[DieGrüneHölle]

...Volt.

Chris Harris reviews the Volt.

There are haters out there, but Chris is not one of them.

[rdub315]

Crazy that they lopped $5,000 off last year's price. Wonder how much they're losing on each one of these.

[PINeely]

Originally Posted by rdub315

Crazy that they lopped $5,000 off last year's price. Wonder how much they're losing on each one of these.

That plus the $7,500 federal tax credit and an additional $2,500 state tax credit in some places.

If they are losing any money on them it isn't much. The haters love to tell you that GM loses $30k on each one sold but that figure includes the R&D costs distributed amongst the first year of vehicles so it's hardly an accurate statistic (plus that R&D is making it into lots of their cars, not just the Volt). But they WILL end up costing GM $30k extra apiece if they can't get them sold, and so far the volt has been a total disaster. If not for California's electric car mandate I think they would have stopped production last year.

[hellrotm]

Originally Posted by PINeely

... and so far the volt has been a total disaster. If not for California's electric car mandate I think they would have stopped production last year.

Why do you say that? The Volt outsells a lot of BMW models each month. It was the number one selling EV in the US last year, outselling the Leaf, Telsa, Prius Plug-in.

The Volt drive train will trickle down to other GM vehicles, including the Cadillac ELR. The investment in this tech now, will show dividends in the future. The tech will only advance as well.

Same goes for BMW's "i" program. They have spent an enormous amount of money on it. In the long run they will reap the benefits.

[son_of_siggy]

Not much to add other than I love my Volt. I went from $300 a month or so in gas in my STi to $18 a month in electricity. Ran up to the hardware store the other day and fit some 8' 2x6 in through the hatch, to the front, and was able to close it all up. I love going to the gas station once every few months. Eventually I'll install a level 2 charger in the garage.

Side bonus: A lot of stores and event places have preferred EV parking. A few nice hotels/clubs in downtown also have 50% off valet parking for EVs.

[PINeely]

Originally Posted by BlackJetE90

Why do you say that? The Volt outsells a lot of BMW models each month. It was the number one selling EV in the US last year, outselling the Leaf, Telsa, Prius Plug-in.

The Volt drive train will trickle down to other GM vehicles, including the Cadillac ELR. The investment in this tech now, will show dividends in the future. The tech will only advance as well.

Same goes for BMW's "i" program. They have spent an enormous amount of money on it. In the long run they will reap the benefits.

Outselling a few BMW models isn't important to me because only a small percentage of the car-buying public is considering BMWs. Electric technology is supposed to be for the everyman but currently the everyman either can't afford it or isn't interested.

Similarly, it doesn't matter that the Volt has outsold other EV's because ALL EV sales have been dismal. The only manufacturer meeting their goals with them is Tesla and it's a luxury car and toy for the rich, in other words an outlier. Additionally, a huge percentage of the Volts sold have been to businesses or went to GM themselves, not individuals.

I am qualifying "failure" from a financial perspective; GM's inability to come anywhere close to their sales targets, such to the point that they essentially have to pay people to take them. However you are 100% right that this technology is going to trickle down to other cars in their line. This is a good thing, so maybe not a total disaster as I had said at first. Does that mean that we should keep the Volt around if it doesn't end up being profitable? I'm not convinced.

[CirrusSR22]

FWIW, the outgoing CEO of GM claimed the next gen Volt will be $7,000 - $10,000 cheaper than the current one.

http://insideevs.com/gm-ceo-chevrole...-for-next-gen/

[Efthreeoh]

Originally Posted by PINeely

Outselling a few BMW models isn't important to me because only a small percentage of the car-buying public is considering BMWs. Electric technology is supposed to be for the everyman but currently the everyman either can't afford it or isn't interested.

Similarly, it doesn't matter that the Volt has outsold other EV's because ALL EV sales have been dismal. The only manufacturer meeting their goals with them is Tesla and it's a luxury car and toy for the rich, in other words an outlier. Additionally, a huge percentage of the Volts sold have been to businesses or went to GM themselves, not individuals.

I am qualifying "failure" from a financial perspective; GM's inability to come anywhere close to their sales targets, such to the point that they essentially have to pay people to take them. However you are 100% right that this technology is going to trickle down to other cars in their line. This is a good thing, so maybe not a total disaster as I had said at first. Does that mean that we should keep the Volt around if it doesn't end up being profitable? I'm not convinced.

I'm sorry, but please cite where you've found that "Additionally, a huge percentage of the Volts sold have been to businesses or went to GM themselves, not individuals." I think this is a BS statement. Okay, so all EV sales are "dismal", but compared to what? Every Volt owner I've talked to LOVES their Volt. A friend of mine at work, who just retired, bought one new for $28K (incl all discounts) - His other car is a 66 'Vette. It's not the car for everyone, but for the target audience it was designed for, there is not much better out in the market at the price point.

The issue with the Volt is the people who really would want to buy it, the Greenies, are a bunch of American-hating ("open-minded") liberals who think GM makes POS cars; being so closed minded about GM they won't even go into a Chevy dealership to test drive and evaluate the Volt. If they did, they find it to be a really great car and probably buy it (if they didn't already have a Prius).

Go drive it and then report back what you think.

[PINeely]

Originally Posted by Efthreeoh

I'm sorry, but please cite where you've found that "Additionally, a huge percentage of the Volts sold have been to businesses or went to GM themselves, not individuals." I think this is a BS statement. Okay, so all EV sales are "dismal" compared to what? Every Volt owner I've talked to LOVES their Volt. A friend of mine at work, who just retired, bought one new for $28K (incl all discounts) - His other car is a 66 'Vette. It's not the car for everyone, but for the target audience it was designed for, there is not much better out in the market at the price point.

Go drive it and then report back what you think.

http://news.yahoo.com/whatever-happe...133027502.html

"'Consumers liked the look of the car but sales were flat," Fix said. "The plug-in portion put it at a disadvantage to other cars in the class. The bulk of the sales of the Chevy Volt is to municipalities, GE and other Obama-connected companies,' she added."

http://www.fool.com/investing/genera...olt-sales.aspx

"GM also benefits from fleet sales of its vehicles to the government, no doubt done in part to help prop up the bailed-out automaker. According to car website Edmunds.com, industry-wide fleet sales made up about 15% of sales -- which is actually a low point because of the effects of sequestration that are still in play, but fleet sales comprised 19% of GM's sales in July. While there are no hard and fast numbers for how many fleet purchases actually comprise the Volt's numbers, if we apply the industry average we see that around 2,800 are private owner sales, making the huge gains perhaps not so dramatic."

EV sales are dismal compared with a non-electric equivalent and the manufacturers sales targets. They can try to will this into existence all they want but the fact remains that the public at large simply isn't as interested as we'd like them to be. Also I'm sure that the Volt is a fantastic car (I'm not saying that it isn't), but it has been a flop from a business standpoint. How many fewer customers would they have if they still retailed for $40k and didn't include tax incentives?

[hellrotm]

Originally Posted by PINeely

http://www.fool.com/investing/genera...olt-sales.aspx

Nothing in that article states how many fleet units are the Volt. It even states that in the article. It is actually stupid for author to even imply that in article without any factual data.

Every car brand has fleet sales. That is Toyota's little secret to sales numbers.

Is the EV segment the number car segment, no. Far from it. But it will grow, still very early in development. Once battery technology catches up and technology gets cheaper. They will start to sell in higher volumes. The Volt will continue to be the number one EV sold in the US, even with new competition coming like the i3.

BMW was a lot smarter, only forecasting 10,000+ units worldwide. That was GM's biggest blunder, their forecasts were way too optimistic. BMW has a lot more money in the "i" program, wonder what their per unit cost is?

It will be fun to see this forum spin the i3 sales as a succes.

[PINeely]

Originally Posted by BlackJetE90

Nothing in that article states how many fleet units are the Volt. It even states that in the article. It is actually stupid for author to even imply that in article without any factual data.

Every car brand has fleet sales. That is Toyota's little secret to sales numbers.

Is the EV segment the number car segment, no. Far from it. But it will grow, still very early in development. Once battery technology catches up and technology gets cheaper. They will start to sell in higher volumes. The Volt will continue to be the number EV sold in the US, even with new competition coming like the i3.

BMW was a lot smarter, only forecasting 10,000+ units worldwide. That was GM's biggest blunder, their forecasts were way too optimistic. BMW has a lot more money in the "i" program, wonder what their per unit cost is?

I really just linked that article to illustrate that fleet sales were taking place. Here are some real numbers that I found:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-.../2829163/posts

"General Motors reported Chevy Volt sales of 1,529 for the month of December... according to GM, 992 of the Volts sold were to retail customers while 537 went to fleet purchasers. "

Also it is known that a percentage of Volt sales are in fleet contracts such as the one with GE:
http://www.plugincars.com/ge-will-pu...ts-106436.html

You nailed it 100% that battery technology has to improve a lot before this movement gets any real momentum.

[hellrotm]

Originally Posted by PINeely

I really just linked that article to illustrate that fleet sales were taking place. Here are some real numbers that I found:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-.../2829163/posts

"General Motors reported Chevy Volt sales of 1,529 for the month of December... according to GM, 992 of the Volts sold were to retail customers while 537 went to fleet purchasers. "

Also it is known that a percentage of Volt sales are in fleet contracts such as the one with GE:
http://www.plugincars.com/ge-will-pu...ts-106436.html

You nailed it 100% that battery technology has to improve a lot before this movement gets any real momentum.

Here is a counter to the anti Volt articles. Good to read both sides.

Addresses a lot of articles you have referenced.

http://gm-volt.com/2012/09/25/five-m...vy-volt-sales/

[PINeely]

Originally Posted by BlackJetE90

Here is a counter to the anti Volt articles. Good to read both sides.

Addresses a lot of articles you have referenced.

http://gm-volt.com/2012/09/25/five-m...vy-volt-sales/

I agree, it is important to read both sides. I'll put the counter-argument here for everyone's convenience. Also I apologize in advance for the book I've just written.


1. The Volt is a sales flop due to an inability to meet targets.
"A few GM executives got carried away and quoted sales goals equal to the production capacity of the updated Hamtramck assemble plant. This despite the well know adoption hurdles to the new technology.
Even if "a few GM executives got carried away" and overestimated sales numbers, everything else about the Volt is contingent upon those estimates including the price, term to profitability, etc. So even if the sales estimates were a mistake, GM still failed to meet them and that mistake will cost them money, ergo a sales flop.

"In 2012 GM reined in its cheerleading sales folks and in the words of Bob Lutz, GM’s former Vice Chairman, reminded them of that the Volt’s 'prime purpose was to introduce a new generation of technology.”
GM Translation: "If it isn't successful then of course it wasn't meant to be. Even though we totally said that we were going to sell a lot of them."

the Volt is now outsell many conventional luxury sedans in its price range including both the BMW 7-Series and the Mercedes-Benz S Class, and even the mid-size Audi A6.
A loose interpretation of "price range" at absolute best.


2. The US Gov is buying most of the Volts.
"The U.S. government has so far purchased only 130 Volts over the last year (source GM). This despite running a fleet of over 200,000 cars. Every attempt to purchase even a handful of Volts has been met by a firestorm of attention by local and national press that has created a barrier to sales."
Is there a recorded instance of this "barrier to sales" actually happening? Or is GM telling us that they can't even sell these things to the government that bailed them out? I find it hard to believe that the Pentagon would back out of buying Volts because a few rednecks somewhere don't like the scary black president.

3. GE and corporations are making large fleet purchases.
"Although in 2011 several large U.S. companies publicly announced that they would add a large number of Volts to their fleets, they have not yet done so. GE specifically announced that it would add as many as 12,000 Volts to its fleet over the next five years."
So this is not a myth at all, straight from the horse's mouth. Large companies were indeed to buy a bunch of Volts, and GM was very keen on parading that around as evidence of the Volt's success. But oh no! "So far GE has not followed through on this and has purchased only several hundred Volts."
That says a lot doesn't it?

4. The volt is selling for $49,000 less than it costs to make.
Anyone who understands R&D can tell you that this isn't true.

5. Volts can't be sold without discounts.
"End of year discounts on last year’s model is not normally headline news, unless of course you are talking about the Chevy Volt. In August, as the 2012 Volt was phasing out in favor of the 2013 model year, GM provided incentives, as it usually does with other models to clear out old stock. This included great lease deals, buyer incentives and dealer bonuses for making sales targets."
GM Translation: "We sold them using discounts."

[quagmire]

The Volt is a perfect car for me right now. My commute is only 16 miles. Can't afford it, but I am with my current situation within its target audience.

The Volt sadly has been a political football due to the bailout. Somehow Obama ordered the Volt to be made in 2009 and was ready by the end of 2010 for sale. Anyone who knows anything about car development knows it takes about 4 years to develop a new regular car. So if they think it took a year to develop the Volt, they are on something. And then the media was ready with the pitch forks whenever the Volt was involved in a fire.....

Ignoring GM's overly optimistic sales projections, the Volt is a good piece of engineering. It is the biggest risk GM has taken in a long long time. And even today they are very adverse to taking risks. So I commend them in taking the risk.

[hellrotm]

We'll see how the ELR sells, it has a hefty $75k price tag. I would like to see the Volt powertrain adapted to a pickup. Would be nice for driving around town, be able to switch to full eletric. Avoiding the thirsty V8. I think Lutz alluded to this concept recently.

[Efthreeoh]

Originally Posted by PINeely

http://news.yahoo.com/whatever-happe...133027502.html

"'Consumers liked the look of the car but sales were flat," Fix said. "The plug-in portion put it at a disadvantage to other cars in the class. The bulk of the sales of the Chevy Volt is to municipalities, GE and other Obama-connected companies,' she added."

http://www.fool.com/investing/genera...olt-sales.aspx

"GM also benefits from fleet sales of its vehicles to the government, no doubt done in part to help prop up the bailed-out automaker. According to car website Edmunds.com, industry-wide fleet sales made up about 15% of sales -- which is actually a low point because of the effects of sequestration that are still in play, but fleet sales comprised 19% of GM's sales in July. While there are no hard and fast numbers for how many fleet purchases actually comprise the Volt's numbers, if we apply the industry average we see that around 2,800 are private owner sales, making the huge gains perhaps not so dramatic."

EV sales are dismal compared with a non-electric equivalent and the manufacturers sales targets. They can try to will this into existence all they want but the fact remains that the public at large simply isn't as interested as we'd like them to be. Also I'm sure that the Volt is a fantastic car (I'm not saying that it isn't), but it has been a flop from a business standpoint. How many fewer customers would they have if they still retailed for $40k and didn't include tax incentives?

I just don't see how you can say the Volt is a "flop from business standpoint" at this point. The car has been on sale barely 3 years and introduces a new drivetrain technology that will take time to be adopted by the auto buying public (if they can ever understand what it is in the first place - most of the buying public are dumbasses and don't understand car tech at all). The Volt from what I have read is the best selling EV worldwide. Although overall EV sales are low numerically to non EV sales, I don't think it can be classified as a sales flop just yet. Three years into the 1st Gen Prius, you could make the same arguments, sales were low, the technology was not very well adopted, and Toyota lost money one every one sold. 14 years later and the Prius is mainstream.

And I still say GM has to fight a 20-year ago earned perception of quality, on top of the stupid "Government Motors" bullshit (anyone heard of farm subsidies or how Tesla really makes money?), all while introducing a advanced drivetrain technology.

So if fleet sales need to push the sales of the Volt to get the general public familiar with the car then so be it. And you point to the fact that even the Government won't buy them. Why, well maybe it's because the Government, with its 200,000 fleet sales, doesn't have the charging infrastructure in place to keep 20,000 Volts (10% of the total fleet) in a ready-charged state. You really are going to depend on a Government employee to drive a Volt for the day, park it, then actually take the 30 more seconds it takes to plug it in?

[Efthreeoh]

Originally Posted by quagmire

The Volt is a perfect car for me right now. My commute is only 16 miles. Can't afford it, but I am with my current situation within its target audience.

The Volt sadly has been a political football due to the bailout. Somehow Obama ordered the Volt to be made in 2009 and was ready by the end of 2010 for sale. Anyone who knows anything about car development knows it takes about 4 years to develop a new regular car. So if they think it took a year to develop the Volt, they are on something. And then the media was ready with the pitch forks whenever the Volt was involved in a fire.....

Ignoring GM's overly optimistic sales projections, the Volt is a good piece of engineering. It is the biggest risk GM has taken in a long long time. And even today they are very adverse to taking risks. So I commend them in taking the risk.

The ONE time it was involved in a fire (3-weeks after a side-crash and roll over test). I can't tell how many e-mails I sent to Fox News...

Fox finally shut up about it when Geo. H. W. Bush bought a Volt for one of the Grandkiddies...

[quagmire]

Originally Posted by BlackJetE90

We'll see how the ELR sells, it has a hefty $75k price tag. I would like to see the Volt powertrain adapted to a pickup. Would be nice for driving around town, be able to switch to full eletric. Avoiding the thirsty V8. I think Lutz alluded to this concept recently.

I heard GM is expecting to sell roughly 200 ELR's a month.

And of course Lutz alluded to the concept, he is on the board of a company that takes Silverado's and converts them to electric.

Originally Posted by Efthreeoh

The ONE time it was involved in a fire (3-weeks after a side-crash and roll over test). I can't tell how many e-mails I sent to Fox News...

Fox finally shut up about it when Geo. H. W. Bush bought a Volt for one of the Grandkiddies...

The Volt has been involved in a few fires. The media jumped on it going, " Is the Volt safe?" before knowing the cause which most of them were caused by the charger, poor electrical work in the garage, etc. Not the Volt's fault.

The one time it was a cause of a fire is the one you just mentioned which was a NTSB crash test vehicle. They didn't pull the red chord that fire fighters are supposed to after crash( not sure what it does, but I am sure it has to do with securing the battery) and they didn't drain the battery of its charge which allowed of course for the short to happen when the liquid coolant that regulates the temperature of the battery leaked into the damaged battery. Of course as you stated, it took 3 weeks for it to happen. But, the media didn't care. The Volt was a political football and they picked it up and ran with it.