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-   -   new EPA label for VOLT (https://ecomodder.com/forum/showthread.php/new-epa-label-volt-15308.html)

gone-ot 11-27-2010 06:12 PM

new EPA label for VOLT
 
...here's the new 'dual-fuel' label being used for the VOLT:

http://www.autoguide.com/auto-news/w...-v6_Slide6.jpg

Chevy Volt Gets 37/93-MPG Rating, 60-MPG Average | AutoGuide.com News

TomEV 11-27-2010 08:24 PM

383 wh/mi and 37 mpg... Not exactly the sharpest tool in the shed using either power source.

Hopefully real world numbers will be significantly higher than the window sticker.

gone-ot 11-27-2010 08:56 PM

...35 miles on battery and 379 miles on gasoline.

camopaint0707 11-27-2010 09:57 PM

what a joke

SVOboy 11-27-2010 11:34 PM

Is GM still insisting on calling this thing an "electric car" and not a hybrid?

ShadeTreeMech 11-28-2010 07:29 AM

I don't think you can drive the Prius very far or fast on electric alone, so it's not like any hybrid out there. But in the purest sense of the word "hybrid", it is one. I think Chevy is trying to make its unique method stand out a bit is all.

I realize it may not be popular with everyone here, but I do like the idea of having a car that runs off electric for most of my driving, with the gas engine there as a back up if I'm caught short on electric power.

luvit 11-28-2010 07:46 AM

i find these numbers acceptable.
my daily commute is 33 miles... (45 minutes).
if i can charge my car at work, it may be rare that i drop to ICE.
now on weekends i drive 150mi (each way after a charge). -- but i would mod for more batteries some how. lol.
**here's a question that may already be answered:
can i force the Volt to use ICE on highway miles then force it to use EV on city/rush hour traffic??
.

Ryland 11-28-2010 09:59 AM

The main difference that I see between the prius and the volt is that the volt can go faster and farther on electric.
For the same less money tho, you can buy a brand new prius and a large enough plug in battery pack to give it a 40 mile all electric range, so I can only imagine that once Toyota comes out with a plug in hybrid, that is designed to be driven as a plug in, that it will be cheaper then the volt with a comparable range.

TomEV 11-28-2010 10:52 AM

In a standard 2004 - 2009 Prius, the ICE turns on at around 34 MPH. If the computer in a Prius is programmed correctly, the Prius can go about 52 MPH on electric power. It is limited to that speed to prevent the main electric motor from over speeding.

Various companies that build extra battery pack systems for the Prius use programming that keeps the ICE turned off under 52 MPH, and others use a more simple programming method and use the built-in motor limit of about 34 MPH. My Prius will do 34 MPH before the ICE turns on, but it has not been modified.

The factory plug-in Prius (possibly available in 2011 - I drove one a couple of weeks ago at a car show) is supposed to have a 13 mile range and a top electric speed of around 62 MPH. Above 62, it will turn on the ICE to help drive the wheels, just as the Volt does above about 70 MPH.

The limited battery-only range in the plug-in Prius is because the battery is relatively small. The upside is that this configuration keeps the interior room the same as a standard Prius. In the Volt, there is only room for four passengers because the battery takes up a lot of room down the center of the vehicle interior.

The planetary gear setup is slightly different in the Volt, which allows the electric motor to spin somewhat slower, giving it a somewhat higher top electric speed.

The volt has a 'mountain mode' setting that will force the ICE to charge the battery pack. If the Volt encounters a steep hill with a depleted battery, it will only be able to go up the hill as fast as the smallish ICE can propel the rather heavy Volt. By some assessments, it will likely be in the truck lane after a few miles on long and steep hills, regardless of how charged the battery is before the hill.

jamesqf 11-28-2010 12:10 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by TomEV (Post 206532)
The volt has a 'mountain mode' setting that will force the ICE to charge the battery pack. If the Volt encounters a steep hill with a depleted battery, it will only be able to go up the hill as fast as the smallish ICE can propel the rather heavy Volt.

This makes sense, and would make more sense if you could turn it on manually before getting to the hill.

Though I've never understood why most people seem to think of the plug-in hybrid as having/wanting to run on battery only until that's depleted, then running on IC engine alone. Seems to me that on anything more than a short trip, you would get better results using both together.

endurance 11-28-2010 12:32 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by jamesqf (Post 206550)
Though I've never understood why most people seem to think of the plug-in hybrid as having/wanting to run on battery only until that's depleted, then running on IC engine alone. Seems to me that on anything more than a short trip, you would get better results using both together.

I think a lot of people are hooked on the idea of never having to buy gas again. However, I think the first time they get a $400 electric bill they just might have second thoughts. Energy costs in any form and while we're running out of oil faster than we're running out of the coal and natural gas that powers our electrical grid, the goal should remain focused on efficiency. Hybrids offer an opportunity that gas engines just can't, by storing the energy of braking and coasting, but a Yukon Hybrid, even if it were a plug-in, is just going to use more energy to get it down the road than a Yaris that burns gas.

At some point the weight of the battery is going to cost you more energy to carry around than it's worth and I'm sure every manufacturer is playing with that size and watching the market's response to their competitors. Expect every Volt to sell off the showroom floors in a hurry, but only the sales the next year will determine if other manufacturers make adjustments to their product line ups.

cfg83 11-28-2010 01:57 PM

Old Tele man -

It's going to be interesting seeing the real-world MPGe for people that have big versus small commutes. My long commute would split me right down the middle where I would need the ICE on the way home, so I would be at about 65 MPG.

CarloSW2

gone-ot 11-28-2010 02:56 PM

...CarloSW2 -- "Yes," real-world information would answer lots of questions, and I'd prefer such info came from real-owners and not from GM-marketing "Hypesters" who apparently can't tell the difference between reality and honesty.

...hm-m-m, which is worse? Political "spin" or Automotive-marketing "spin"?

roflwaffle 11-28-2010 06:55 PM

I can't believe they only pull 35mpg city in charge sustaining mode. Even a Fusion hybrid can pull 41mpg city and that's a full size car. Was engineering a smaller two-mode hybrid system or licensing some of Toyota's stuff really that hard?

jamesqf 11-28-2010 08:40 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by endurance (Post 206561)
I think a lot of people are hooked on the idea of never having to buy gas again.

Yeah, but they're not driving in reality mode :-) In addition to the range/battery weight issues, there's the problem of current draw: a battery that does fine in the flatlands because you never accelerate at max throttle for more than a few seconds is going to fail miserably when you e.g. try to climb several thousand vertical ft at 6-7% grade, because even if it has the energy capacity, it's not going to be able to sustain the discharge rate.

SoobieOut 11-28-2010 09:12 PM

The numbers on the EPA label seem to not be reality based. For instance they base the electric cost on 11 cents per Kilowatt hour. See this info on this link Electric Power Monthly - Average Retail Price of Electricity to Ultimate Customers by End-Use Sector, by State, and you will see that very few states are below the 11 cent cost per Kilowatt hour cost! This means all of the cost calculations on this label are questionable at best. Thanks to the Government Motors lobby I bet for the twilight zone sticker.

Also many residential customers will get sticker shock when charging the EV puts them into a higher bracket for KWH charges. I recently attended an Energy Management course for businesses. There is a charge for business customers called Peak Demand charge. This charge is carried through for a period of time, sometimes an entire year based on the peak electrical use for a 15 minute period. So if you plug in your car to a business and it happens to be a 100 degree day, with the Air conditioners using max power, the business will pay more all year!

This peak demand charge will sour most businesses allowing folks to recharge EV's at work. I spoke with one business property manager who said he would turn off the circuit breakers for the charging stations in his parking garage. Imagine driving to work, and not being able to recharge for the trip home?

NeilBlanchard 11-28-2010 09:17 PM

Actually, the EPA used $0.12/kWh on the Leaf's rating, and $0.11/kWh on the Volt. I'm not sure if these would be figured for the place that they are selling it?

luvit 11-28-2010 09:59 PM

i want to add that the 2004 honda civic EPA label low-balled the MPG.
i often drove at 53 MPG.
i hope the Volt's EPA label also underestimates.

04_Sentra 11-28-2010 10:36 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by TomEV (Post 206479)
383 wh/mi and 37 mpg... Not exactly the sharpest tool in the shed using either power source.

This just illustrates that when you try to do everything you end up doing nothing really well.

04_Sentra 11-28-2010 10:43 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by NeilBlanchard (Post 206629)
Actually, the EPA used $0.12/kWh on the Leaf's rating, and $0.11/kWh on the Volt. I'm not sure if these would be figured for the place that they are selling it?

I missed that. Seems like the only fair thing to do would be to use the national average of $0.12kWh. Certainly the same rate should be used for the cost for all electrics.

04_Sentra 11-28-2010 10:54 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by roflwaffle (Post 206616)
I can't believe they only pull 35mpg city in charge sustaining mode. Even a Fusion hybrid can pull 41mpg city and that's a full size car. Was engineering a smaller two-mode hybrid system or licensing some of Toyota's stuff really that hard?

That's not really a fair comparison because in city driving the fusion gets the benefit of the electric motor. A better comparison would be to the fusion highway rating of 34mpg. Volt gas only mileage is 37mpg though they don't say whether its city, highway, or mixed.

roflwaffle 11-28-2010 11:26 PM

It's fair AFAIK, both are running in charge sustaining mode. The Fusion gets worse highway mileage because it's a fullsize car, not a compact, but it should also get worse city mileage. The problem with the Volt is that running everything through to a generator, then converting that back to mechanical power via the motor reduces efficiency by ~15%-20%, and the single speed trans for he electric motor hurts a bit too (~5+%). If they sent mechanical power directly from the engine to the wheels in charge sustaining mode they would do a lot better than the Fusion hybrid and be very close to a Prius.

tumnasgt 11-29-2010 12:05 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by roflwaffle (Post 206651)
It's fair AFAIK, both are running in charge sustaining mode. The Fusion gets worse highway mileage because it's a fullsize car, not a compact, but it should also get worse city mileage. The problem with the Volt is that running everything through to a generator, then converting that back to mechanical power via the motor reduces efficiency by ~15%-20%, and the single speed trans for he electric motor hurts a bit too (~5+%). If they sent mechanical power directly from the engine to the wheels in charge sustaining mode they would do a lot better than the Fusion hybrid and be very close to a Prius.

I both agree and disagree. I think the Volt should either use a system like all the other hybrids and direct-drive the wheels (especially with the physical connection already there), or even better: have the ICE completely disconnected from the wheels, and run it as a fixed output generator, running at peak efficiency all of the time, and just dumping excess power in the battery pack. Once the batteries are at a set charge level, the motor can switch off (like pulse and glide).

The latter is how I originally thought the Volt would work, as it makes a lot more sense than the super complex set up they have now.

Ryland 11-29-2010 12:48 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by endurance (Post 206561)
I think a lot of people are hooked on the idea of never having to buy gas again. However, I think the first time they get a $400 electric bill they just might have second thoughts.

To use $400 worth of electricity you would have to drive the volt 8695 miles, to drive the same distance on gasoline would cost you over $700.

roflwaffle 11-29-2010 02:32 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by tumnasgt (Post 206660)
I both agree and disagree. I think the Volt should either use a system like all the other hybrids and direct-drive the wheels (especially with the physical connection already there), or even better: have the ICE completely disconnected from the wheels, and run it as a fixed output generator, running at peak efficiency all of the time, and just dumping excess power in the battery pack. Once the batteries are at a set charge level, the motor can switch off (like pulse and glide).

The latter is how I originally thought the Volt would work, as it makes a lot more sense than the super complex set up they have now.

The latter is how the Volt works more or less IIRC. Instead of just having one discrete state they have more than one depending on how much power the motor needs. There is a slight efficiency increase by only operating the Volt at whatever different states, but it's small compared to the drop in efficiency from generating efficiency to feed to the motor instead of just going from the engine to the wheels.

tumnasgt 11-29-2010 04:49 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by roflwaffle (Post 206677)
The latter is how the Volt works more or less IIRC. Instead of just having one discrete state they have more than one depending on how much power the motor needs. There is a slight efficiency increase by only operating the Volt at whatever different states, but it's small compared to the drop in efficiency from generating efficiency to feed to the motor instead of just going from the engine to the wheels.

I suspect that having direct drive instead of the transmission would more than make up for the loss. Fixed output generators are much more efficient than variable output as they run at the most efficient speed. An hybrid car is a perfect application for it as the alternator can be set up to load the system at its most efficient level. As I understand it, the Volt only provides the amount of electricity needed to power the wheels + a bit extra in case of steep hills, so it cannot always be running the gasoline engine at peak efficiency.

Regardless of which is actually better, I agree that GM made the wrong decision. Of the two sensible solutions (true series hybrid or Prius-like hybrid), they managed to combine the worst bits (having a transmission and going gasoline -> rotation -> electric -> rotation).

jamesqf 11-29-2010 11:51 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by MorphDaCivic (Post 206628)
This peak demand charge will sour most businesses allowing folks to recharge EV's at work. I spoke with one business property manager who said he would turn off the circuit breakers for the charging stations in his parking garage. Imagine driving to work, and not being able to recharge for the trip home?

Depends on the employer, though. Some might decide to cover the parking lot with solar panels, like this: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/26/sc...me&ref=science

Not every employer focuses on the short-term nickel & dime, or tries to squeeze its employees. For instance the large computer company I once worked for, which keeps about a thousand acres surrounding its Bay Area research lab as a wildlife preserve. I'm pretty sure they'll be putting in EV charging stations before too long, if they haven't already.

04_Sentra 11-29-2010 02:10 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by roflwaffle (Post 206651)
It's fair AFAIK, both are running in charge sustaining mode.

If the battery pack SOC on both vehicles was the same pre/post test then I suppose that its a fair comparison, but I don't know if that's a requirement for fuel economy testing.

roflwaffle 11-29-2010 02:12 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by tumnasgt (Post 206687)
I suspect that having direct drive instead of the transmission would more than make up for the loss. Fixed output generators are much more efficient than variable output as they run at the most efficient speed. An hybrid car is a perfect application for it as the alternator can be set up to load the system at its most efficient level. As I understand it, the Volt only provides the amount of electricity needed to power the wheels + a bit extra in case of steep hills, so it cannot always be running the gasoline engine at peak efficiency.

Regardless of which is actually better, I agree that GM made the wrong decision. Of the two sensible solutions (true series hybrid or Prius-like hybrid), they managed to combine the worst bits (having a transmission and going gasoline -> rotation -> electric -> rotation).

Do you have any sources? Direct drive instead of a transmission only frees up ~5-10% depending on the transmission, and some hybrids are practically direct drive anyway IIRC (Toyota and licensing their patents). Maybe for small engines fixed output generators are significantly more efficient, but for hybrid automotive engines efficiency doesn't vary a lot, especially over the speeds/loads the engine is operating most of the time. The drop in efficiency from converting everything to electricity and then back to mechanical power via a motor is way more than any gain from running an engine at whatever discrete states. The proof is in the pudding really. The Volt should at least do better in the city than the heavier/larger fusion hybrid, but it does significantly worse because it is a series hybrid.

roflwaffle 11-29-2010 02:16 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by 04_Sentra (Post 206772)
If the battery pack SOC on both vehicles was the same pre/post test then I suppose that its a fair comparison, but I don't know if that's a requirement for fuel economy testing.

It's a requirement AFAIK. Obviously 30% SOC for the Volt is way more than 30% SOC for a normal hybrid, so they don't use an arbitrary point, but they do start where both vehicles will run exclusively in charge sustaining mode IIRC.

Nerys 12-07-2010 10:46 AM

yeah sure $400 FOR THE ENTIRE YEAR electric bill maybe. Nope sorry even the ENTIRE YEARS worth of electricity for the electric car would not cost $400

where do you get $400 electric bill? WORST CASE SCENARIO for your average driver assuming bad electricity price and horrible heat forcing the lithium cooling system into overdrive when charging your looking at MAX $30 on your electric bill (assuming a VERY VERY high $3 per 100 miles) for the average us citizen driving 12,000 miles a year so 1000 miles a month.

I can't even fill my Geo Metro gas tank for $30 and the average person would need to fill it at least twice a month. (I fill it twice a week sometimes but I am unusual in that regard)

Ryland 12-07-2010 01:32 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by MorphDaCivic (Post 206628)

This peak demand charge will sour most businesses allowing folks to recharge EV's at work. I spoke with one business property manager who said he would turn off the circuit breakers for the charging stations in his parking garage. Imagine driving to work, and not being able to recharge for the trip home?

This is a good example of poor education.
From what I've read the charging stations can tell the cars charger to charge at a slower rate if for example they are charging at a peek demand time or you have a lower amp service at that location.
Having electric space heater under peoples desks is going to make a larger impact then the charging of electric cars.

At my job they already paid for an outlet for my electric car charging, figured the 25 cents a day it costs to have me plug in was worth it.

Nerys 12-07-2010 02:11 PM

exactly. this is called propaganda. the actual electrical cost is TINY compared to pretty much ANYTHING ELSE. they use this as "scare tactics"

gone-ot 12-21-2010 03:55 PM

...so far, to my eyes, what GM has shown/delivered seems to be: (A) great initial idea, but (B) poor production implementation.

Allch Chcar 12-21-2010 09:02 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Nerys (Post 208405)
yeah sure $400 FOR THE ENTIRE YEAR electric bill maybe. Nope sorry even the ENTIRE YEARS worth of electricity for the electric car would not cost $400

where do you get $400 electric bill? WORST CASE SCENARIO for your average driver assuming bad electricity price and horrible heat forcing the lithium cooling system into overdrive when charging your looking at MAX $30 on your electric bill (assuming a VERY VERY high $3 per 100 miles) for the average us citizen driving 12,000 miles a year so 1000 miles a month.

I can't even fill my Geo Metro gas tank for $30 and the average person would need to fill it at least twice a month. (I fill it twice a week sometimes but I am unusual in that regard)

Nerys, the estimated yearly cost for electric only use of the Volt is on the EPA sticker and it states $601. If that wasn't there I'd think you were just ranting, again.

Frankly the EPA's estimates are pretty high for yearly consumption. $601 would mean a bit over 5,000 KW-H at 12 cents per KW-H and that is half of the average US household consumption(11,000 KW-H as of 2008). But that is probably the standard 15k miles annually estimate. Which is pretty ambitious IMHO. 333 KW-H is terrible EV only efficiency. I usually use 250 as a worse case estimate!

Now I'm going to have to see the EPA informational regarding this, it just reeks of mal-adjustments.

gone-ot 10-04-2011 03:41 AM

...more EPA changes for 2012 Volt:

Volt EPA sticker changes and GM will hold a Web chat today


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