mileage”, with these guys in the car (and not flooring it like that all the same) I would bet you I’d still get close to the same 5 miles per kWh…because you forget, a lot of the momentum created can and will also be regenerated upon slowing or braking, if you are in L and/or an efficient driver.

You just can’t keep comparing these “old school hybrid notions” when discussing the Volt…you need to simply drive the car.

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Perspective is me accepting that your priorities are not mine, and as long as you afford me the same dignity with remarks prefaced by " your personal preferences" , fine and dandy. The Volt works for you, other cars work for me. Whether the Volt works for many others, is yet to be decided, by them.

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@dagosa As the French say “Chacun pour soi”, to each his own. I know some guys who are married to high maintenance women, but they don’t complain.

After all these posts we now know that driving a Volt is not necessarily paying homage to the environment or optimizing transportation costs.

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@docnick

Bingo. I agree, re: “not necessarily”. But after all these posts, we also now know there a several other powerful reasons to drive a Volt, even if the two you mentioned just now don’t ring true for a particular person’s situation.

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@dagosa.
Agreed. After all, that IS what I am talkin about, Willis.

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And if GM or someone else comes out with a ~$35k AWD CUV Voltec EREV in the next few years (think cheaper Tesla Model X with a range extender), the preference and cost-benefit analysis can revisited for some.

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Like Volt found out, strict range extenders while driving are less efficient then powering the drive with both the electric and the gas motor while charging. This was where we started the debate. The so called gas motor as a range extender only like the diesel on an electric diesel train does not exist in the Volt. It is a parallel hybrid at times.!
You will not see Teslar, throw in a gas engine just to charge the battery. It will have a transmission controlled by a computer, just like Prius, just Volt. When you keep referring the ICE on a volts a range extender, you keep perpetuating the lie.

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Rather than incorporating a fuel burning engine to extend range, Tesla plans to install a recharging network so that people can travel a coupla-three hundred miles, stop, get a recharge in 30 minutes, and be on their way.

http://www.autonews.com/article/20130530/OEM05/130539993/tesla-accelerates-plan-for-coast-to-coast-recharging#axzz2X5aCXt00