[carve]

Wait...lets say yout commute is 40 miles, gas is $3/gal, and electricity is 11 cents per kWh. The volt ideally uses 8 kWh to go 40 miles, and I'll use your assumption that the Toyota Prius is getting 50 mpg

Volt: 88 cents of electricity
Prius: $2.40 of gas

Delta: $1.52

Delta over one year: About 400 bucks

This would be an ideal for a volt commute. Gas prices will probably rise quicker than electricity prices. What isn't included in this number is that the Toyota has a NiMh battery that'll last a very long time, and the Li Ion in the volt will need to be replaced for somewhere between $4 & $10k after, say, 8 years. In that time, you'd have to use more and more gas for your commute. The Toyota would probably have the lower overall cost of ownership unless gas goes through the roof.

This also doesn't include that the Prius driver is paying road taxes and the volt driver is freeloading. Eventually, if enough electrics are built, they'll have to find a way to tax the electricity (2nd power meter for the car? or yearly odo. checks?)) in order to pay for roads.

On a 300 mile road trip, these numbers would converge since the Prius and Volt will get roughly the same mpg on gas, but the volt will still be a buck fifty ahead in energy costs due to the first 40 miles. Even if it uses 2x the power on the highway, it'll still be ahead unless the Prius gets significantly better highway mpg. The Prius and Volt were never really intended for this kind of duty on a regular basis though- they're primarily commuter cars. If you're a road warrior, get a TDI or 335d.

[quagmire]

GM is warranting the Volt's battery for 10 years/150,000 miles.

[atr_hugo]

Originally Posted by carve

This also doesn't include that the Prius driver is paying road taxes and the volt driver is freeloading. Eventually, if enough electrics are built, they'll have to find a way to tax the electricity (2nd power meter for the car? or yearly odo. checks?)) in order to pay for roads.

Good point!

[Vudoo4u2]

Originally Posted by carve

Wait...lets say yout commute is 40 miles, gas is $3/gal, and electricity is 11 cents per kWh. The volt ideally uses 8 kWh to go 40 miles, and I'll use your assumption that the Toyota Prius is getting 50 mpg

Volt: 88 cents of electricity
Prius: $2.40 of gas

Delta: $1.52

Delta over one year: About 400 bucks

This would be an ideal for a volt commute. Gas prices will probably rise quicker than electricity prices. What isn't included in this number is that the Toyota has a NiMh battery that'll last a very long time, and the Li Ion in the volt will need to be replaced for somewhere between $4 & $10k after, say, 8 years. In that time, you'd have to use more and more gas for your commute. The Toyota would probably have the lower overall cost of ownership unless gas goes through the roof.

This also doesn't include that the Prius driver is paying road taxes and the volt driver is freeloading. Eventually, if enough electrics are built, they'll have to find a way to tax the electricity (2nd power meter for the car? or yearly odo. checks?)) in order to pay for roads.

On a 300 mile road trip, these numbers would converge since the Prius and Volt will get roughly the same mpg on gas, but the volt will still be a buck fifty ahead in energy costs due to the first 40 miles. Even if it uses 2x the power on the highway, it'll still be ahead unless the Prius gets significantly better highway mpg. The Prius and Volt were never really intended for this kind of duty on a regular basis though- they're primarily commuter cars. If you're a road warrior, get a TDI or 335d.

the volt is rated @ best 25 kWh/100 miles...so @ best, we assume 10 kWh per 40 mile commute (40%)...

so based on that you would get volt=1.10 in electricity (assuming you pay .11/kWh where you are) plus gas cost for that is 40/230*3.00=.52 cents

so 1.10+.52=1.62 for a volt 40 mile trip, and 2.40 for a prius 40 mile trip.

For a local commuter who doesnt go outside of 10 miles, its not bad...if you dont look @ the cost of the batteries in the long run.

The volt becomes expensive when you look at mixing in regular trips, where it uses more power, and when you look at how quickly electricity costs will rise.

The cost of electricity will rise faster than your cost of gas in the next 10 years...especially if there are more electric cars needing the power, and a limited power supply...we do afterall, have to make this electricity somehow, and we only have so many nuclear plants.

if you pay .19/kWh...its a wash between the two even on short trips.

and .19/kWh isnt exactly a crazy electricity price...

but once you go on a longer trip, the prius is immediately cheaper (not even looking @ long term battery cost as well)

and isnt the volt going to be ~30+K new??...an extra 10k over the prius to start?

[carve]

I'm having a hard time following what your numbers represent there. I think you think it gets 230 mpg, plus electricty cost. The 230 isn't the amount of gas it burns under gas power, either , and it doesn't use any gas until the battery runs out.

So, you could say it's getting infinity miles per gallon until the battery runs out (if you could divide by zero, which you can't), and after that it'll probably get mileage comparable to a Prius...we're not sure yet. I've heard predictions as low as 30 and as high as 70 mpg. It'll probably be 50 ish.

The range is said to be 40 miles, and it never draws more than 8 kwh out of its battery. But OK- 10 kwh per 40 miles is probably more realistic, reducing the range to 32 miles once it uses up it's 8 kwh battery. 8 kwh hours is the most it can every extract from the battery without plugging in, so that comes out to 88 cents @ 11 cents per kwh.

The point is, this'll probably get mileage similar to the Prius under gas, so after that 32 miles they'll be burning about the same amount of fuel per mile. The Volt just has a 32 mile head start using cheaper electricity, which costs about a third as much as gas per mile.

Coincidentally, if it goes 32 miles on the battery, and 8 miles on gas at 50 mpg, the numbers come out about the same as you ran- 48 cents of gas per day @ $3/gal. That plus the 88 cents of electricity comes to $1.36 in fuel for the 40 mile commute, and a prius getting 50 mpg would burn $2.40 in fuel. It adds up, but it'd take a long time to break even in the volt unless gas costs skyrocket. If the volt costs ~10k more, that'd be 25 years, not even including the time value of money! Or course, by then electricity will be cheap if we master fusion, and gasoline will be big bucks, not that it'd matter since the car would've been long ago junked.

Electricity can be made from many sources, and gasoline is politically volatile. I think in the next 10 years we'll see electricity go up more than gas. We're nowhere near peak coal or peak uranium. Even now, powerplants waste a lot of energy at night because they can't throttle down very quick, so off-peak charging won't require any power that can't already be generated for, essentially, free for MANY years.

I still think electric is the future, but they should've really made this more economicaly viable. I don't think I'd buy one unless the price difference between it and a Prius could be recovered in 3 or 4 years.

[carve]

I was just thinking...the fact that vudoo was under the impression it got a continous 230 mpg despite the fact that this whole thread is about how it DOESN'T get that mileage really brings home the point how misleading this number is.

[Vudoo4u2]

Originally Posted by carve

I was just thinking...the fact that vudoo was under the impression it got a continous 230 mpg despite the fact that this whole thread is about how it DOESN'T get that mileage really brings home the point how misleading this number is.

which was part of my point...that theyre taking advantage of the lack of detail around their presentation, and the EPA's lag in properly quantifying a hybrid vehicles mileage

their car seems better than it really is...

I also wasnt saying it gets a continuous 230 mpg, I was saying the 230 mpg is an insanely misleading and useless number, because in reality the prius' mileage is better and cheaper to run. I imagine that the Volt DOES get 230 mpg on gas, but that it only runs a smidge of gas while it runs the majority of the cars power off the electric engine. So they give you the EPA mpg for the gas engine, which isnt even the primary engine in the vehicle anyways, completely ignoring the "mileage" of the electric engine...which would make this in reality a ~30-40 "MPG" car...technically no longer mpg...there needs to be a new indicator since this engine barely uses the gas portion. It just uses the gas portion enough, to allow GM to say 230 mpg, and make people stand up and shout "SEE! were better than toyota", because 99% of people wont look into the details, theyll just be excited

I wasnt defending the volt, I was picking apart its "230 mpg" claim as false....perhaps youve misread what I wrote before comparing the cost of running the volt vs the prius.....I dont like the volt, or their claims about its efficiency any more than I like GM as a brand for the past 15 years

for a similar length trip, I was saying the prius is more efficient than the Volt and gets better mileage. (thus the cost comparison showing the prius cheaper to run)

[quagmire]

GM's claim of 230 MPG isn't false. The way GM got the figure was using the EPA's testing methods they will use for this kind of vehicle. And I have heard it is a conservative rating too.

[Vudoo4u2]

Originally Posted by quagmire

GM's claim of 230 MPG isn't false. The way GM got the figure was using the EPA's testing methods they will use for this kind of vehicle. And I have heard it is a conservative rating too.

correct...but its a useless number, since it doesnt take into account the electrical power needed for such a trip...which makes 230mpg sound like a godsent....when in reality, the car is less efficient than a prius for a similar 300 mile trip.

It makes it sound like you can drive this car for free, when in reality it costs more to "fuel" than a prius would.

gotta love GM taking advantage of the EPAs inability to properly quantify mileage on a gas/electric hybrid of this type

someone in the marketing/development department needs to get a gold star for this creation of publicity

[quagmire]

Originally Posted by Vudoo4u2

correct...but its a useless number, since it doesnt take into account the electrical power needed for such a trip...which makes 230mpg sound like a godsent....when in reality, the car is less efficient than a prius for a similar 300 mile trip.

It makes it sound like you can drive this car for free, when in reality it costs more to "fuel" than a prius would.

gotta love GM taking advantage of the EPAs inability to properly quantify mileage on a gas/electric hybrid of this type

someone in the marketing/development department needs to get a gold star for this creation of publicity

And Toyota wouldn't? Even Nissan has with the Leaf saying it gets 367 MPG despite not even using gas when GM released the Volt's 230 MPG rating.....

Just saying...... Any automaker would do this.

[jeremyc74]

Originally Posted by Vudoo4u2

correct...but its a useless number, since it doesnt take into account the electrical power needed for such a trip...which makes 230mpg sound like a godsent....when in reality, the car is less efficient than a prius for a similar 300 mile trip.

It makes it sound like you can drive this car for free, when in reality it costs more to "fuel" than a prius would.

gotta love GM taking advantage of the EPAs inability to properly quantify mileage on a gas/electric hybrid of this type

someone in the marketing/development department needs to get a gold star for this creation of publicity

You don't know what you're talking about. This is the number for CITY driving. CITY! Not a 300 mile road trip. The EPA assigns a MPG equivalency for the electric operation portion of the city cycle. Using the entire 40 mile electric range every day uses 10kwh, which will cost you about 70-90 cents in electricity, depending on where you live. A Prius will use nearly 1 gallon of fuel for the same distance under the same conditions, and that will cost at least $2.

[carve]

Vudoo: The car is 100% electric until the battery dies. So, if the battery lasts 40 miles, it's getting 40 miles/0 gallons, which is an undefined number. You can't divide by zero. It will get 40 miles/8kWh, which actually tells you something useful.

It still won't cost more in daily operating cost as a Prius- it'll probably burn a similar amount of gas once the engine starts

Quagmire: The only way to get "230 mpg" is to get the full 40 mile max range on electric power, and then drive the 11 mile epa test cycle, and pretened that the electricity was free and doesn't really count as fuel. It's like saying your electric dryer uses less natural gas than any other dryer on the market. If you only drive 5 feet on gas for your commute, could they advertise the car as getting 15,000 mpg? Why or why not?

The fact that any automaker would do this is irrelevent to the point: "mpg" can't be accuratly measured or used for anything meaningful if most (or any) of your fuel can't be measured in gallons.

Jeremy: the car only uses 8 kwh before the engine kicks on. City mpg rating should not depend on the length of your trip, otherwise it's a useless number. The EPA does NOT convert the electricity to gallons equivelent. A gallon of gas has 36.6 kwh of energy. The battery can hold 8 kwh of useable energy- equivelent to .2186 gallons, and go a max of 40 miles on that (which is optimistic). That's a max of 183 mpg equivelent on pure electric power. Real world range will be closer to 32 miles, for 146 mpg equivelent. Both these numbers are significantly below the 240 quoted number. To get that number, the EPA takes the 40 electric miles for free, and then runs it's 11 mile test. Go significantly further, and the mileage can become a fraction of the rating. Go significantly less far and the mileage would be many, many times higher. If the mpg can vary this drastically depending on how far you drive, it's not a useful number. They need to provide city/hwy mpg when the generator is running, range on battery power (city/hwy), and energy efficiency on battery power(city/hwy). Those numbers would actually tell you something useful about what you're buying.

[quagmire]

Originally Posted by carve

Quagmire: The only way to get "230 mpg" is to get the full 40 mile max range on electric power, and then drive the 11 mile epa test cycle, and pretened that the electricity was free and doesn't really count as fuel. It's like saying your electric dryer uses less natural gas than any other dryer on the market. If you only drive 5 feet on gas for your commute, could they advertise the car as getting 15,000 mpg? Why or why not?

The fact that any automaker would do this is irrelevent to the point: "mpg" can't be accuratly measured or used for anything meaningful if most (or any) of your fuel can't be measured in gallons.

Oh I know, all I stated is any automaker would take advantage of the EPA's stupidity. I do think the EPA is handling how to test this kind of vehicle in the wrong way. As you state, if people go more then 50 miles( or never charge the Volt) their MPG will drop dramatically. So it is a bit misleading to say the Volt can achieve 230 MPG.

[jeremyc74]

Originally Posted by carve

The only way to get "230 mpg" is to get the full 40 mile max range on electric power, and then drive the 11 mile epa test cycle, and pretened that the electricity was free and doesn't really count as fuel..

That's not how it works. They are assigning a value to the electricity used, and quoting an MPG equivalent for it. The first 40 miles aren't free, they're just really cheap.

We don't really know the distance the EPA is using for the EV city test right now, because all the details haven't been released, but it's very likely that GM used the EPA tests as part of their design criteria, which makes me think it's probably around 40 miles. That's probably not a bad number, because it covers a large portion of the population's daily commute.

[carve]

Originally Posted by jeremyc74

That's not how it works. They are assigning a value to the electricity used, and quoting an MPG equivalent for it. The first 40 miles aren't free, they're just really cheap.

We don't really know the distance the EPA is using for the EV city test right now, because all the details haven't been released, but it's very likely that GM used the EPA tests as part of their design criteria, which makes me think it's probably around 40 miles. That's probably not a bad number, because it covers a large portion of the population's daily commute.

The EPA does NOT convert the electricity to gallons equivelent, or not in any useful way. A gallon of gas has 36.6 kwh of energy. The battery can hold 8 kwh of useable energy- equivelent to .2186 gallons, and go a max of 40 miles on that (which is optimistic). That's a max of 183 mpg equivelent on pure electric power. Real world range will be closer to 32 miles, for 146 mpg equivelent. Both these numbers are significantly below the 240 quoted number

They MAY look at average electricity COST to come up with that number- that might be reasonable and would explain the the mpg rating on the leaf, but electricity cost span a range of about 300% across the country, and change year to year, as do gas prices. Could you imagine if your mpg rating was based on the price of gas in 1977? It'd be WAY off for today. The amount of energy (gas or electric) that is used does not depend on what that energy costs. Even for current year, it ignores the fact that the Volt driver is paying no road taxes.

[jeremyc74]

Originally Posted by carve

The EPA does NOT convert the electricity to gallons equivelent, or not in any useful way. A gallon of gas has 36.6 kwh of energy. The battery can hold 8 kwh of useable energy- equivelent to .2186 gallons, and go a max of 40 miles on that (which is optimistic). That's a max of 183 mpg equivelent on pure electric power. Real world range will be closer to 32 miles, for 146 mpg equivelent. Both these numbers are significantly below the 240 quoted number

They MAY look at average electricity COST to come up with that number- that might be reasonable and would explain the the mpg rating on the leaf, but electricity cost span a range of about 300% across the country, and change year to year, as do gas prices. Could you imagine if your mpg rating was based on the price of gas in 1977? It'd be WAY off for today. The amount of energy (gas or electric) that is used does not depend on what that energy costs. Even for current year, it ignores the fact that the Volt driver is paying no road taxes.

They are using cost. It's the only number that makes any sense to the consumer when comparing an electric vehicle to a standard gasser or hybrid. They pick a standard rate for both electricity and gas. How often it's updated remains to be seen.

[mtla4]

These hybrid cars are useless. Cost wise it's better to buy an Aveo or Yaris and call it a day. What Gm should do is do like in the 90s the 1.0 3 cylinder Geo Metro these things had amazing gas mileage. Just start producing a low output aveo I bet that it will outsell the Volt.
The Volt is only good publicity but at the price that they will sell it......I have my doubts....even the Prius is not worth it..the Yaris is a better buy it's about 2.5 times cheaper.

[Vudoo4u2]

However the EPA is doing it, its very clear that GM designed around this (and yes quag, I agree, any manufacturer would do the same..not just GM...but they really needed something to get them going recently)...

the point being, I agree with carve, and its what Ive said (whether I understand the intricacy of how the electric engine turns on or off), the 230 mpg rating is misleading, and so is the notion that electricity is cheap

the EPA really needs to do a better job with testing these things and give them a combined miles/kWH rating + miles/gallon rating, to make this useful. Until then, manufacturers will design with this test in mind, knowing they can tote around 230mpg and the average person will think their drive is going to be damn near free

and jeremy, just because you dont drive 300 miles in one sitting in a city, doesnt mean you cant use a full 300 mile trip to assess the cost of a city drive. You might drive ALL city miles for a week and it adds up to 300 miles. City MPG is for a city drive, on and off and on and off until you reach a certain # of miles. If 25 kWh/100 miles is true, and at a US avg of .11 $ /kWh (and this is an avg...for which its also a useless number, since 95% of the people owning this vehicle would be in a city, and city electricity is pricier...sadly I know this first hand), then operating a prius for a similar 300 mile trip is cheaper

[atr_hugo]

I'm driving a car with 300+ HP on purpose, so while 230 or 158 or some fractional MPG thereof is a moot point, what I really want to know is this:

I leave Denver headed west on I-70, get through the Eisenhower tunnel and head north towards the back side of Rocky Mountain National Park on US 40. Up over the Berthoud pass I go (on that 1.4L I4 57kW motor). Will I make it to the top? Once on the top of the pass, will I make it down the other side with any brakes left? Inquiring minds want to know . . . ; -)

[carve]

Wow...if they're basing it on cost, they should measure it in...hold your breath "miles per dollar as of national average gas and electric prices on Aug 13 2009 if you travel 51 miles and if you pay road taxes on the gas but not the electricity"

I mean, in a years time that 230 mpg will be meaningless by ANY standard, yet the gasoline fueled cars will still reflect their mpg accurately- it's just the price of those gallons that'll be different. Measuring it in dollars-to-gallons-equivelent is RETARDED.

Jeremy- I think we're largely in agreement, but you'd need electricity to be 30 cents per kwh and gas to be $3/gal for the Volt and Prius to have equal fuel costs on a 40 mile trip. On long trips fuel costs will probably be very similar. But yeah- the Prius is still the better value for nearly everyone.

atr hugo- after your battery is depleted, you'll have about 70 hp going up the mountain (75 hp going through ~93% efficient motor). It'll be pretty week. The good news is going back down the mountain, you'll use regenerative braking on the way back down and will be able to substantially charge up the battery without plugging in. You'll recover about 1/3 of the energy you put into the hill by climbing it.

[quagmire]

Originally Posted by carve

Wow...if they're basing it on cost, they should measure it in...hold your breath "miles per dollar as of national average gas and electric prices on Aug 13 2009 if you travel 51 miles and if you pay road taxes on the gas but not the electricity"

I mean, in a years time that 230 mpg will be meaningless by ANY standard, yet the gasoline fueled cars will still reflect their mpg accurately- it's just the price of those gallons that'll be different. Measuring it in dollars-to-gallons-equivelent is RETARDED.

Jeremy- I think we're largely in agreement, but you'd need electricity to be 30 cents per kwh and gas to be $3/gal for the Volt and Prius to have equal fuel costs on a 40 mile trip. On long trips fuel costs will probably be very similar. But yeah- the Prius is still the better value for nearly everyone.

atr hugo- after your battery is depleted, you'll have about 70 hp going up the mountain (75 hp going through ~93% efficient motor). It'll be pretty week. The good news is going back down the mountain, you'll use regenerative braking on the way back down and will be able to substantially charge up the battery without plugging in. You'll recover about 1/3 of the energy you put into the hill by climbing it.

If needed, the battery will help supply power.

"When the battery reaches a minimum state of charge, the Volt automatically switches to Extended-Range mode. In this secondary mode of operation, an engine-generator produces electricity to power the vehicle. The energy stored in the battery supplements the engine-generator when additional power is needed during heavy accelerations or on steep inclines."

http://media.gm.com/servlet/GatewayS...12&docid=56132

"The engine-generator has the capability to provide the level of electrical power that the Volt needs for the most frequent maneuvers. However, the battery will continue to generate some power and work together with the engine-generator to provide peak performance when it's required, such as driving up a steep incline or for high acceleration maneuvers. The engine-generator will then continue to provide electricity to power the vehicle and simultaneously return some energy to the battery to replenish and maintain a low energy level. The battery will not be recharged to a “full” state by the engine-generator."
"During both modes of operation, energy is captured during braking, converted into electricity and stored in the battery. This process of capturing energy is called regenerative braking. Regenerative braking increases the overall efficiency of the vehicle."

http://media.gm.com/volt/eflex/works.html

[carve]

The generator kicks on when the battery hits 25% charge, but won't top the battery up beyond 30%. That 5% buffer allows you to get full power...for short bursts. Climbing 7000' from Denver to the mountains is not a short burst and you'll quickly deplete that buffer.

By the time you get way up there, power will probably be 50 hp due to the thin air.