95redLT1

Chevy Volt Mule: First Drive

Yesterday morning we finally hopped into a Chevy Volt mule with outgoing GM product czar Bob Lutz for a spin around the Warren Tech Center. What's it feel like? It's utterly unremarkable and appliance-like.

The Volt project's often dismissed as a marketing stunt, a gimmick, too expensive for the segment, or a toy for wealthy eco-nuts. We withheld our judgment until we had the chance to do a test drive. Now, after driving a Volt-in-a-Chevy-Cruze-shell powertrain mule, we're prepared to declare it — much to the delight of the Volt's PR team, engineering crew and Bob Lutz — utterly unremarkable.


The Volt's unremarkable because it's exactly like driving any other appliance car on the road today, and that's the point. GM is trying very hard to make the Voltec system driving experience as familiar as anything before it and even at this early prototype mule level they've succeeded quite nicely. The Voltec system consists of a 1.4-liter four-cylinder gasoline engine driving a generator, an electric motor driving the wheels and a lithium ion battery pack in between the two to hold plug-in and regenerated power. This doesn't work like a Prius or an Insight, there's no transmission, the engine doesn't power the wheels; it's an EV that goes 40 miles and then it runs off the generator, and it works.

Our ride in the Volt was up to about 55 MPH on the grounds of GM's Warren Tech Center and the cars are, dare we say it, peppy. There are no whirs or whines or whistles like in a traditional EV, just silence, like the motor has stalled out and you're coasting along on momentum. There's no shifting going on as there are no gears to shift, just direct power, and unless you're paying attention you don't even notice. Stab the go-pedal and it responds happily, it's even got a little get-up and go. According to Lutz the current prototype accelerates from 0-to-60 MPH in around 8 seconds — that's about 2.0 seconds faster than a 2009 Toyota Prius and about 3.5 seconds faster than a Chevy Aveo. Not too shabby for an appliance if you ask us.

There are two drive modes, a normal highway type where you accelerate and coast normally, and a second drive mode which maximizes regenerative braking in city traffic. It feels like you're hitting the brakes but you aren't hitting the brakes. We had hoped the Volt would give us a back-rub and deliver a milkshake, but it's just a car, even bridging on the pedestrian, the bland, the appliance. But this is again, the point, to make this huge paradigm shift and make it seem easy.

The Volt is coming, and from a powertrain perspective, it's pretty darn good. Lutz was adamant on that point saying "Volt is currently on time and we fully believe it will hit the market as expected." The Chief Engineer, Frank Weber, a rather intense German who has been extraordinarily cautious in the past about the program's hurdles, seems to be seeing the light at the end of the tunnel. Yesterday he remarked "There are no more large elephants in the room, only hundreds of small ones."

In June, GM will be completing the first full prototype vehicles, nearly 80 in total, which will look and feel and operate like real Volts. They'll have all the correct body panels, interior bits, and system calibrations and we'll be driving those eventually. At that point we'll be much more able to judge the complete vehicle. Until then, we're kind of hopeful the Volt might actually be fun to drive, along with being frugal at the pump.

http://jalopnik.com/5259513/chevy-volt-mule-first-drive

95redLT1

On a related topic a Toyota Hybrid broke down before the Nascar race last weekend.....

A Toyota Highlander Hybrid parade vehicle used for driver introductions at Lowe's Speedway this past weekend wouldn't start and had to be towed. Hopefully we won't see this from next weekend's Camry hybrid pace car.

Here's what our tipster Hank sent along with the picture:


"Check out this Toyota Highlander Hybrid parade vehicle used as part of the driver introductions for the All-Star race this past weekend at Lowe's Speedway. When all the cars started up to drive away, this one wouldn't start, so they had to tow it. Supposedly the crowd was going crazy laughing..."

http://jalopnik.com/5261006/toyota-h...e-nascar-event

monstertodd

Cool!

This is really good news. It's good to hear that the Volt is coming along nicely.

Now if stealerships don't charge 10k markups on them when they come out, I might think about buying one.

Despite the fact that these cars will be overpriced compared to the Prius and the Insight, I would still pay the 35-40K sticker for one simply because it's a GM vehicle.

JeremyNYR

On one hand, I really hope they succeed and provide a serious image renovation and hopefully profit for GM. On the other hand, I realize that their success primarily relies on gas prices skyrocketing again... and I really don't want that to happen.

TheV6Bird

When I read "utterly unremarkable", I thought it was going to be a negative review from the press though in my mind I kept thinking, "Isn't that what the Volt and the people in the market for this want? A car that gets good mileage but is....boring?"

Good thing I read the whole article

shock6906

Yeah, it threw me off at first as well.