Any Chevy Volt owners here?

General Discussion
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Sorry, I misspoke. the 7-10% would be typically highway driving, where the EPA is 40, not 37, that is the combine test circuit because the city rating is 35. A Volt driver recently drove for a week depleted and got 45.5 for a whole tank - that’s basically Prius gas mileage, and the Volt weighs 600 pounds more, is a little less aerodynamic, and was wider tires.

Personally I’ve never driven the Volt long enough in CS to get a gas mileage ready - I did do 11 miles at 43 mpg once, on a hilly rural highway, up and down.

That’s a big part of the point. Precise MPG doesn’t matter when you’re 80, 90% (or 96.8% in my case) Lifetime EV miles. It’s just a feature.

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Now let’s discuss the CS (Charge Sustain, or “just another hybrid” mode, as the factually-challenged dagosa has so maligned as some kind of “GM Conspiracy”). Keep in mind that When the battery is depleted to ~%15 (or two other driver selected modes, Mountain and 2013 and later’s Hold), the Volt gasoline engine comes on initially, and periodically to maintain this SOC (state of charge) of the battery, the same way all hybrids including the Prius do. But that is where the comparison to a Prius and other “weak EV” plug-ins ends.

During CS mode, the planetary gear system in Volt is designed maximum efficiency from different sources, depending upon the situation. Here are the most common ones:

  1. In normal acceleration events, all propulsion will come from the main traction motor just as in CD mode. And in fact, if the SOC of the battery is close enough to 15%, the engine will remain off at any speed. This is different from Prius, which will trigger the engine even under mild acceleration or hills, and at some arbitrary points like reaching 41 mph (Gen II).

  2. In extreme acceleration events (“flooring it”, up a steep hill, etc), again, all propulsion will come from the main traction motor as it can handle it and it gives you the best, safest performance. The gas engine will likely come on, and may rev higher to compensate for both the increased drain on the battery, and also be able to provide some juice direct to the motor (aka a “series hybrid” event) which is more efficient than putting it in the battery first. Of course, efficiency is not the top priority in any car when you are hard accelerating; performance and safety are. So this is also all very different than the Prius, which in hard acceleration immediately “latches” the engine directly to the wheels because its traction motor can’t handle the torque (and its power electronics can’t handle the juice). So you get the poorer performance (jerky and racing engine; feeling the car “struggling”) and less driving safety in extreme situations.

  3. Sustained, steady speeds (above 35 mph?) for a 7-10% efficiency gain. That’s the only time the Volt is in a “parallel hybrid” type mode. As soon as you accelerate, disengage cruise control, etc, you’ll likdel drop out of this mode back to single motor EV.

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Check out volt stats dot net, you will see the folks with high EV miles like me have low mpg (it doesn’t matter) but those with more gas miles, many have over 40 mpg LIFETIME.

Anyhow, the Volt IS an EV with a range extender.The real world stats prove it. Comparing the CS mode mpg to Prius is a red herring. Don’t waste any more time on it!

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@bscar2 - Many Volt owners have already used their Volt to power stuff their houses in a power outage. I did just that last year during the hurricane, with a off the shelf 410W inverter. The traction batter would power lamps, computer, etc for days if needed, then the gas engine would kick in for more.

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PS My Prius averages 47 mpg in summer, 45 in winter. Yes, the Volt would do A FEW mpg less on a long trip (not MUCH worse as dagosa hyperbolizes)…but first you’d have to drive the Volt almost 200 miles before it would break even with the Prius.

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Note: the approx “~200 mile trip” efficiency advantage the Volt has over the Prius is for gasoline consumption break-even only; both would use ~4 gallons. But factoring in the slight extra cost of premium gas and the cost for the kWh charging for the Volt, the cost-basis break even would be somewhere between 75 and 125 miles, depending upon a person’s electricity costs (unless someone got a “free” charge).

Of course you can then plug the Volt in for a few hours at a charging station or overnight while you sleep, something the Prius will never do, and beat the Prius for another hundred+ miles all over again. Sorry Prius, there’s really no “catching up” long term unless you drive a long way, all the time, every day!

So that’s why, if I’m going on a ~75+ mile trip on the weekend, I still try to force myself (MY STATS NOOO!) to take the Volt. I may be only saving pocket change that day or perhaps just breaking even with my Prius, but I’m also likely reducing my personal gasoline consumption by almost a gallon, more if I can plug in at my destination.

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One last real world mpg long “day-trip” example for you, with my wife as the driver (note that she does not “hypermile”, nor think about driving gently nor not use climate controls AT ALL).

It was a 98 mile round trip: She did 45 miles all EV miles all the way there (1 mile range left!) Easy plug in at a friendly outlet for a few hours while we golfed; On the return, she did 17 more EV miles + 36 high speed (~75 mph) gas miles to get home, consuming just 0.96 gallons for a total trip mpg of 103 mpg.

We avoided using 1.1 gallons of gas and saved $1.88 (net after electricity costs), and used 25 kWh LESS energy overall compared with if we had taken our Prius.

Beat that, if you can!

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I do not nor have I denied that if you live in the sweet spot range, you can get excellent results. But, the same results exists with a Plug In Prius for it’s limited range and for a Leaf for It’s.

Are you denying that at times, a Volt acts as a parallel hybrid with a planetary gear set that allows the motor to help drive the wheels to increase efficiency ?
And, do you agree that once the battery is depleted, the mileage rating of a Volt highway is 37 mpg, EPA rated, no better then many compact cars ?
I have not made up anything and I like you would look for the upside of spending all that money o buy a Volt. It does have up sides, but I certainly isn’t economy after continuous 30 miles !

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@dagosa -
“same results exists with a Plug In Prius for it’s limited range and for a Leaf”:

Not the same results AT ALL. The PIP cannot function but in an extremely crippled way at minimal speeds or acceleration as an EV for a real world range of ~10 miles, due to its half size 80 hp traction motor attempting to pull its 3200 lb+ weight. In addition its inferior air-cooled (vs Volt’s liquid cooled) battery being only 4.4 kWh, lacks the power density of the Volt’s 16.5 kWh, and important factor in providing acceleration power energy. The PIP is poor attempt try rig up the existing Prius into a sort sort of semi-usable EV. Also, as soon as you turn on most climate controls in the PIP, the gas engine comes on, Heat is ICE dependent on the PIP, whereas the Volt is all electric heat which will just gradually east at your range. In fact this morning I sat in my Volt with the heat blasting for ~45 minutes, and all that happened was 5 miles of range ticked down, understandably. The Volt is a ground-up engineered EREV solution, using some ideas from previous GM EVs and hybrids (yes, including the Prius), and only the platform (some chassis components) from the Delta series of vehicles.

The Leaf is simply an BEV and therefore it can never use 100% of its engineered EV range (as the Volt can, because whether you need 1 mile more or 150 miles more, the Volt will simply switch over to gasoline as the fuel source) So the Leaf’s proven real world use able range shrinks to the low-to-mid 50 miles in harsh winters; in a similar scenario in the Volt I was still often getting over 40 miles range. So the range difference in the real world is almost insignificant; how the “oh no I’m going to get stuck” range anxiety factor is not!

In the Volt, you only get “gas anxiety”, otherwise know as a fun car trip diversion. :wink:

And as I have proven, the Volt’s sweet spot vs the gas Prius is NOT 30 miles as you keep repeating, it’s 75 to 200 miles depending upon how you calculate and your electricity costs. Ironically, he PIP is the one that might have the advantage in trips well under 30 miles only! And what a limitation-ridden ride that has to be! Watch out for that hill! Will it be cold today? Guess we a gassing it!! :slight_smile:

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@dagosa who wrote “Are you denying that at times, a Volt acts as a parallel hybrid with a planetary gear set that allows the motor to help drive the wheels to increase efficiency ?”

Nope, not denying that, and I never was. I actually explained that mode above. And the key words there are “to increase efficiency”. Unlike the other weak EV plug ins, there is and was never a design engineering need to use the gas engine for propulsion for any power reason. The Volt’s single traction motor is plenty of oomph (love the Sport Mode!)

So due to this engine latch design inclusion (which by the way the GM engineers have been publicly forthcoming about FROM THE BEGINNING) means in the real world highway drives doing ~65 mph with cruise control on will get 40-45+ mpg in the Volt, instead of of like 36-41 mpg they might have gotten if GM hadn’t made the conscious choice to remove the extra losses of the “middle man” of a generator, electronic power conversion, etc. It makes perfect sense if you really think about it from a design perspective.

For me, In my 22,000 miles of driving, which includes only ~750 gas miles so far, it’s a feature that has little benefit nor use for me - I doubt I have driven even a hundred miles, or one half of one tenth of 1 percent of my total mileage with the engine clutch latch mode you prefer to describe as “parallel hybrid”. To people who do a lot of long trips on the highway (well don’t buy a Volt for that) it may save them some gas over 98% of the other lower mpg vehicles they might have chosen. But no, not over standard Prius on a 300+ trip with no stops for charging. The Prius will save you a couple bucks in that scenario. Like literally ~$2. There, happy? :slight_smile:

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My lifetime mpg on the Volt for 22k miles is over 970 mpg. Much higher than the 230 mpg GM originally claimed. Look it up on volt stats dot net, car is named Oppy.

My MPGe which comparing actually miles on a different energy source is harder to accurately measure, but I would estimate it is ~120 MPGe real world (I typically get 5 miles per kWh driving, as opposed to the EPA rated 3.4 miles per kWh, where the 93 to 98 MPGe rating comes from)

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970 mpg ?
That’s rediculous.
In sheer energy terms, a Leaf gets the equivalent of 99 mpg. Guess your electriity is free !

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Dag,correct me if I’m wrong,but you cannot ever drive a Prius as a pure eletric can you?(at one time I thought you could-always thought that would be a nice feature to get you to a gas station on an empty tank) thanks for the info BSCAR, I think that GM had a pickup a few years back you could use as a backup generator{check out the the new 2014 Chevy truck lineup with the revised ECO TECH 3 engines} I would have narrowed this lineup a while back had i been GM.-Kevin

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Yes you can drive a Prius for short distances on 100% battery. I do the same with my MKZ hybrid.

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@dagosa who wrote: "And, do you agree that once the battery is depleted, the mileage rating of a Volt highway is 37 mpg, EPA rated, no better then many compact cars ? "

No, you are still spreading misinformation. As I have already corrected you once, the Volt’s highway mpg rating (in CS or “hybrid” mode only of course) is 40 mpg highway; 35 city; 37 combined. Look it up, it’s called google.

GM like all carmakers, tests their own vehicles and sends the ratings to the EPA, who simply approve them, as they only verify 10-15% of submissions. GM has been very conservative with this on the Volt and other vehicles; Hyundai, and more recently Ford, not so much with their 47 mpg claim on the CMAX hybrid (many people are only getting 35 or less) have run into trouble.

In real world use (thanks in part to the steady-state efficiency ICE latching that you keep harping on) most Volt drivers are getting over 40 mpg on their limited highway driving, for example, in cruise control at 65 mph- you will almost certainly get over 40 mpg in the Volt. Again, most Volt drivers, majority of the miles are EV, and the small percentage of gas miles are mostly highway for long trips, where they are getting over 40 mpg in the real world. These are facts you need to reconcile your incorrect info.

And the only vehicles that MIGHTget equal or better highway mpg than the Volt are a very few hybrids like Prius or CMAX, a very few compact diesels (that are more expensive to fuel), and a very few sub-compact stick shift econo-boxes (like my former Yaris, which would get 42 mpg, with a great deal of coasting and coaxing)

But all this focus on a few mpg difference is such a red herring, it really doesn’t matter, because the benefits of the 80% EV on the one hand, and have to only own 1 vehicle on the other (if you have a Leaf, you might need a 2nd gas car for long trip) so outweigh this insignificant issue.

It’s like complaining about {insert name of movie star you think is hot name here}'s morning breath. :wink:

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As for all this 230 mpg criticism, that is such old news. It’s quite easy for anyone (who has selected the Volt because it fits their lifestyle; for example, they do not commute a hundred miles a day or are not a traveling salesperson) to get 230+ mpg long term.

Let’s use the very conservative pre-2013 ratings to illustrate the point.

Simply plug in at night, commute 35 miles a day for 5 days using no gasoline (175 miles). Then take a 72 mile trip on the weekend and use a gallon of gas. For the week, you’ll have gotten 247 mpg…because you used on gallon of gas and went 247 miles.

That’s how GM could have estimated its 230 mpg as a simple way to explain its ground-breaking, paradigm-shifting efficiency to the masses…and guess what, it’s true.

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http://gas2.org/2010/11/24/chevy-volt-gets-combined-epa-rating-of-60-mpg/
And no W A, it’s called Bing. Am tiring of your snide remarks.
Simply plug in at night…your electricity is still free ? No, not even a completely electric car car can do better then 99 mpg cost/energy equvelant. Your claims completely discounts the electricity you buy and is as bogus as GMs claim of 230 mpg. You casually say…plug in to some friendly output as if while you play a round of golf, you get a full charge or free… If we take what you say as true about a Volt, then when applied to a Leaf, it must costs nothing to drive and goes an infinite number of miles for free. From here on, you’re convincing yourself. Have a good day.

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@dagosa who wrote “970 mpg ? That’s rediculous… Guess your electriity is free !”

No…the total electricity cost for driving my Volt is ~$50 a month…but ~$20 a month is paid for by my employer because I plug in at work every day to complete my 70 mile round trip gas-free. (I usually arrive at work or home with ~15 mile range, because my summer range is ~50 miles, if I lay off the Sport Mode:).

So my out of pocket cost for fuel is only ~$30 a month. And for EVs, a better measure of efficiency than either mpg which as you said gets rediculous, or MPGe which gets very complex to calculate accurately, is miles per dollar.

So my driving cost is about 34 miles per dollar (1700 miles a month/$50)…or in out of pocket costs, 57 miles per dollar.

Where as a standard Prius (at $3.75 gas prices) only gets you ~13 miles per dollar.
(The average new car purchased in 2013 got 24.5 mpg, or 6.5 miles per dollar)

Last year I did also use 18 gallons of gas, so that ~$70 cost does need to be taken in to account. Factoring that in, my true miles per dollar is 47.5.

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And, there are some places in the US where the cost of electricity is higher per mile then the cost of gasoline.

Bragging about how little a Volt cost to run when your employer is paying for some of your electricity to charge it is like me bragging about how efficient my gas powered car is to run when I get a mileage fee from my employer to cover my gas. It shows how distorted your numbers have come to be.

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@dagosa - my apologies if it seemed like I was bragging; I was just trying to answer your question.

So after removing the employer transportation/commuter fringe benefit (let’s call it what it actually is) my miles per dollar is 33. (Compared to 13 for a Prius)

And my home electricity is not by any means on the cheap side; 16.5 cents a kWh, when the national average is 12 cents, and less than 6 in sone states with certain TOS or other discount programs.

As cheap as it is to fuel an EV for me, others “brag” about how much cheaper theirs is, but I try to jot take it personally :slight_smile: