I honestly laid in bed last night thinking about the Chevy Volt’s $41k price tag. Seriously. When I got the press release shortly before it crossed the wire yesterday, the price seemed about right for a first-gen Voltec vehicle. Then the $350 lease program looked even better. I was already totally sold on the Volt after driving an early mule over a year ago and the price tag didn’t even bother me one bit. It’s not like I planned on buying one, but I could see where GM was coming from.
Then my post went up at 12:00 pm yesterday and quickly filled with commentors railing against the $41,000 price tag. That was followed by nearly every national news program claiming the Volt’s price invokes a bit of sticker shock. I thought, “Did these people really think the Volt was going to be the same price as a Malibu?” Apparently.
But then Rush Limbaugh opened-up on the Volt today and two things became clear. One, many people including Rush (and previously Letterman) do not fundamentally understand the Volt’s capabilities. I believe most consumers expected the Volt to be a mass-market vehicle and an instant hit in a sort of iPhone way. Yeah, that’s just not how the auto industry works.
I guess part of my acceptance of the $41k price is that I have GM in my blood. The Internet would call me a GM fanboy, but it’s something a little more deep. I’m more of a GM loyalist — being born, raised and still living within minutes of GM’s long-forgotten birthplace — Flint, MI (70 miles from Detroit). This is the place where under the leadership of Billy Durant, a bunch of separate automakers joined together and formed General Motors starting with Buick in 1908. It’s now a sorry remnant of its storied past, but things are getting better, partly because of the Volt.
GM is spending $230 million in Flint, primarily to retool one of the old factories into the manufacturing facility for the Chevy Volt and Cruze’s 1.4L gasoline engine. The Volt’s battery pack is being developed and made across the state in Holland, Michigan. It’s safe to say that everyone around here is pulling for the Volt.
But if I set aside all the feelings I have about GM, I still believe that $41k is the right price for the first-gen Volt. Even without the tax credit worth up to $7500, most of the initial 10,000 available Volts will be snatched up at full retail. People are buying luxury cars right now and it’s undeniable that the Volt will give the Prius a run for its celebrity clientèle.
Bloomberg reported a few weeks ago about the state of luxury autos right now; BMW, Mercedes, and Audi simply cannot keep up with the demand. While I’ll be the first to counter that point by saying that a Chevy isn’t an Audi, the report clearly states that people have money to spend on cars. The $7,500 tax credit President Bush approved (Sorry, Rush, this isn’t Obama’s tax credit) back in the recession of 2008 is just a bonus for the first round of buyers.
With a price tag of $41k, GM is clearly targeting this higher-end market. The Chevy Volt isn’t a car for the masses — at least it isn’t yet — and that’s fine. It doesn’t need to be. The Volt isn’t a consumer electronic like the iPad. It’s a car and its story isn’t finished within the first month of sales.
General Motors isn’t just in the business of selling one vehicle. The once king of automakers originally earned that title by developing many similar vehicle’s around common platforms and powertrains. This practice, along with the “it’s good ’nuff” attitude, is one of the main reasons for its demise as well, but the Volt’s powertrain, named Voltec, isn’t the overused 3800 engine used by countless Buicks, Chevys, Pontaics, and Oldsmobiles for two decades. It’s one of the keys to General Motor’s future.
There’s no way to tell how much R&D went into the Volt, but it’s probably safe to say that it was far more than the average vehicle. Rest assured that the entire investment isn’t riding on this one car (two if you count its European twin, the Opel Ampera), but rather on the multitude of vehicles that will share the same underpinnings and electric powerplant.
GM already showed off a few such vehicles like the Cadillac Converj sports coupe concept and the production-bound MPV5 crossover. Those are just the beginning, too. The Volt is the first model in what is sure to be a large line-up of extended-range electric vehicles with the same electric motor backed by a gasoline-powered generator.
Part of the reason for the Volt’s higher initial price than, say, the Leaf is that the Volt’s essentially the first of its kind to be designed with mass production in mind. Simply put, it’s an electric vehicle with a range of 40 miles that also has a small gasoline engine that will power the motor with excess sent to the batteries until the tank reads E — supposedly another 260 miles. Think of it as a hybrid with the powerplants in different roles. In a traditional hybrid like the Prius, the gasoline engine and electric motor can run separately — electric during slow speeds, braking and idle — or combined together during hard acceleration. However, it requires gasoline to go and the Volt doesn’t (Volt’s primary power plant is the electric motor).
This is what sets the Volt apart from other alternative vehicles; you literally don’t need to run on gas — the gas generator might still pop on to regulate the climate if it gets too hot or cold while the Volt’s parked, though. But then the Volt can also drive long-range as long as there’s gas in the tank. Sure, it’s not the best at either as many EVs have longer range and estimates peg the Volt’s gas mileage around 50mpg, but the real story is that it does both, which no other vehicle can claim. Well, maybe the coach-built Fisker Karma but that also carries a $87k pricetag.
$41,000 is a lot of money for a vehicle that many thought would be the savior of General Motors. But the Volt doesn’t have to be a breakaway hit for it to be success in GM’s eyes. The Prius will no doubt outsell it for years and the same probably goes for the Nissan Leaf. But GM’s in this for the long run and the Volt is just the beginning.
i’d love to help save the environment, but i live in an apartment building like millions of new yorkers. stupid plug in electric vehicles
EVSolutions multi-unit charger is the solution.
Ask your landlord or HOA and try to convince them.
http://evsolutions.avinc.com/products/multi-unit
Yes i am also having same limitation. Thinking of buying a house just for this. But is it reasonable?
Buying a car since you have a car which needs a garage. come on..
The funny thing about the so-called environmentally friendly Volt, is that it is not an environmentally friendly vehicle. The power needed to charge and re-charge the battery is produced by coal; an extremely dirty fossil fuel.
On top of that, as the batteries charge wares out in time, the same amount of coal will be needed to fuel your “not-so-environmentally” friendly car – end result, your now driving more like 28 miles to a full charge, not 40. Better turn off the in-dash navigation to get an extra 1/2 mile out of that battery!
Until many more nuclear plants are developed, the electric vehicle takes a back seat to a cleaner, more efficient fossil fuel – Gasoline.
When you look at the big picture, plug-ins still have lower emissions compared with gas powered vehicles, even if the electricity used to charge them is from coal. What most people don’t think about with gasoline is all the energy it takes to drill for it, refine it, and transport it.
http://energy.typepad.com/the-energy-blog/2010/04/greenhouse-gas-emissions-electric-vs-gasoline-cars.html
Really? and where does coal come from? Does it just float up? And lets not forget the nuclear energy that powers so much of the US.
No, of course it does not just “float up.” I work in the energy sector and can tell you that mining coal takes less energy than drilling for oil and refining it into gasoline and transporting it to your local gas station. I’m not defending the use of coal electricity, but the fact is that this issue has been heavily researched. The conclusion is that electric power for a vehicle produces a lot fewer emissions than gasoline power, when you take into account the entire life cycle of the fuel.
Also, most states are actively working to increase the renewable portfolio of their electricity generation, meaning electricly powered vehicles will produce fewer emissions as the grid gets “greened.” The same cannot be said for gasoline powered vehicles.
what about blowing the tops off mountains to get coal? what does that “cost?”
Your comparison is missing a key detail. Regular cars solve the problem of creating energy while moving down a road at 60 mph. This has led to combustion being the only reasonable means of energy creation.
Any kind of car that plugs in moves the problem of energy generation to a stationary plant that is designed for the purpose. And yes, some of the power comes from a coal plant, but it can also be hydroelectric, solar, wind, etc.
So yes, they both use power, but moving the energy production outside of a moving vehicle creates a MUCH greater array of options for generation. To pretend otherwise is misleading.
Really? Coal? Because the vast majority of my power comes nuclear, hydro, and soon wind. Clearly not everyone is fortune to live in the Great Lakes/Niagara Falls region but 33.4 million people do, which is more then a tenth of the US population.
I stopped reading at “I believe most consumers expected the Volt to be a mass-market vehicle and an instant hit in a sort of iPhone way. Yeah, that’s just not how the auto industry works.”
The auto industry needs to work that way.
Yeah, I thought the same thing. The Model T was a runaway hit, wasn’t it?
Ford also sold it for less than half of the price of most cars on the market. Then kept dropping the price and a few years later it actually started to sell well (first few years were good for car sales at the time, measured in the tens of thousands. A few years later it was revolutionary for cars in general
The Model T car itself wasn’t revolutionary, the process in making them was. Someone needs to re-revolutionise how electric cars are made to be actually affordable, and that basically means an amazing, cheap, light battery. The Volt and it’s kin are more along the lines of the Model A.
But this follows most car manufacturing of the past few decades, any new feature is in a top end car, to fund R&D. The stuff that’s in your Merc and BMW now will be in your Kia in the next couple of decades. I suspect a similar thing will happen here, this is a kickoff. And it’s still an amazing car for $41k, it’s a better car than most $20k cars (if not all). But it’s not the mass market car, that’ll come in a few years.
While it’s true that the auto industry NEEDS to work that way, I don’t think it can. The iPhone didn’t revolutionize the mobile industry because of technology. It was revolutionary because of its man-machine aspects.
That’s absolutely NOT the car industry’s problem right now. Its problems revolve around energy, and the solutions must be technological in nature. The problem is that none of the players seem to have the technological answers: Neither Toyota nor GM nor anyone else currently know how to make an affordable long-range, clean electric car with a practical charging solution.
The article is right — the auto industry is FAR more complex than the auto industry, and it’s currently struggling with serious technological problems.
The car industries problem is the same as the banking sectors problem. Can you say GREED? I hope GM goes broke again due to it’s stuborn overpricing of vehicles.
The technology simply doesn’t exist, yet, but it’s getting there
No it doesn’t. The difference is cars cost tens of thousands if not hundreds of thousands of dollars and people hold on to them for a long time. Next year people will be in lines to throw away their iPads and iphone 4′s on the next gen. Break away hits are all relative. I have no doubt they will sell very well. You can make an iPhone that works for everyone but cars have different purposes. I have a my truck an I have my new Camaro. I wouldn’t try to tow a boat with my Camaro and I don’t plan on taking my truck to the drag strip. The Volt isn’t for everyone, but it has a wider market than the leaf and I think the people whom it’s aimed at will snatch them up rather quickly. (On a side note what’s wrong with the 3800! That V6 is bullet proof! :-)
I was wondering about that shot at the 3800 too…maybe the cars it went in were a little stale, but that engine was unbelievably durable…
If the auto industry used the same business model as the mobile phone industry you would get the car for free and pay some service provider for every mile you drive. Oh, and don’t forget charges for driving more than your allowed number of miles per month, charges for using the radio, charges for driving outside your pre-defined area… Are you serious?
Great analogy…love it.
Great article. I agree completely. As an engineer, I’m completely in awe of the Volt due to its insanely simple interface and really complex underpinnings. Couple small nits, though, with your descriptions on the Volt’s and Prius’s powertrains: first, the Prius can completely run on either motor, gas or electric. It’s a parallel hybrid. The electric motor and battery in the Prius, though, is very small. It’ll only allow the car to run at very low speeds with little acceleration on its limited battery. WRT the Volt, the gas engine primarily acts as a generator for the electric motor directly. The engine does not (normally) charge the battery at all. It does this because GM smartly wants you to use as much cheap grid electricity as possible, rather than expensive, inefficient fossil fuels. If the gas engine charged up the battery, by the time you got to your destination, the battery might be close to full and you’re not taking advantage of the cheap grid power.
Again, I really appreciated the article. I agree with you that the pricepoint seems reasonable. Hell, the original iPhone was $600 when it came out.
The only problem I have with the Volt is that they’re marketing it as an “electric car.” I’m sorry but any car with a gasoline engine in it is no more of an “electric car” than an Oldsmobile Cutlass Supreme with electric windows.
Remove the gas engine, then we can talk.
Don’t put any gas in the tank and then its your electric car. Just don’t drive more than 20 miles from your charge station.
But the infrastructure to support electric cars (plug-in charging stations) does not exist. So the next best option is piggyback on the existing gas station infrastructure. Remember that the gas engine is used *solely* as a generator. If/when the Volt becomes popular enough to justify building the electric infrastructure, then you can eliminate the gas engine.
Let me know when there’s a real “electric car” that dosen’t use petroleum-based plastic in it, then.
No, when the American auto makers were bailed out with our tax dollars no one wanted to see a mass produced low milage vehicle. We all wanted a $41K vehicle for celebrity clientele to brag about owning.
I really would like to know where TECHCRUNCH gets it’s writing staff from. From the articles I’ve read they obviously aren’t in touch with the average citizen.
The average citizen doesn’t read tech-blogs.
youre really clueless, this wasnt supposed to be affordable. everyones happy except you pussy.
Wow, that’s a high-brow sophisticated take on Tom’s comment (which actually makes a good point, by the way)
I totally agree with Tom,
@Nate – GM here. We’ll try to take that engine out this week. Do you think we could do lunch next week?
Hmm…
1 – A new vehicle technology comes to market.
2 – The government offers financial incentives (up to $7K).
3 – Chevy jacks up their price (by about $7K).
Sounds to me like another way for the government to give Chevy money… The IRS should call it a manufacturer’s incentive.
When is the last time someone bought an American car WITHOUT some sort of incentive?
All the image conscious eco-posers will buy this thing and end up running it on the gas engine anyway.
Might as well just get a Prius, it has excellent smug-mobile cred, you can save some dough and it is both reliable and drives nice.
1. It’s not a Volt-specific credit. Any manufacturer foreign or domestic can have the credit applied if they meet the criteria.
2. You must have missed the numerous life endangering Toyota recalls recently.
3. Saying the Prius “drives nice” is like saying a shopping cart “handles well.” Pretty much every other car handles better than a Prius, including the Volt. That part has already made it out by members of the press who drove the development mules.
re 1. You’re putting words in my mouth, I never said it couldn’t be applied to non-American cars.
re: 2. People too stupid to turn the car off (try it, I have) and/or shift into neutral (try it, I have) and/or firmly apply the brakes (try it, I have)
re 3. It drives nice compared to nearly every other rental car I’ve had over the last decade… judging by your statement I’d say you’ve never actually driven a Prius.
Did you read the article?
1) The incentive was started under your hero Bush
2) The incentive also applies to ANY electric vehicle (e.g. the Nissan Leaf). It is not just limited to the Volt.
Yes, they are encouraging car buyers to buy cleaner cars. This will in turn create incentives for car companies to research clean, renewable technology. Market competition will make the technology as cheap as possible, thus allowing the incentive to fade out.
Then we’ll be left with many car companies that can make clean cars cheaply. The horror!
Great, another slow ass car to get in my way. All you elitist lemmings better get out of my way or I’ll run you over in my SUV!
LMAO!!! You made my day. I do not agree with you but you are funny!!!
GM is counting on the VOLT to ‘save’ their company. If it is not a mass market product then it won’t do much to make them profitable again and they’ll keep wasting our money.
GM is really on the move. I love how well they are doing now. I am seriously considering buying American next time around. Personally, I can’t justify 50,000 for a 3 series BMW when I can buy a malibu that is just as quiet and comfortable for a lot less money. I want America to succeed. I’m sick of all of our money going to other countries and America falls. It’s part of the problem with Capitalism and the free market. The reason companies outsource is because it’s cheaper. Why do they want to do things cheaper? Competition, making money, stretching every dollar. Ultimately, the consumer will decide where the money goes in this market. We have a lot of pro-america people in the belt way, that should be GM’s target audience. Let’s see if they can buy cars as well as they can bash Obama and make sweet tea.
You can’t actually compare a BMW 3-series to a Malibu. They are completely different beasts.
On one hand they are about the same size and hold the same amount of people.
Good job!
Not 30,000 dollars different.
http://www.caranddriver.com/features/09q4/2010_10best_cars-10best_cars/2010_bmw_3-series_2f_m3_page_3
Base price is $33k.
I’ve had Malibu rental cars and they are pretty awful… awful enough that I go back to the counter now and get something else… pretty much anything else.
No they are not, the 3 series is junk. Not even a real BMW. Maybe if you had compared something better, but the 3 series is the poor mans BMW.
“Not even a real BMW.”
Oh *please*. Not you again.
Dude….Malibu over BMW? You are either retarded or a troll.
Tell me why a BMW is better than a Malibu and I’ll tell you why I don’t give two shits about whatever you list as “reasons.”
A BMW 3 series is a sedan that drives like a sports car. Actually better than most sports cars. A malibu is a sedan that drives like a sedan.
People who buy 3 series BMWs aren’t going for “just as quiet and comfortable”. Its impossible to explain without experiencing.
FWIW, I really like the new Malibu and Fusion and would take them any day over a Camry or Accord – but neither are targeted at the same buyer as a 3 series.
If you don’t appreciate the act of driving, then why not just save the money and ride the bus?
GM is on the move? They sure are. With your tax dollars. GM and Chrysler are nothing more than union pension funds at this point. The government is offering a tax break if you buy the car and there is another program to give you a free charging station. The car may be great, i don’t know, but i doubt there is any demand for this government made product at an unsubsidized price. I am happy to keep my 350z, thank you.
Please cite where the government was involved in the design of the Volt.
Also please provide the cite that says that the Volt is made by Federal employees. I’ll give you a hint, being a minority shareholder does not mean they are government employees.
I’ll wait until Beck is over and then you can get back to me.
Here’s a little hit, UAW dirtbag: 61% is not a minority shareholder–it’s ownership.
I bought a loaded 2010 3-Series xDrive for $36,000. There’s no way this Volt or any other US manufacturer is going to come close to this car, especially for $5000 more.
You didn’t buy a “loaded” 2010 3 Series xDrive sedan for $36,000. It only takes 3 seconds to go to bmwusa.com and see the MSRP is $35,150 on that model WITHOUT any options.
Add in all the options (which is the definition of “loaded”) and the price baloons to $42,375
Flint, MI? Wow….cesspool.
I bet you are pulling for Government Motor Company.
What a fuck you are.
LOL…you must be from Flint too… FUN! Same as Detroit, just smaller. The labor unions bankrupted the U.S. auto industry so much that they required a bailout. The federal government owns GM and Flint.
Please cite where the unions bankrupted GM. Also please cite where you have proof that it wasn’t poor designs, over-reliance on SUV’s, or executive bonuses. You obviously have conclusive proof.
Please cite the federal goverment’s ownership of the town of Flint.
I’ll wait…
Though his heart is in the right place, he’s actually incorrect about complete government ownership, because they turned over the controlling share of the company to the Auto Union. For free. Paid for with OUR tax dollars.
So, thanks to Obama, I gave a free gift of GM ownership to the Unions I despise.
Awesome.
I’m very excited about the Volt, but really not sure I want to support the Unions.
The Volt is not a car for the masses? Why not? It uses pump gas and then plugs into the wall outlet at your home, business, etc. Both of these items – petrol and electricity – are readily available. The only argument as to why this is not a car for the masses is because of the ridiculous price tag. $41k is A LOT for a plugin-hybrid that has as many (or few) features as a Toyota Prius.
Go FORD!
Ford is selling a big ass taurus that starts at 38K called the SHO…If i can pay 40K for a ford, i can more than easily pay 40K for a volt….
Its 33,500 with the tax credit. People pay close to (or in some cases over) 30k for a prius very often. I can see the same people going for a volt at that price if it gets significantly better mileage than a prius. Does anyone know what the rated mpg is?
Who the fuck listens to limbaugh-pill-addict anyway.
I like the work they put behind this car. i never expected it for much cheaper then 41k, mostly because its really the first car like this. i dont ever remember a car that charges its own baterry with gas.
“i dont ever remember a car that charges its own baterry with gas.”
You’re joking, right?
(they all do)
People need to stop trying to make everything cheaper and start trying to make more money.
Its not about where you are today, its what you learned along the way. Think “LONG TERM” People…
It’s comical that people think that electric cars and such are the future. Didn’t consider the oil infrastructure that builds those cars, hmm? That every piece of that vehicle down to the tires is somehow derived from oil or oil powered processes.
The amount of oil used to manufacture a car is about 12% of the amount burned over a typical car’s lifetime. So yes, building electrics represents a huge potential savings in oil consumption.
I could’ve sworn GM said right from the start that they expected it to reach the market with an approximately $40k price tag.
Yes they did.
Hmmmm. I bash Obama. And I make a hell of a sweet tea. But I drive a HUMMER dropped on 24′s.
I’m with Nate. You want me to break out my wallet? Then take out the gas tank. Give me hours of use, not miles.
Smokin’ out. Pourin’ up. Puttin’ gas up in my truck. All my cars got leather n wood, in my hood we call it buck.
So what exactly is the carbon footprint of driving this car on road?
And no, I am not asking mpg .. I know what that is.
To charge this Volt we still use electricity – where does that come from? Lets say Volt is a hit (I highly doubt) – are we questioning the source of energy before we start plugging all these cars in the wall jack?
We need to learn from the Israelis – build the infrastructure of renewable sources of energy and then worry about getting the electric car on road.
Why did the first attempt at making all electric cars fail? Prius was a new idea when it came out, Volt is just a revival of a failed idea. You would think a company like GM would have learned something from its own history!
Even electricity from the dirtiest coal plant is cleaner than an ICE.
The Volt is not a revival of a failed idea, the Leaf is. Volt is not the EV1, it is an electric hybrid. For most trips, you use no gas, but if you need to drive from San Francisco to San Diego, you can do it, and without having to wait 8 hours somewhere for a recharge.
It’s fascinating watching people react negatively to technology for *political* reasons, knee-jerk anti-environmentalist sentiment, or conservative talking points (here’s a hint Rush idiots, the Volt was being designed during the Bush administration, prior to the bail out, Bush was also responsible for SUV subsidies and the EV tax credits)
As for pollution, either way, this car beats a regular gas car. If you took out the batteries and only used the gas-generator, it gets 50mpg. When plugged in, sure, if draws power from the grid, but the amount of CO2 generated per mile is still lower, even for coal plants, because cars are effectively traveling fossil fuel plants that have to lug around their own weight, whereas coal plants have efficiencies of scale and only transmission losses to deal with.
What’s your next talking point? Battery pollution? Really, conservatives who promote nuclear plants with nuke storage and a uranium manufacturing system to support it are worried about lithium?
Oh, and the energy needed to make the car. Yeah, because manufacturing batteries is so much more energy intensive than making large 4-6 cylinder engines, transmissions, and the other ICE powertrain features, vs electrical distribution to electric motors at the wheel, and a small gas generator engine with no transmission.
Stop evaluating technology through the prism of knee jerk political tribalism.
check it out opel built a european road racing vehicle that had a 5 cykinder diesel engine, broke 15 european records, got 113 miles per gallon while doing it. why isn’t anyone investigating this. chevy volt is a joke. has anyone asked what kinds of fuel will be burned to generate the electricity to power these vehicles? electricity has to be generated somehow, and in each conversion, energy is lost. it would be more efficient, and cleaner to build high mileage diesel vehicles than to burn oil or coal to generate electricity for an infrastructure that doesn’t exist to power a vehicle that is less efficient and more expensive than available high efficient vehicles.
First of all, the 113mpg opel was a lightweight prototype, not a production vehicle. There are numerous purpose built super-eco vehicles out there, if you want a car made out of car board. The real diesel ecoflex engine only gets 59mpg, roughly on par with the Volt’s 50mpg gas-generator.
Second of all, your claims are baseless without math. Energy is lost with each conversion, but energy is also lost digging up crude, refining it, and transporting it to gas stations, this is not a ‘transmission lossless’ system, so unless you produce math factoring in all the costs, you’re just blowing smoke, another idiot addicted to the idea fossil fuels.
i am not addicted to fossil fuels. i just made the point that energy production costs energy in each step of the process. you supported that by writing that “energy is lost digging up crude, refining it, and transporting it to gas stations”. electricity is not free energy no matter how it is produced. also, you missed the point on the opel. of course, this is not production technology. my point is this, if opel can build an extremely high performance car that gets that kind of mileage, then why hasn’t the auto industry jumped on this. much of the technological advances in the auto industry come from their racing development. you do the math.l
It would be great if one of the impassioned bloggers (or neutral 3rd party research firms) out there did a bit of research to compile a so-called “total environmental cost” (TEC) comparative rating for cars. It would be a great deal of fun to compare and contrast the TEC ratings of all of the alternative fuel/EV/hybrids vs. standard gasoline/diesel-based cars. This rating would be easy for consumers to understand and would also change mindsets in the auto-industry by allowing them to see the market effect when consumers are aware of more than MPG or miles-per-charge, etc. The TEC ratings should be calculated over a standardized 5 year or 10 year ownership/usage period and should incorporate the total environmental impact (or carbon footprint) associated with driving and manufacturing the cars & components.
“We’re not in the business of making cars. We’re in the business of making money.” – A.P. Sloan
I didn’t know you were in Michigan! (or is it Canada?) How about a meet up for us mid western Crunchers?
Matt, You must be stupid to write this article. And your thoughts are based on emotion and not objectivity.
Especially when there are hundreds of comparisons between the Volt and Leaf (where both cars have identical numbers from size, speed and just about every other feature). I am sure you must have read ATLEAST some of those articles and their price difference of $10,000 (WHERE THE LEAF IS CHEAPER BY 10k).
Stop writing stuff you have zero knowledge about, please. To me there is not difference between your thoughts and Rush Limbaughs thoughts.
Apparently you missed my closing paragraph where I speculate that the Leaf will outsell the Volt. But the Volt doesn’t have to outsell the Leaf to ultimately be successful.
Hey Tom, go get your own weblog with the popularity of this one, and then you can call Matt stupid.
Until then, STFU.
Just to set the record straight I’m the Tom who was called a “pussy” by jpojopj yesterday for saying
“I really would like to know where TECHCRUNCH gets it’s writing staff from. From the articles I’ve read they obviously aren’t in touch with the average citizen”.
This is a different Tom who called Matt stupid. Not that I don’t partially agree with this Tom (I might have said out-of-touch), but wanted to set the record straight. Fire away jpojopj whoever you are!
One more bit of record straightening, I’m a completely different Tom who has called bullshit on a few people on this thread, but not on Matt, or Tom, or jpojopj, whoever he is.
“Matt, You must be stupid to write this article. And your thoughts are based on emotion and not objectivity.”
Your comment was based on emotion and not objectivity. Are you stupid as well, or are you allowed to do that?
Lets do some math:
Chevy Volt: $41,000 (True Cost)
Honda Civic: $20,000 (Average build)
Difference: $21,000
Gas: $2.45/gal (in NJ)
The difference in price would buy 8,571.43 gallons of gas. The Civic gets an average of 29 miles to the gallon. That’s 248,581.47 miles on the price difference.
Assuming the average driver drives 12,000 miles a year, AND you only drive the Volt on the 40 mile range of it’s battery, using no gas, you’d have to own the Volt for 20.7 years to justify the price difference in gas savings. How long’s that warranty again?
Bragging rights: Priceless
Encouraging the (maybe misguided) green car movement: Priceless
Being the first kid on your block to spend 41k on a midsize chevy: Priceless
The world doesn’t need any more bean counters like you.
No, the “true cost” of the Volt is $33,500. That’s what people actually pay when all is said and done. And you can’t touch a Civic configured like a Volt for $20K. Every Volt has a navigation console, and the most basic Civic that comes with that is $22500. Not to mention every Volt comes with remote start and XM Radio, which are another $1K on a Civic. So really, it’s about a $10K difference in actual cost between the two at the most.
But I agree: if you lie and make false comparisons, the Volt is TOTALLY overpriced! OMG!
In all fairness, gas is not going to stay anywhere close to $2.45/gallon. In Michigan, we are currently paying around $2.90. After the global economy recovers, it won’t be long before gas reaches $3.50 or $4/gallon again. When you add comparable features as LAW pointed out, and consider the usefulness of this car when the price of gas rises again, the mileage difference before the Volt is cheaper is closer to 75,000. Even when you consider the cost of the electricity to charge the car, this is easily a mileage you could reach, and the battery would still be under warranty.
In my eyes, the other problem with these primarily electric vehicles is out of the builder’s hands. Where will the gas stations with the chargers be? Will hotels and restaurants begin offering chargers in the parking lot? If the only place I can charge the thing is in my own garage, it’s not likely I would buy one. That’s why Hybrids sell – because it’s just a regular car that happens to get decent mileage and little hassle on my part.
It cost more to make, own and dispose of a Prius at the end of the cars life, than it did a Hummer!! It also polluted more due to all the processes involved in make the batteries. These cars are polluters in green clothing, don’t be fueled, i mean fooled!!
The ignorance of liberals always amazes me. All you hear is “we are addicted to oil”, “stop the fossil fuels!” “you are killing the planet!” I imagine that its really hard to be a liberal with all of the emotions clouding your judgment on daily basis.
In come the electrics and hybrids – the latest fad that makes as much sense as really fashionable electronic devices with non-replaceable batteries.
If you do an ROI analysis on any hybrid, it is immediately clear that the premium sticker price you pay for higher gas mileage will pay for itself in about 6-8 years – much longer than an average American has a car. The gap narrows only at gas prices of above $5-6 gallon and it still takes 3-4 years to see that money pay for itself. This is exactly why liberals want to see the gas prices be high, because ALL green technology doesn’t make sense at current energy prices (cap and trade as a great example).
So why would anyone buy a hybrid then? Well – to save mother Earth of coarse! Lets talk about that. What powers these electrics and hybrids? – Highly toxic batteries. Do you think those run forever? How long does your phone or laptop battery go before it doesn’t charge anymore? And what are you going to do with those when they die? ship it for recycling and get a credit on buying a new one? Is that going to be cheap you think? And where do these batteries go when they die? Partly recycled, I’m sure, but the other parts will most likely end up in some barrel in a landfill! So much for saving the Earth! And lets talk about how you charge that car. Where do you think electricity comes from? Coal? Nuclear? Really? I thought we wanted to get away from those? When was the last time we built any of those in this country for environmental reasons (America)?
Green technology is a money making machine, and the entire movement is designed to increase the bottom line of energy companies and special interests in a world where fossil resources are scarce and prices are relatively low in low demand. Green energy (much like IMAX) is a great new gimmick to get a fresh influx of revenue.
Al Bore, I mean Gore is a great example of this. With his Nobel Peace prize for Global Warming work, he is rolling in dough because he has extensive investment and personal business in green sector and gets grants from all over the place.
Its all about money and power! Feel free to rip this apart… truth hurts…
liberals, liberals, liberals
wah wah wah.
You might have a valid point, but no-one read it, because you started your rant with an insult and everyone skipped to the next comment.
It’s much easier for your small brain to put complicated and large groups into narrow categories, isn’t it? And, it’s kind of funny that you just insulted “liberals” for insulting someone else and then tried to discredit them for using an insult. You really need a lesson in logic and reason.
I really didn’t understand that. Are you a liberal or not?
Tom, just go back to digging ditches and making sweet tea. You don’t deserve an explanation because, frankly, you wouldn’t understand. Kind of like how you wouldn’t be able to pull a derivative or integrate a calculus equation if I gave you one, so why should I give you one? It would be stupid. You wouldn’t ask a fourth grader to plan the next apollo mission, or would you?
I eat derivatives for breakfast and poo calculus equations. And I doubt there will be another Apollo mission, so you’re wrong on all counts. I win this retarded internet argument. How does that feel, little poor student child?
By the way, i think you have the wrong Tom in mind. See the record straightening section elsewhere in this thread. (yet another fail for your collection. oh dear. )
Hahaha, I’ll at least give you credit for being funny. : )
“I believe most consumers expected the Volt to be a mass-market vehicle and an instant hit in a sort of iPhone way. Yeah, that’s just not how the auto industry works.”
It certainly is not how the auto industry works, but GM is definitely treating the Volt as its iPod. I think the execs there are thinking several positives from a successful Volt launch:
- Showing govt/taxpayers they can build good stuff (public goodwill)
- Increase brand recognition/equity
- Bring people to showrooms and hope they’ll buy something else
All these traits would point to the Volt as a “halo” device. Just like the iPods driving Mac sales.
GM will position the Volt as a halo car until/unless demand for it dictates an increase in production. What I can see is this: Go to a showroom and see a Volt, kick the tires, stare at the MSRP, then turn around and look at the Chevy Cruze (which will come out around the same time), notice it starts under 20K and gets around 40mpg highway.
Is it just me, or is this author a total prick? How does growing up in an area in which these cars are produced in any way justify a ridiculous price tag?
its just you.
It’s just you.
hurray! :)
Let’s see, I only drive 40 miles a day and never have to buy gasoline. That’s approx. $4.00 per day savings less $1.00 for electricity and I save about $1000.00 per year. The exact same gas car costs $15K less until my neighbors stop paying the $7500 incentive, then it’s well over $20K. Why would anyone spend $20K to save $4.00 a day. Double the price of gas and it still doesn’t make sense. Keep the car for 20 years to break even? I don’t think so.
$41k ????????
Of course GM figures the American consumer is flush with cash at this point in the economic downturn and expect line-ups at the dealerships to drop hard earned bucks on this baby. Something wrong here IMO. BMW or VOLT? I don’t plan to get shocked.
Wow you are from Flint? Do people ask you about Michael More whenever you mention this fact?
Why do I get the feeling of Acura TL?
How many tax dollars went to subsidize the production of the vehicle and the soon to be subsequent sale to the American public? Way too much.
If there was a market for this car, you wouldn’t need to see subsidies to promote it.
The Government Motors Volt is a flop before it even hits the showroom floors. If I had the money to spend on a 41K automobile, I’d be looking elsewhere for certain.
But if you greenies want to look like the arrogant fools you are, please go ahead and buy one and drive in the HOV lanes with that smug look on your faces.
Wow. Surprised you aren’t at home beating the dog. You sound like another typical red-neck idiot driving his Ford F-350 like a sports car. Idiot. Get a life, an education, a knife, and castrate yourself.