Why does the Chevy Volt ONLY get 40 mi/charge?
Chevy sold the NiMH patents to Chevron and they forced Toyota, others to stop making EV size ones, limiting them to 10 amp/hr.
“Car companies don’t like them because there are few parts to wear out. An EV motor only has a couple bearings that wear out and doesn’t need a transmission. Because of this their main profit, after market parts and replacement cars because they last so long”.
It’s a function of battery size and cost. With this type of battery it’s easy to almost reach the cost of the car itself if you make it big enough.
The Volt is a compromise between cost, range, and charging time. GM determined that 40 miles was about right. If you bought a Tesla, at 3-4 times the price, for commuting, your range would be that much larger.
If you are looking for a conspiracy here, I don’t think there is one.
These are the same people who kept the 100 mpg carburetor off the market all these years.
I agree with Docnick 100%. There is no conspiracy here just a business solution. I drive less than 40 miles per day so the Volt would be perfect for me. If you drive more than 40 miles per day then the Volt would not be your best choice for transportation.
I too agree with Doc. Further, I don’t believe there ever actually was a workable 100mpg carburator. Extreme mileage can be accomplished using extreme techniques and making extreme compromises, but I believe the 100 mpg carburator often cited is folklore…a myth.
I’m not talking conspiracy! Look it up. Car builders are forced to use very heavy lead acid or the very expensive lithium ion batteries, like in the tesla.
The quoted part was from someone’s post on another forum.
It’s not a conspiracy that Chevron stopped companies like Panasonic from producing their better version(EV-95 NiMH) of the NiMH battery, that Toyota used, it’s fact!
Do you honestly think big oil wants electric cars!?
http://fuel-efficient-vehicles.org/energy-news/?p=690 one of many sites
100 mpg carburetor…please.
there never was any car in production that had that on it
This is a non-issue…NiMH batteries are obsolete and can not compete with Lithium-ion or the even better Lithium-poly that will power Hyundai’s new hybrid…
“Why does the Chevy Volt ONLY get 40 mi/charge?”…Because in order to contain costs, it’s battery SIZE is limited to provide that range…It’s not a true plug-in electric like the Lief which theoretically has a 100 mile range provided by its much larger Lithium battery…
This might have been an issue, no longer. Control over one specific battery technology is not the reason EVs are expensive. Expensive batteries are the reason. Cut battery cost, decrease recharge time, and they’ll start making sense.
And the Chevy Volt ‘only gets 40 mi/charge’ because it has a gas engine on board for when you need to go further. Nobody can afford a car with 100+ miles battery range + a gas engine today (assuming Uncle Sam isn’t footing the bill).
The 100 MPG carburetor is a myth that’s been around for more decades than I can remember. You would not believe how many people I’ve run into over the years who know an uncle/friend/grandfather/co-worker’s in-law/whatever who lives across town/next town over/just across the state line and who was visited by government agents/guys in black suits and shades who confiscated the carburetor never to be seen again.
The generally previaling theory is that these mysterious guys were covert Big Oil agents who got wind of this miracle carb and headed it off before it became widely known. A mechanic I worked with at one time told me his uncle had spent 3 years building a 100 MPG carburetor (never installed on a car though) and one evening while working in his garage in Shawnee, OK 3 men in suits showed up and took the carburetor. (jackets opened slightly to reveal shoulder holsters of course) 
I’d be extremely surprised if the Volt will get 40 MPG on a full charge out in the real world; just like the Tesla is not going to go anwhere near the distance they claim.
My prediction from the get-go has been that the Volt will be a dismal failure and just like Tesla and the ill-fated Venture One it’s all hype to bring in the investment dollars and government funding.
There is on my nephew’s motorbike! Remember the Fish carburetor from the 50’s; it had no moving parts and was supposed to give fabulous mileage.
The Chinese will have cornered the auto battery market in a few years. They have all the exotic materials and don’t care who owns what patent.
“Car companies don’t like them because there are few parts to wear out. An EV motor only has a couple bearings that wear out and doesn’t need a transmission. Because of this their main profit, after market parts and replacement cars because they last so long”.
Actually, EVs do have some sort of gear train between the motor and the wheels and when the bearings of an electric motor do fail, it pretty much renders the motor un-repairable, unless the failure is caught in the early stages.
What else can go wrong with an electric motor? Insulation failure resulting in shorts. Rotor bar melting in induction motors from severe overloads, which can also destroy the magnet wire’s insulation. In DC motors with permanent magnet fields, overheating can weaken the magnetic field resulting in high armature current and low torque which compounds the overheating resulting in the very familiar to me burnt out motor smell.
It’s funny how “big coal” never got it together and bought out the patents for the gasoline burning internal combustion engine to keep people using steam engines and how “big hay” never managed to keep steam engines off the market.
But true believers seem to see conspiracies everywhere they look.