“Why?” Is ramping up production and deliveries still a problem? Is demand weak? Are unscrupulous dealers to blame?
50 Replies to “It’s Because They’d Still Suck At Half The Price, That’s Why”
The Volt . . . the wind turbine of cars.
Needs a massive subsidy to be sold, doesn’t work in cold weather and doesn’t perform as advertised.
The perf
Instead of how many L/100Km or mpg will they say how many lightbulbs you could light per mile?
This vehicle reminds me of the Simpson episode where Homer’s long-lost and successful industrialist brother allows him (Homer) to design a car…which is so useless it bankrupts the company…LOL
There’s just not enough people who want to be known as “Dolts with Volts”. Who can blame them!
I looked at the $26,000 dollar basic all electric Nissan Leaf.
Nice car, clean ashtrays, smells good.
But if I want to go on an extended long trip,
that extra 600 miles of electric drop-cord cost $6,000 dollars.
January – 31 days
February – 28 days
January sales – 321
February sales – 281
January sales/day = 10.35
February sales/day = 10.04
Yep, on a sample size this big, that’s a huge difference to get all concerned about.
Innumeracy, thy name is legion.
I wonder if you have stumbled up on the real reason why Obama and the Bernanke are inflating the money supply.
With a winter like we just had, the sale for these will just skyrocket, i’m sure…I’ll let you guys go and call your investment advisors now.
I’m old school, I’ll tie my money around North American dirty oil exploration once President Palin says “drill baby drill” in January ’13.
The Volt will go the way of the Ford Edsel…Except this time, taxpayers will share the pain being it’s from Government Motors and all…
Richard,
Nope. They are inflating for other reasons, some noble some venal. Noble reasons are the US economy was so far down that a flood of money was, repeat was, required to keep deflation from taking hold in a more than marginal way.
Venal reasons. They continue to do this because the US is awash in debt and they need to soak up their own treasuries, and like any debtor welcoming the real rdevaluation of its obligation it is contributiong to the slide.
As for staying on topic. It has a limited market, it is a niche product, as previously pointed out. Nothing wrng with the idea of electric cars, just making it a requirement for taxpayer money and potentially destroying value in the stock by misallocating the capital provided is the reason to be upset.
Its one of those things that will make sesne in some markets and for some people. But it will take a long time to hit the weet spot. But please no more money from government for production….if you feel the need to spend taxpayer dollars on this stuff spend it at the more basic level like battery research, or the core level of basic science on materials that would feed into better batteries. Throwing money at a car, where so much can be right and yet a couple of things can be wrong and you have a major failure is just the wrong place to go.
Money for automotive dreams is the symptom of the larger problem of spending moeny the economy is either not generating or isnt being taxed at appropriate levels.
The chief of the Royal Bank made a nice comment on it last night. The math doesnt add up. They have the capacity to fix the problem but the longer they wait the harder it is goig to be. Unfortnatley he doesnt see it being fixed ahead of the 2012 election. He mentioned both sides of the leger, entitlement spending and tax revenues…I still say the US will have a VAT. But unless they show spending discipline, ie stop funding VOLT’s, it will all be for nought.
Richard,
Nope. They are inflating for other reasons, some noble some venal. Noble reasons are the US economy was so far down that a flood of money was, repeat was, required to keep deflation from taking hold in a more than marginal way.
Venal reasons. They continue to do this because the US is awash in debt and they need to soak up their own treasuries, and like any debtor welcoming the real rdevaluation of its obligation it is contributiong to the slide.
As for staying on topic. It has a limited market, it is a niche product, as previously pointed out. Nothing wrng with the idea of electric cars, just making it a requirement for taxpayer money and potentially destroying value in the stock by misallocating the capital provided is the reason to be upset.
Its one of those things that will make sesne in some markets and for some people. But it will take a long time to hit the weet spot. But please no more money from government for production….if you feel the need to spend taxpayer dollars on this stuff spend it at the more basic level like battery research, or the core level of basic science on materials that would feed into better batteries. Throwing money at a car, where so much can be right and yet a couple of things can be wrong and you have a major failure is just the wrong place to go.
Money for automotive dreams is the symptom of the larger problem of spending moeny the economy is either not generating or isnt being taxed at appropriate levels.
The chief of the Royal Bank made a nice comment on it last night. The math doesnt add up. They have the capacity to fix the problem but the longer they wait the harder it is goig to be. Unfortnatley he doesnt see it being fixed ahead of the 2012 election. He mentioned both sides of the leger, entitlement spending and tax revenues…I still say the US will have a VAT. But unless they show spending discipline, ie stop funding VOLT’s, it will all be for nought.
The answer is pure and simple: they cost too much for what you get. Ultimately, it’s not the propulsion system* the consumers care about (after all, any car must have an engine of some sort); it’s what they get for their money in terms of passenger space and accessories.
So you can pay $30,000+ to be in the cramped confines of a Nissan Leaf or the same amount to be in a roomy Toyota Highlander with all the bells and whistles. A no-brainer.
* Though making a system that appears rather complicated and awkward to use doesn’t help. An espresso machine might appeal to a certain type of consumer but the main market for coffeemakers just wants to be able to turn the damned thing on in the morning and enjoy a jolt of java.
The Soviets showed the way: make the Volt the only car available (except for the elite).
Even so, the Lada and the Yugo did MUCH better than
the Volt in external markets.
Even a brilliant design is wasted if it’s impractical in application. I can’t enumerate the problems these cars would give in a standard Canadian winter.
What is it with greens? Why don’t they trust the demand market? If electric cars were more efficient and reliable than a diesel dually in Canadian winters people would have been using them for decades.
I thought I had read somewhere that dealers were selling them at about four thow over list…
They could indeed be having production difficulties – battery supply might be an issue and many of the drivetrain parts come from Europe and elsewhere.
I suspect that inside the engineering Dept they would love nothing better than for the volt to fail at the sales level. GM has had a long history with electric cars – none of it favorable. They have wasted a lot of tIme and treasure on them – cars that were meant to be halos – never profit centres. Money that could have been spent on making an accord/camry beater was lost to this last cause. For it to fail again – this time taking down the Ed Begleys of the world with would be a very sweet moment for them.
This is the Al Gore (global warming fraudster and troubled man) Vehicle which is truly nothing but a symbols of sucker-hood.
Driving one of these retarded cars will only prove your gullibility and that you have probably have that you just don’t know what to do with.
Remember when the Cadillac was a symbol of success, but then the brand was taken over by black pimps and drug dealers.
It may have been a once cool idea to drive an overpriced, under-performing electric roller skate of a vehicle to prove you were a caring individual, but then the brand was taken over by gaia zealots and Hollywood twits who have no idea what they are doing at the best of times.
Always just do your own thing and don’t bother with trends. If you have caught a preview of the now second gen IPad … you probably already feel stupid for jumping on that trend last year and now you own an obsolete and inferior toy.
We should all be more adult and more thoughtful about whose zoomin’ whom.
I agree with Abe. Also, those who think the Volt is a “green” alternative are sooo suckers. You’re taking the emissions out of the city but replacing them with increased energy requirement leaving the “pollution” at the power generating station.
A week or so ago I drove past the Sheerness Power Station south of Hanna AB. It was a beautiful cold clear day and the steam plume rose majestically then did a sharp turn when it met the north wind. By my odometer that plume stretched for 10 kms. I wonder how much bigger that plume would have been if we were all forced to drive electric cars. Not that I was in anyway tempted to drive an electric, my Ford pickup kept us toasty in the -32 C air while we zipped along at 120.
I don’t think sales per day is a very useful metric.
I think a better measure would be Leaf/Volt sales vs. sales of other GM/Nissan vehicles.
GM sold 83004 cars in Feb. vs. 66878 in Jan.
Nissan sold 58897 in Feb. vs. 45361 in Jan.
Overall sales for small/mid-size cars were also up.
A decrease in sales for electric vehicles when the sales for their manufactures and segment significantly increased, is not a positive sign.
The numbers above were taken from http://www.motorintelligence.com/m_frameset.html.
JJM nailed it.
This is $45,000 car that belongs in the $15,000 bracket.
$30,000 is bit much to spend to feel good about yourself. No matter how much the “ists” want to believe it, the general public just ain’t stupid.
“But please no more money from government for production….”
Stephen
Who wants to gamble that all the unsold Volts that will be built for public consumption end up as Government fleets for entire government depts?
Then 5 years or so from now we’ll start hearing stories of waste from battery manufacturing fraud and cost overrun from maintenance scandals…Not to mention to cost to dispose of the batteries too.
I can see State cruisers trying to intercept anything gas powered off the highways:
“Eh look Randy, there goes a Citroen 2 cylinder…I’m sure we have the power to catch up to that thing…”
“But Ricky, that car is only doing 3 Km over the speed limit, you want to bother? The guy’s going to be pissed ya know?”
“I don’t care, I’m bored sitting here in this damn golf cart… And turn up the heat will ya?”
“Can’t do that buddy, we won’t have enough juice to go to Timmy’s for break..”
Ever now and then I have to eat my words about the public being a flock of gullible sheep…
Jamie MacMaster,
Maybe most of the people with enough money left to buy a Volt have enough smarts not to buy a Volt.
That’s what you get for naming a car after a mediocre hockey team.
The Nissan Canuck, now that might create some interest.
Got to wonder about the cost of electricity to run one of these. I know my electricity bill is exhorbitant ($900 bi-monthly – thanks Dalton). It would have to be more than the price of evil gasoline.
Oz at March 4, 2011 11:03 AM
Exactly
Twenty years from now my 2008 Nissan Maxima will still be running whilst most of those Leafs and Volts will be piled up in the dead battery disposal holding area. What’s greener eh?
Consider that just calling something a “Leaf” dooms it to failure … I cite the Toronto hockey team that is all about losing all day long.
They should rename them … The Chevy Dolt and the Nissan Loser.
Incandescent bulbs? No way, they use too much electricity.
Electric cars? Ooh, how green!
“I know my electricity bill is exhorbitant ($900 bi-monthly – thanks Dalton). It would have to be more than the price of evil gasoline.”
Are you heating the Air Canada Centre? Our bi-monthly bill for electricity (in Toronto) is about $235 all in including electric water heater and stove.
I saw a Nissan Leaf last night – nice looking car but I wouldn’t buy one. The cost of electricity for over night charging is inexpensive relative to gasoline.
Giant subsidized car makers, wind mills, solar, eco cars, ethanol and unions, are rent seeking scams by STATIST elites who have destroyed our countries and are robbing our future.
I will destroy them all, and do everything I can to see them all burn in hell.
There’s your curb appeal, shine in your ride.
F.You and the horse you rode in on.
Kathryn: win.
I wonder how much cold-weather testing they’ve done on those cars. The electric C-train here in Calgary always has problems when the temperature drops into the -30 range. Always.
The more I understand electricity, the more I love my Airwalks!
But – an all-electric car is such a noble idea! They just need to increase the advertising budget to explain that to the people in fly-over country.
The Volt shares the same weakness of every battery powered device ever invented – batteries!
I wonder when the battery powered tow truck version hits the road? Or the battery-powered 18 wheeler?
I heard they studied the feasibility of a battery powered 747, but it apparently never got off the ground.
John B – hoping that replacing the older furnace and ac unit will help. Maybe getting rid of the 24 year old who appears to be afraid of the dark will make a difference.
Truthfully, there are 2 home businesses here, so things run 24/7, but it’s still awfully high. And that was my last bill before time of day becomes an issue. I may very well have the highest residential hydro bill EVER.
And no, no grow op (inquiring minds and all)
Make the UAW buy them with some of the $26 billion of my money that Barry gave ’em.
KevinB said:
“January – 31 days
February – 28 days
January sales – 321
February sales – 281
January sales/day = 10.35
February sales/day = 10.04
Yep, on a sample size this big, that’s a huge difference to get all concerned about.
Innumeracy, thy name is legion.”
——
Well, hello, Mr. Legion!
Five weekends in January plus a holiday means 20 week days. 16.05 cars/day.
Four weekends in February plus a holiday means 19 week days. 14.79 cars/day.
Number gets a little smaller if deals are finished on Saturdays, but they aren’t open every Saturday around these parts, so I left it out.
I long ago stopped caring about Autoblog, let alone Autoblog Green.
Almost without exception, the commenters (and posters) start with the assumption that something called “green” is to be preferred.
This leads them, invariably, to faulty conclusions.
(That and the Green Car People are subject to the same sort of insularity and self-reinforcement that all other fandoms are; they think “everyone will want an EV!!!” for the same reason a certain sort of computer geek thinks “everyone will want Linux!!!”.
They’re both wrong, for the same basic reason.)
Yukon: Around here, at least, car dealerships do sales on the weekends – indeed, many people do more car shopping on the weekends, because they have “jobs” during the week.
Yukon:
I don’t know where your parts are (and, really, I don’t want to know), but here in Toronto, my wife is director of finance for a chain of auto dealers.
Saturdays are their biggest sales day, by far. And since I’d suggest (and have suggested here, repeatedly) that electric cars only make sense for, and are only attractive to urban drivers, I’d suggest Volt/Leaf/Prius/etc. sales are heavily skewed to cities, where most dealers are open on the weekends.
But seriously – there are so many factors at play here. What about “holiday hangover”, where people are so tapped out in January they won’t shop for cars? What about the “don’t buy a car in its first year” effect? We haven’t even gotten into regional weather patterns, which I’d suggest is even more of a factor in people deciding whether to visit a show room or not.
I’m not saying that there is a huge demand for electric cars in general, or the Volt in particular. What I’m saying is the article Kate linked to posts a single data point, and then draws ridiculous conclusions from it which have no basis in reality. Then a bunch of people here seemed to have piled on.
Those of you who read the National Post might have noticed my letter today, decrying another ridiculous statistic regarding sexual assault. Sometimes I feel that I’m one of the lonely few who actually have a sense of number. (And grammarians – I spent a couple of minutes wondering whether that should be “have” or “has” – number extends beyond numerals.)
I think you’ll find that the Ford F-250 and the Chevy 2500 and the Ford Shelby Mustang, and the Dodge Challenger, and the Chevy Camaro, all at $40 to $50K+++ far, far outsold the noble Chevy Volt.
No brainer really, everybody knew this going in. The idea I think is to use this as an excuse to -force- Americans to buy the Chevy Volt. For their own good, of course.
“What I’m saying is the article Kate linked to posts a single data point, and then draws ridiculous conclusions from it which have no basis in reality.” – KevinB
What, specifically, are the “ridiculous conclusions” you are referring to?
SDH pointed out that overall GM sales were *up* considerably in February (2,964/day) compared to January (2,157/day), and Nissan went from 1,463/day in January to 2,103/day in February; I suggest that it would be ridiculous to conclude that sales for the Volt and the Leaf went down in February because of “regional weather patterns.”
Fom Naderism to environmentalism….. the stumbling bumbling overly protracted demise of GM.
They did not deserve to suffer because Ralf Nader’s wife was an incompetent driver … but they have deserved every boot to the corporate balls they’ve received since.
They had the opportunity to fight political ecco-crusaders back in the Carter days … Claybrook etal…. but they caved and we have ALL paid for it.
Where are the trolls, defending the green car saviour of the world, demanded by OBOZO?
EBD: What, specifically, are the “ridiculous conclusions” you are referring to?
From the article:
“Is ramping up production and deliveries still a problem? Is demand weak? Are unscrupulous dealers to blame?”
To be fair, perhaps “ridiculous assertions” would have been a better choice of words on my part. Apologies.
As for monthly sales differences, you and many others make the assumption that Volt sales should exactly mirror other car sales. Why? Do Corvette sales in January exactly mirror Corvette sales in July? Do convertibles of any type sell as well in winter as they do in summer? On what basis do you contend that electric/hybrid sales should exactly mirror all other car sales?
Again, all I was pointing out was that, on a day-by-day basis, the Volt sold approximately as well in January as it did in February. The original article insinuated that Volt sales were going down, and then postulated the above listed reasons as possible explanations. I call BS on both of those.
This electric vehicle is an abomination in many respects: first it misappropriates the name of a physical constant for an expensive POS and secondly it is useless.
KevinB suggests that the V would appeal to urban drivers. When I lived in Vancouver, I had a hard enough time finding parking for one vehicle and KevinB is suggesting that every urban dweller would need to find two parking spots. The V is useless in winter and on the highway and can at best be considered an expensive luxury for those people who have large amounts of money and a need to spend it. One of the few advantages of urban living (ie downtown Vancouver) is that one doesn’t have to drive. I got along quite well walking everywhere in Vancouver and taking taxis for longer distances. The prospect of driving any vehicle down Robson street is simply too terrifying to consider doing.
The best analogy I can think of is trying to convince the owner of a modern computer to give up his 2 GHz dual core 64 bit processor for a more “environmentally friendly” wind powered Babbage difference engine. Sure, the difference engine will compute faster when it’s windy outside but I certainly wouldn’t give up my computers (although the difference engine is an interesting historical artifact).
IMO, the V is at the difference engine stage of computer development. For me to get an electric vehicle, I want it to outperform my current Grand Cherokee in all categories. I want longer range as my jeep is a gas guzzler and I think about regenerative braking every time I do the long downhill run home from my office. The highway range is about 300 miles at the speed I like to drive, probably 400 for someone who drives more slowly. An electric version of the Grand Cherokee would need to have greater energy storage in the space that the current gas tank occupies and the electric motors/generators should have a weight less than that of the current gasoline engine and drive train.
One of the limiting factors of regenerative braking is that current automotive batteries can’t absorb the current that is produced by a heavy vehicle going downhill and I don’t think the necessary power control circuitry currently exists. Also, I want a vehicle that is as EMP-proof as my 1969 Dart.
We need new energy storage technologies before electric cars are feasible. Once electric vehicles have specifications in terms of range, speed and acceleration that exceed those of gasoline vehicles, people will start buying them.
It is even worse than that. The Volt was hyped as a serial electric car, where the electric motor did all the work, but it turns out the Volt is a hybrid just like the Prius (the gasoline engine turns the wheels as well).
The only real difference between the Volt and the Prius is the proportion of work the gasoline engine and the electric engines do in driving the car, so for any practical purpose, you can make a one to one comparison between the Volt and the Prius.
On every basis from price to performance (including real world fuel economy, not the fantasy numbers provided by the US Government) the Prius is far superior. You would think for $50 billion GM could have produced something a bit better……
@favill:
“This vehicle reminds me of the Simpson episode where Homer’s long-lost and successful industrialist brother allows him (Homer) to design a car…which is so useless it bankrupts the company…LOL”
Well if Chevy rebadges it the homer and installed a musical horn that played la cucaracha, I guess that would multiply the sales to well of Simpsons fans as a collectors item…
If Obama would kick in a Presidential Medal of Freedom maybe people would buy it.
loki: The best analogy I can think of is trying to convince the owner of a modern computer to give up his 2 GHz dual core 64 bit processor for a more “environmentally friendly” wind powered Babbage difference engine. Sure, the difference engine will compute faster when it’s windy outside but I certainly wouldn’t give up my computers (although the difference engine is an interesting historical artifact).
Oh,geez.. argumentum ad absurdum, anyone?
First, the Volt has been tested and retested on the Detroit proving grounds. I worked in Detroit for two years. Is it as absolutely harsh as the winters in, say, Winnipeg? No. Is it as cold as winter in, say, Vancouver? 100 times yes, and ten times over. How many times in a year do you get temperatures below 0 F? Yeah, that’s what I thought.
Second, I have not experienced Vancouver traffic on a daily basis, but anyone who’s been on the Don Valley PARKway in rush hour, or the 405 in LA, or the Lincoln tunnel in NYC knows exactly what I’m talking about when I say you spend a good portion of your commute doing 0 mph – your pedestrian and parochial experience notwithstanding.
Why do I have to say this again and AGAIN and AGAIN.. electric cars are not for every one. But for many urban drivers, they are economical, practical, and useful. Do electric cars make sense in every instance? Of course not. But then.. do vanilla beans? Should SK farmers eschew wheat for vanilla beans? Vanilla beans have over 1,000 times the value by weight of wheat. Plant vanilla! (loki.. same type of arg. ad. abs. you posted above)
If gas stays over $1.25/l, you can bet sales of electrics will pick up in Toronto this spring.
KevinB: “If gas stays over $1.25/l, you can bet sales of electrics will pick up in Toronto this spring.”
Yikes, it sounds like you bought one of these POS. If you took the time to read the links in Kate’s link, you would have seen these were US sales.
The total car sales in the US in Feb was 490,994. I’m not real good on small numbers – what’s 281 divided by 490,994?
BTW: Did you know a Canadian football field (counting the end zones) will hold 1013 Volts?
The Volt . . . the wind turbine of cars.
Needs a massive subsidy to be sold, doesn’t work in cold weather and doesn’t perform as advertised.
The perf
Instead of how many L/100Km or mpg will they say how many lightbulbs you could light per mile?
This vehicle reminds me of the Simpson episode where Homer’s long-lost and successful industrialist brother allows him (Homer) to design a car…which is so useless it bankrupts the company…LOL
There’s just not enough people who want to be known as “Dolts with Volts”. Who can blame them!
I looked at the $26,000 dollar basic all electric Nissan Leaf.
Nice car, clean ashtrays, smells good.
But if I want to go on an extended long trip,
that extra 600 miles of electric drop-cord cost $6,000 dollars.
January – 31 days
February – 28 days
January sales – 321
February sales – 281
January sales/day = 10.35
February sales/day = 10.04
Yep, on a sample size this big, that’s a huge difference to get all concerned about.
Innumeracy, thy name is legion.
I wonder if you have stumbled up on the real reason why Obama and the Bernanke are inflating the money supply.
With a winter like we just had, the sale for these will just skyrocket, i’m sure…I’ll let you guys go and call your investment advisors now.
I’m old school, I’ll tie my money around North American dirty oil exploration once President Palin says “drill baby drill” in January ’13.
The Volt will go the way of the Ford Edsel…Except this time, taxpayers will share the pain being it’s from Government Motors and all…
Richard,
Nope. They are inflating for other reasons, some noble some venal. Noble reasons are the US economy was so far down that a flood of money was, repeat was, required to keep deflation from taking hold in a more than marginal way.
Venal reasons. They continue to do this because the US is awash in debt and they need to soak up their own treasuries, and like any debtor welcoming the real rdevaluation of its obligation it is contributiong to the slide.
As for staying on topic. It has a limited market, it is a niche product, as previously pointed out. Nothing wrng with the idea of electric cars, just making it a requirement for taxpayer money and potentially destroying value in the stock by misallocating the capital provided is the reason to be upset.
Its one of those things that will make sesne in some markets and for some people. But it will take a long time to hit the weet spot. But please no more money from government for production….if you feel the need to spend taxpayer dollars on this stuff spend it at the more basic level like battery research, or the core level of basic science on materials that would feed into better batteries. Throwing money at a car, where so much can be right and yet a couple of things can be wrong and you have a major failure is just the wrong place to go.
Money for automotive dreams is the symptom of the larger problem of spending moeny the economy is either not generating or isnt being taxed at appropriate levels.
The chief of the Royal Bank made a nice comment on it last night. The math doesnt add up. They have the capacity to fix the problem but the longer they wait the harder it is goig to be. Unfortnatley he doesnt see it being fixed ahead of the 2012 election. He mentioned both sides of the leger, entitlement spending and tax revenues…I still say the US will have a VAT. But unless they show spending discipline, ie stop funding VOLT’s, it will all be for nought.
Richard,
Nope. They are inflating for other reasons, some noble some venal. Noble reasons are the US economy was so far down that a flood of money was, repeat was, required to keep deflation from taking hold in a more than marginal way.
Venal reasons. They continue to do this because the US is awash in debt and they need to soak up their own treasuries, and like any debtor welcoming the real rdevaluation of its obligation it is contributiong to the slide.
As for staying on topic. It has a limited market, it is a niche product, as previously pointed out. Nothing wrng with the idea of electric cars, just making it a requirement for taxpayer money and potentially destroying value in the stock by misallocating the capital provided is the reason to be upset.
Its one of those things that will make sesne in some markets and for some people. But it will take a long time to hit the weet spot. But please no more money from government for production….if you feel the need to spend taxpayer dollars on this stuff spend it at the more basic level like battery research, or the core level of basic science on materials that would feed into better batteries. Throwing money at a car, where so much can be right and yet a couple of things can be wrong and you have a major failure is just the wrong place to go.
Money for automotive dreams is the symptom of the larger problem of spending moeny the economy is either not generating or isnt being taxed at appropriate levels.
The chief of the Royal Bank made a nice comment on it last night. The math doesnt add up. They have the capacity to fix the problem but the longer they wait the harder it is goig to be. Unfortnatley he doesnt see it being fixed ahead of the 2012 election. He mentioned both sides of the leger, entitlement spending and tax revenues…I still say the US will have a VAT. But unless they show spending discipline, ie stop funding VOLT’s, it will all be for nought.
The answer is pure and simple: they cost too much for what you get. Ultimately, it’s not the propulsion system* the consumers care about (after all, any car must have an engine of some sort); it’s what they get for their money in terms of passenger space and accessories.
So you can pay $30,000+ to be in the cramped confines of a Nissan Leaf or the same amount to be in a roomy Toyota Highlander with all the bells and whistles. A no-brainer.
* Though making a system that appears rather complicated and awkward to use doesn’t help. An espresso machine might appeal to a certain type of consumer but the main market for coffeemakers just wants to be able to turn the damned thing on in the morning and enjoy a jolt of java.
The Soviets showed the way: make the Volt the only car available (except for the elite).
Even so, the Lada and the Yugo did MUCH better than
the Volt in external markets.
Even a brilliant design is wasted if it’s impractical in application. I can’t enumerate the problems these cars would give in a standard Canadian winter.
What is it with greens? Why don’t they trust the demand market? If electric cars were more efficient and reliable than a diesel dually in Canadian winters people would have been using them for decades.
I thought I had read somewhere that dealers were selling them at about four thow over list…
They could indeed be having production difficulties – battery supply might be an issue and many of the drivetrain parts come from Europe and elsewhere.
I suspect that inside the engineering Dept they would love nothing better than for the volt to fail at the sales level. GM has had a long history with electric cars – none of it favorable. They have wasted a lot of tIme and treasure on them – cars that were meant to be halos – never profit centres. Money that could have been spent on making an accord/camry beater was lost to this last cause. For it to fail again – this time taking down the Ed Begleys of the world with would be a very sweet moment for them.
This is the Al Gore (global warming fraudster and troubled man) Vehicle which is truly nothing but a symbols of sucker-hood.
Driving one of these retarded cars will only prove your gullibility and that you have probably have that you just don’t know what to do with.
Remember when the Cadillac was a symbol of success, but then the brand was taken over by black pimps and drug dealers.
It may have been a once cool idea to drive an overpriced, under-performing electric roller skate of a vehicle to prove you were a caring individual, but then the brand was taken over by gaia zealots and Hollywood twits who have no idea what they are doing at the best of times.
Always just do your own thing and don’t bother with trends. If you have caught a preview of the now second gen IPad … you probably already feel stupid for jumping on that trend last year and now you own an obsolete and inferior toy.
We should all be more adult and more thoughtful about whose zoomin’ whom.
I agree with Abe. Also, those who think the Volt is a “green” alternative are sooo suckers. You’re taking the emissions out of the city but replacing them with increased energy requirement leaving the “pollution” at the power generating station.
A week or so ago I drove past the Sheerness Power Station south of Hanna AB. It was a beautiful cold clear day and the steam plume rose majestically then did a sharp turn when it met the north wind. By my odometer that plume stretched for 10 kms. I wonder how much bigger that plume would have been if we were all forced to drive electric cars. Not that I was in anyway tempted to drive an electric, my Ford pickup kept us toasty in the -32 C air while we zipped along at 120.
I don’t think sales per day is a very useful metric.
I think a better measure would be Leaf/Volt sales vs. sales of other GM/Nissan vehicles.
GM sold 83004 cars in Feb. vs. 66878 in Jan.
Nissan sold 58897 in Feb. vs. 45361 in Jan.
Overall sales for small/mid-size cars were also up.
A decrease in sales for electric vehicles when the sales for their manufactures and segment significantly increased, is not a positive sign.
The numbers above were taken from http://www.motorintelligence.com/m_frameset.html.
JJM nailed it.
This is $45,000 car that belongs in the $15,000 bracket.
$30,000 is bit much to spend to feel good about yourself. No matter how much the “ists” want to believe it, the general public just ain’t stupid.
“But please no more money from government for production….”
Stephen
Who wants to gamble that all the unsold Volts that will be built for public consumption end up as Government fleets for entire government depts?
Then 5 years or so from now we’ll start hearing stories of waste from battery manufacturing fraud and cost overrun from maintenance scandals…Not to mention to cost to dispose of the batteries too.
I can see State cruisers trying to intercept anything gas powered off the highways:
“Eh look Randy, there goes a Citroen 2 cylinder…I’m sure we have the power to catch up to that thing…”
“But Ricky, that car is only doing 3 Km over the speed limit, you want to bother? The guy’s going to be pissed ya know?”
“I don’t care, I’m bored sitting here in this damn golf cart… And turn up the heat will ya?”
“Can’t do that buddy, we won’t have enough juice to go to Timmy’s for break..”
Ever now and then I have to eat my words about the public being a flock of gullible sheep…
Jamie MacMaster,
Maybe most of the people with enough money left to buy a Volt have enough smarts not to buy a Volt.
That’s what you get for naming a car after a mediocre hockey team.
The Nissan Canuck, now that might create some interest.
Got to wonder about the cost of electricity to run one of these. I know my electricity bill is exhorbitant ($900 bi-monthly – thanks Dalton). It would have to be more than the price of evil gasoline.
Oz at March 4, 2011 11:03 AM
Exactly
Twenty years from now my 2008 Nissan Maxima will still be running whilst most of those Leafs and Volts will be piled up in the dead battery disposal holding area. What’s greener eh?
Consider that just calling something a “Leaf” dooms it to failure … I cite the Toronto hockey team that is all about losing all day long.
They should rename them … The Chevy Dolt and the Nissan Loser.
Incandescent bulbs? No way, they use too much electricity.
Electric cars? Ooh, how green!
“I know my electricity bill is exhorbitant ($900 bi-monthly – thanks Dalton). It would have to be more than the price of evil gasoline.”
Are you heating the Air Canada Centre? Our bi-monthly bill for electricity (in Toronto) is about $235 all in including electric water heater and stove.
I saw a Nissan Leaf last night – nice looking car but I wouldn’t buy one. The cost of electricity for over night charging is inexpensive relative to gasoline.
Giant subsidized car makers, wind mills, solar, eco cars, ethanol and unions, are rent seeking scams by STATIST elites who have destroyed our countries and are robbing our future.
I will destroy them all, and do everything I can to see them all burn in hell.
There’s your curb appeal, shine in your ride.
F.You and the horse you rode in on.
Kathryn: win.
I wonder how much cold-weather testing they’ve done on those cars. The electric C-train here in Calgary always has problems when the temperature drops into the -30 range. Always.
I love it! GM Volt is less popular than the Ford Edsel! This link proves it!!!
http://www.edsel.net/production.html
This just gets better! The Ford Pinto out sold the Volt! Turns out GM should have brought back the Corvair!!!
http://www.corvaircorsa.com/prod.html
The more I understand electricity, the more I love my Airwalks!
But – an all-electric car is such a noble idea! They just need to increase the advertising budget to explain that to the people in fly-over country.
The Volt shares the same weakness of every battery powered device ever invented – batteries!
I wonder when the battery powered tow truck version hits the road? Or the battery-powered 18 wheeler?
I heard they studied the feasibility of a battery powered 747, but it apparently never got off the ground.
John B – hoping that replacing the older furnace and ac unit will help. Maybe getting rid of the 24 year old who appears to be afraid of the dark will make a difference.
Truthfully, there are 2 home businesses here, so things run 24/7, but it’s still awfully high. And that was my last bill before time of day becomes an issue. I may very well have the highest residential hydro bill EVER.
And no, no grow op (inquiring minds and all)
Make the UAW buy them with some of the $26 billion of my money that Barry gave ’em.
KevinB said:
“January – 31 days
February – 28 days
January sales – 321
February sales – 281
January sales/day = 10.35
February sales/day = 10.04
Yep, on a sample size this big, that’s a huge difference to get all concerned about.
Innumeracy, thy name is legion.”
——
Well, hello, Mr. Legion!
Five weekends in January plus a holiday means 20 week days. 16.05 cars/day.
Four weekends in February plus a holiday means 19 week days. 14.79 cars/day.
Number gets a little smaller if deals are finished on Saturdays, but they aren’t open every Saturday around these parts, so I left it out.
I long ago stopped caring about Autoblog, let alone Autoblog Green.
Almost without exception, the commenters (and posters) start with the assumption that something called “green” is to be preferred.
This leads them, invariably, to faulty conclusions.
(That and the Green Car People are subject to the same sort of insularity and self-reinforcement that all other fandoms are; they think “everyone will want an EV!!!” for the same reason a certain sort of computer geek thinks “everyone will want Linux!!!”.
They’re both wrong, for the same basic reason.)
Yukon: Around here, at least, car dealerships do sales on the weekends – indeed, many people do more car shopping on the weekends, because they have “jobs” during the week.
Yukon:
I don’t know where your parts are (and, really, I don’t want to know), but here in Toronto, my wife is director of finance for a chain of auto dealers.
Saturdays are their biggest sales day, by far. And since I’d suggest (and have suggested here, repeatedly) that electric cars only make sense for, and are only attractive to urban drivers, I’d suggest Volt/Leaf/Prius/etc. sales are heavily skewed to cities, where most dealers are open on the weekends.
But seriously – there are so many factors at play here. What about “holiday hangover”, where people are so tapped out in January they won’t shop for cars? What about the “don’t buy a car in its first year” effect? We haven’t even gotten into regional weather patterns, which I’d suggest is even more of a factor in people deciding whether to visit a show room or not.
I’m not saying that there is a huge demand for electric cars in general, or the Volt in particular. What I’m saying is the article Kate linked to posts a single data point, and then draws ridiculous conclusions from it which have no basis in reality. Then a bunch of people here seemed to have piled on.
Those of you who read the National Post might have noticed my letter today, decrying another ridiculous statistic regarding sexual assault. Sometimes I feel that I’m one of the lonely few who actually have a sense of number. (And grammarians – I spent a couple of minutes wondering whether that should be “have” or “has” – number extends beyond numerals.)
I think you’ll find that the Ford F-250 and the Chevy 2500 and the Ford Shelby Mustang, and the Dodge Challenger, and the Chevy Camaro, all at $40 to $50K+++ far, far outsold the noble Chevy Volt.
No brainer really, everybody knew this going in. The idea I think is to use this as an excuse to -force- Americans to buy the Chevy Volt. For their own good, of course.
“What I’m saying is the article Kate linked to posts a single data point, and then draws ridiculous conclusions from it which have no basis in reality.” – KevinB
What, specifically, are the “ridiculous conclusions” you are referring to?
SDH pointed out that overall GM sales were *up* considerably in February (2,964/day) compared to January (2,157/day), and Nissan went from 1,463/day in January to 2,103/day in February; I suggest that it would be ridiculous to conclude that sales for the Volt and the Leaf went down in February because of “regional weather patterns.”
Fom Naderism to environmentalism….. the stumbling bumbling overly protracted demise of GM.
They did not deserve to suffer because Ralf Nader’s wife was an incompetent driver … but they have deserved every boot to the corporate balls they’ve received since.
They had the opportunity to fight political ecco-crusaders back in the Carter days … Claybrook etal…. but they caved and we have ALL paid for it.
Where are the trolls, defending the green car saviour of the world, demanded by OBOZO?
EBD:
What, specifically, are the “ridiculous conclusions” you are referring to?
From the article:
“Is ramping up production and deliveries still a problem? Is demand weak? Are unscrupulous dealers to blame?”
To be fair, perhaps “ridiculous assertions” would have been a better choice of words on my part. Apologies.
As for monthly sales differences, you and many others make the assumption that Volt sales should exactly mirror other car sales. Why? Do Corvette sales in January exactly mirror Corvette sales in July? Do convertibles of any type sell as well in winter as they do in summer? On what basis do you contend that electric/hybrid sales should exactly mirror all other car sales?
Again, all I was pointing out was that, on a day-by-day basis, the Volt sold approximately as well in January as it did in February. The original article insinuated that Volt sales were going down, and then postulated the above listed reasons as possible explanations. I call BS on both of those.
This electric vehicle is an abomination in many respects: first it misappropriates the name of a physical constant for an expensive POS and secondly it is useless.
KevinB suggests that the V would appeal to urban drivers. When I lived in Vancouver, I had a hard enough time finding parking for one vehicle and KevinB is suggesting that every urban dweller would need to find two parking spots. The V is useless in winter and on the highway and can at best be considered an expensive luxury for those people who have large amounts of money and a need to spend it. One of the few advantages of urban living (ie downtown Vancouver) is that one doesn’t have to drive. I got along quite well walking everywhere in Vancouver and taking taxis for longer distances. The prospect of driving any vehicle down Robson street is simply too terrifying to consider doing.
The best analogy I can think of is trying to convince the owner of a modern computer to give up his 2 GHz dual core 64 bit processor for a more “environmentally friendly” wind powered Babbage difference engine. Sure, the difference engine will compute faster when it’s windy outside but I certainly wouldn’t give up my computers (although the difference engine is an interesting historical artifact).
IMO, the V is at the difference engine stage of computer development. For me to get an electric vehicle, I want it to outperform my current Grand Cherokee in all categories. I want longer range as my jeep is a gas guzzler and I think about regenerative braking every time I do the long downhill run home from my office. The highway range is about 300 miles at the speed I like to drive, probably 400 for someone who drives more slowly. An electric version of the Grand Cherokee would need to have greater energy storage in the space that the current gas tank occupies and the electric motors/generators should have a weight less than that of the current gasoline engine and drive train.
One of the limiting factors of regenerative braking is that current automotive batteries can’t absorb the current that is produced by a heavy vehicle going downhill and I don’t think the necessary power control circuitry currently exists. Also, I want a vehicle that is as EMP-proof as my 1969 Dart.
We need new energy storage technologies before electric cars are feasible. Once electric vehicles have specifications in terms of range, speed and acceleration that exceed those of gasoline vehicles, people will start buying them.
It is even worse than that. The Volt was hyped as a serial electric car, where the electric motor did all the work, but it turns out the Volt is a hybrid just like the Prius (the gasoline engine turns the wheels as well).
The only real difference between the Volt and the Prius is the proportion of work the gasoline engine and the electric engines do in driving the car, so for any practical purpose, you can make a one to one comparison between the Volt and the Prius.
On every basis from price to performance (including real world fuel economy, not the fantasy numbers provided by the US Government) the Prius is far superior. You would think for $50 billion GM could have produced something a bit better……
@favill:
“This vehicle reminds me of the Simpson episode where Homer’s long-lost and successful industrialist brother allows him (Homer) to design a car…which is so useless it bankrupts the company…LOL”
Well if Chevy rebadges it the homer and installed a musical horn that played la cucaracha, I guess that would multiply the sales to well of Simpsons fans as a collectors item…
If Obama would kick in a Presidential Medal of Freedom maybe people would buy it.
loki:
The best analogy I can think of is trying to convince the owner of a modern computer to give up his 2 GHz dual core 64 bit processor for a more “environmentally friendly” wind powered Babbage difference engine. Sure, the difference engine will compute faster when it’s windy outside but I certainly wouldn’t give up my computers (although the difference engine is an interesting historical artifact).
Oh,geez.. argumentum ad absurdum, anyone?
First, the Volt has been tested and retested on the Detroit proving grounds. I worked in Detroit for two years. Is it as absolutely harsh as the winters in, say, Winnipeg? No. Is it as cold as winter in, say, Vancouver? 100 times yes, and ten times over. How many times in a year do you get temperatures below 0 F? Yeah, that’s what I thought.
Second, I have not experienced Vancouver traffic on a daily basis, but anyone who’s been on the Don Valley PARKway in rush hour, or the 405 in LA, or the Lincoln tunnel in NYC knows exactly what I’m talking about when I say you spend a good portion of your commute doing 0 mph – your pedestrian and parochial experience notwithstanding.
Why do I have to say this again and AGAIN and AGAIN.. electric cars are not for every one. But for many urban drivers, they are economical, practical, and useful. Do electric cars make sense in every instance? Of course not. But then.. do vanilla beans? Should SK farmers eschew wheat for vanilla beans? Vanilla beans have over 1,000 times the value by weight of wheat. Plant vanilla! (loki.. same type of arg. ad. abs. you posted above)
If gas stays over $1.25/l, you can bet sales of electrics will pick up in Toronto this spring.
KevinB: “If gas stays over $1.25/l, you can bet sales of electrics will pick up in Toronto this spring.”
Yikes, it sounds like you bought one of these POS. If you took the time to read the links in Kate’s link, you would have seen these were US sales.
The total car sales in the US in Feb was 490,994. I’m not real good on small numbers – what’s 281 divided by 490,994?
BTW: Did you know a Canadian football field (counting the end zones) will hold 1013 Volts?