Long distance test/review of a Chevy Volt

[Eikon]

My company has a Chevy Volt that they need transferred from MI to OH. They needed someone to help out and I just happen to be making that trip. I also was able to arrange a ride back to MI for Monday morning, so I'm going to be able to help out and drive the car about 250 miles.

Since most folks haven't had the chance to test drive an electric/hybrid car, I thought I'd keep some notes and write up my thoughts on the topic.

I hope to drive a Leaf sometime in the future as well, so this should allow me to do a solid comparison test at some point.


I'll update this thread when I have a chance to put my thoughts together.

Anyone have any specific suggestions or questions? Any ideas about things to pay attention to as I drive the car?


Thanks

[NolimitZ32]

Can you set it on fire and take some glorious pics than say you got carjacked , lol JK. let us know how it goes.

[Jesda]

I wish there was a way to test the mountain mode. My understanding is that if you dont hit the mountain button prior to climbing, you'll run out of charge halfway up and lose a ton of power.

[Bubba1]

My company has a Chevy Volt that they need transferred from MI to OH. They needed someone to help out and I just happen to be making that trip. I also was able to arrange a ride back to MI for Monday morning, so I'm going to be able to help out and drive the car about 250 miles.

Since most folks haven't had the chance to test drive an electric/hybrid car, I thought I'd keep some notes and write up my thoughts on the topic.

I hope to drive a Leaf sometime in the future as well, so this should allow me to do a solid comparison test at some point.


I'll update this thread when I have a chance to put my thoughts together.

Anyone have any specific suggestions or questions? Any ideas about things to pay attention to as I drive the car?


Thanks

I'm personally curious how well it does with A/C on, but I'd really like to hear your overall driving impressions as I have yet to try one.

[Eikon]

I wish there was a way to test the mountain mode. My understanding is that if you dont hit the mountain button prior to climbing, you'll run out of charge halfway up and lose a ton of power.

The biggest hill between Detroit and Cleveland is probably the I-280 bridge over Toledo.



My understanding is that the volt is supposed to do the first 25-50 miles in electric and then change over to gas... then switch back now and then when it has built up some battery power through regen braking, etc..

I'm not sure if the batteries in this car will be fully charged prior to me leaving... I'm assume so, but I could be wrong.

[frapjap]

Run all of the powered accessories at once- windshield wipers, fog lights, horn, windows, etc and see if you can get the battery life meter to drop a percent or two.

[asoomal]

Also crank up the radio to the max ;D

[Jesda]

I heard later Volts didnt get the Bose system standard.

[Eikon]

So I drove the Volt. It was neat to drive the car. It's always a novelty to drive something new.

Having said that.. the car sucks.


I'm not going to do a full review.. If you want the background on the volt read the wiki: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chevrolet_Volt

My thoughts:

Pro's:
Nice exterior look
Great infotainment system
handles pretty decent, nice cornering for a non-sports car.
Bright LCD screens behind steering wheel and in center of dash stack.
Eco Meter "coach" is pretty good
back up cam is nice.
Overall build quality seems high.. door shut crisp and solid.
Quiet ride on the highway.
Full electric at high speeds.
Seemless conversion from pure electric to gas engine electric

Cons:
HORRIBLY SLOW.. to the point it felt dangerous to try to get it out into traffic.
Brakes have a mind of their own.. the regen system doesn't let go when you do.. so you get an extra second or two of braking after you've let up sometimes.. To me, this is not acceptable.
tight interior
strange stacked upper dash.. nice materials, but odd design.
low roofline. I hit my head getting in an out a number of times. Poor visability.. hard to see streetlights over intersections.
horrible foot space for left foot.. can't stretch out left leg.
center console too thick and cuts into right leg.
MRSP = $41,000.. enough for a Chevy Cruze and a heck of a lot of gas.
when your electric charge runs out you are supposed to get 44mpg. The one I was in had 6,000 miles on it and averaged 36.3 over life of vehicle.
Door panel inserts appear to be thin plastic like the top cover on a bicycle helmet.. really bad!!!
You get "thumbs up" signals from douchebags in other Volts and hybrid cars


Conclusion..
Nice try Chevy, but you fail. It's a great idea, I'm sure the electrical system is great, but this car is horrible to drive in. Once you're on the highway at speed, it runs nice, is quiet, rides smooth, but responsive and is nice to spend time in thanks to the infotainment system. However, the interior is cramped and after a while becomes very uncomfortable to sit in. For some reason the footwell area is not shaped like a square so that you can stretch out both legs... instead it's more like a triangle, so you can only stretch out your right leg.. not cool!!! The biggest problem is that it's unsafe to drive in city conditions. You just can't allow enough space in traffic to get up to speed quickly enough to survive in a city. Plus, you freak out when you have to hit the brakes because they have a mind of their own. There is no way you can justify $41k for the economic benefit you get from a 25 to 50 mile electric range. At $4/gallon, you could buy 5,000 gallons of gas for the difference between a Volt and a Cruze.. at 35mpg that is 175,000 miles on the cruze. So you would have to put 175,000 miles of electric only miles on the Volt to break even.. and that doesn't count the cost of the electricity..

FAIL... but please try again! Electric cars do have a future. It's going to take a few steps to get to a reasonable product goal.. but keep at it and eventually the general public will embrace the technology and start buying the cars.

[Jesda]

The Volt's recorded 0-60 time is 8-9 seconds, on par with my well-aged Saab, which feels peppy.

Could there be something wrong with this one's powertrain? Most say it feels energetic around town.

[Eikon]

It's possible there was something wrong with it that affected low speed acceleration.
It seemed like it had enough power on the highway, but just couldn't get off the line. It was certainly slower than my 98 Honda Civic.. and that might have 90 hp.

[Jesda]

Next time you get a chance, can you time your 0-60 run? The reviews I've read praise the Volt as being an electric car that doesn't drive like a typical fuel miser, accelerating competently and handling surprisingly well. I wonder if there's a software glitch in yours.

The intrusive center console would drive me nuts, especially with my short legs, and I had the same complaint about the 2008+ Cadillac CTS.

[Jesda]

I also thought the dash and door panels felt cheap.

[Razi]

I also thought the dash and door panels felt cheap.

Same here.
Steering wheel "leather" or whatever it is felt pretty bad too.