GM shrinks Volt’s gas tank

Thats not really fair to throw the company under the bus just becuase of the Unions.

— Spectator (View Profile)

Posted on 7/9/2008 1:58:28 PM | reply to this comment | Votes: 4   

....and BMWs union workers are so much smarter.

— Bmw8ter (View Profile)

Posted on 7/9/2008 2:07:40 PM | reply to this comment | Votes: 5   

I don't like unions but I don't see what unions have to do with it unless I missed something in the article. I for one will not buy a car that has short range. I am totally pissed at all car companies who cut the capacity of gas tanks just to reduce the total weight of the vehicle with a full load of fuel. The incremental inconvenience of a short range far outweighs the slight extra cost of lugging around an extra 100 lbs of fuel. Maybe Lutz does not drive.

— EnnNorak (View Profile)

Posted on 7/9/2008 2:16:51 PM | reply to this comment | Votes: -4   

amazinBimmer YOU MAKE ME SICK!!!!!!!!!!!!!! when ever I see any comment from you!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

ARE YOU STUPID DO YOU REALLY THINK THAT THE FOREIGN AUTO MAKERS ARE NOT MAKING MONEY?????????????

DO YOU GET PD FOR WHAT EVER BUSINESS OR JOB YOU HAVE?????

AND YES IT IS TO BAD, THE DAMN UNIONS ARE HURTING THE AMERICAN AUTOMAKER HOWEVER DOES THAT MEAN NOT TO SUPPORT OUR COUNTRYS COMPANY'S. I FEEL BAD FOR GM AND COMPANYS LIKE THEM BECAUSE THEY WOULD BE MUCH MORE PROFITABLE IF IT WASNT FOR THE UNION'S.

I see your comments all the time and all you ever do is slam the American Auto's, you never give any of them credit for anything well done YOU MAKE ME ILL!!!

a** comments like you make all the time why do you not move out of this country since you hate the AMERICAN COMPANYS and hate the AMERICAN WORKER, YOU always are calling names, like fat lazy american worker I am sick of your rude comments and lack of knowledge and lack of respect for other Americans that work their A**es off to make a great product.

Why do you lump the American Auto maker into Fat and Lazy??? and I seen you comments where you call them F*cks, who gave you the right stereo type like you do? YOU ARE PATHITC, talk about predujice you are, who made you the JUDGE????

I would rather give our country's company's and our country's workers my money for a Great product, like they do produce, then to give my money to FOREIGN companys and supporting FOREIGN countrys workers. Because when the FOREIGN companys who get our money they are not putting it back into our ecomony. Let me repeat my self so you hear this, do you think when they get our money do you think they are giving it to us to put into our countrys ecomony and our are they supporting American jobs, American spending.

Did you ever take economics?? when you see GM laying people off that is NOT GOOD FOR ANY ONE THAT LIVES, WORKS, And OWNS A BUSINESS in this country. NO JOBS, MEANS NO MONEY, WHICH = NO SPENDING SO SUPPLY goes up AND DEMAND GO DOWN WHICH then prices drop, which = OUR ECOMOMY GOES TO SHIT!!!

IF YOU HAVE HALF A BRAIN YOU WOULD REALLY RE-THINK YOUR COMMENTS. AND SINCE I DO NOT THINK YOU DO LET ME SPELL IT OUT FOR YOU,,,, IF YOU LIKE YOUR LIFE STYLE Like you Job and like money, YOU MAY WANT TO THINK ABOUT A AMERICAN PRODUCT NEXT TIME, RATHER THAN A FORIEN COMPANYS BECAUSE ALL YOU ARE DOING IS SENDING MONEY OVER SEAS TO MAKE THERE ECONOMY PROSPER.

I do not know about you, I know I would rather support our economy then other countries economy. I like my life style. And I love my Country.

By 1st thing I saw was this Jokes comments 1st thing and I am so sick of him so I did not even say anything about the car in the article I think this car looks Great ANOTHER GREAT JOB GM!!!! I HOPE THE BEST OF SUCCESS WITH IT AND ALL THE OTHER GREAT AUTO'S GM HAS BEEN COMING OUT WITH..........

— bestofallcad (View Profile)

Posted on 7/9/2008 4:05:37 PM | reply to this comment | Votes: 4   

@ amazingBimmer,

Yeah, that was a dumb comment...almost sounds like you were thinking the right thing but typed the wrong thing.

Besides, the Unions just build the car in accordance to the design specs of GM.

— Bored (View Profile)

Posted on 7/9/2008 5:56:22 PM | reply to this comment | Votes: 4   

Amazin, that is probably one of the worst comments on here. Maybe you should go hang out with EL some more.

Trying to keep this discussion on topic and not about some @$$holes retarded comments now;

It makes sense to shrink it down. Fuel sitting around does not get better with age. With all the additives and such in it now, it is not as good for long periods of time sitting. And 360 miles to a tank with 40 miles pure electric is insane!

Also take into account it gets 40 miles pure electric on a full charge. So if your commute is like mine say 50 miles round trip. If I did not plug it in at work I would be using only 10 miles a day in gas. That's 50 miles in one week and over a month only 200 miles of commuting using gas. That leaves another 160 miles in a month of gas driving.

Hopefully you followed me on that one. It does not get 40 miles electric once and then go all gas, you get 40 miles for each full charge and if I charge it at work, that would mean I would be driving to and from work using no gas!

So that really makes the whole it only does 360 on gas still a HUGE advantage as you get that electric usage each time then pickup the driving. Still feasible for long trips as well as you can get 360 miles to one tank.

— Whelan (View Profile)

Posted on 7/9/2008 2:09:56 PM | reply to this comment | Votes: 5   

Guys, I think you are missing the point of the Volt Concept. It is not a Prius-like hybrid, in which the car is driven by both electric and gasoline motors. It is also not a purely electric car, which requires the battery to be recharged from an electrical outlet.

The 1-liter 3-cylinder gas engine in the Volt drives a generator which charges the car's battery pack, which in turn powers the electric motors that actually propel the car.

To quote answers.com,
"This general layout is considered a plug-in series hybrid design since mechanical power initially drives the generator, which in turn charges the battery pack. Power is then drained from the batteries to run the electrical motors which move the vehicle. The internal combustion engine does not have any mechanical linkage to the wheels (unlike current vehicles such as the Toyota Prius), and it can run at a constant rpm for optimal efficiency."

GM plans to keep the lithium-ion battery in a state-of-charge (SOC) range of between 30% and 80%, with the on-board generator kicking in at the 30% level.[10]"

As the eletric motors don't care where its "juice" comes from, a diesel engine could be used in place of a gasoline one. All internal-combustion engines achieve optimum efficiency running at a constant optimal rpm, but diesels are much more efficient than gasoline engines when running in constant-optimal-rpm mode.

Hydrogen fuel cells could also be a source of electricity in future Volts.

True, the Volt will be able to run 40 miles on the battery pack alone, and then can be recharged from a power outlet. However, that would reduce the Volt to the status of a commuter car. For longer trips, one needs the gasoline engine to recharge the battery pack. As conventional cars can travel 400 to 500 highway miles on a tank of gas, GM's decision to cut the Volt's full-tank range to 360 miles would be a minor inconvenience to most drivers. However, for the motorist who has to drive across a vast desert complete with the stereotypical "no gas for 400 miles" warning signs, adding a gallon or two to the tank capacity might be a good idea!

— Audiphile (View Profile)

Posted on 7/9/2008 3:36:02 PM | reply to this comment | Votes: 4   

GM, come on, no one needs your car anymore. Just go bankrupt and never come back :)

— MercedesBenz00Z (View Profile)

Posted on 7/9/2008 3:41:10 PM | reply to this comment | Votes: -6   

I do like the points made by Whelan and Audiphile, but "perception is reality" and I think this will be the Volt's downfall. I believe their only chance at success with this vehicle is a no nonsense, propaganda-free advertising campaign that educates the public on this approach.

Anyway, I posted the following yesterday:

I had some hope for this vehicle until I read this:

http://blogs.cars.com/kickingtires/2008/07/volt-gas-tank.html

GM is looking to sell this vehicle for around $30K w/ gov't tax breaks. If they are going to cut potential fuel mileage by about 40% (from 600 mi. to possibly as low as 360 miles), the price needs to be under $20K.

WHY? Two reasons:

1) The Prius starts @ $21,500, with the minimum potential to travel 571 miles on a full tank of gas.
2) The VW Jetta TDI Bluemotion will start @ $22,000, with the minimum potential to travel 638 miles on a full tank of diesel.

Obviously, there are more alternatives but I would gladly pocket the $8K.

Wouldn't you?

— Bored (View Profile)

Posted on 7/9/2008 3:59:07 PM | reply to this comment | Votes: 0   

Since when is 350 miles per tank a huge problem? I don't think I've ever even owned a car that got more than 400 mi per tank. My current car gets about 350/tank and I've never seen it as the massive issue that some of you seem to think it is. Seriously, this is a big issue for you guys??

I also totally agree that this is intended as a commuter car. As someone else said, if you have a 50 mile commute, you would only use 10 miles worth of gas per day. If you are getting something like 40 miles per gallon (probably closer to 50 in reality) you would only use .25 gallons per day. Let's say the tank ends up being 8 gallons. This would be enough that you wouldn't have to stop for gas for 32 days!

If you are worried about long road trips, well how often do you really drive more than 350 miles at one time without stopping for food or to use a toilet? You have to stop anyway, so what is the big deal with stopping to get gas at the same time?

Seems like you guys are just looking for things to get ticked off about.

— holmstar (View Profile)

Posted on 7/9/2008 6:03:41 PM | reply to this comment | Votes: 5   

Hey, bestofallcad
Yeah we're with you that some people on here are being trolls... but chill out. No need to write a book about it. If you really are that annoyed, tell it to 001.

— holmstar (View Profile)

Posted on 7/9/2008 6:11:53 PM | reply to this comment | Votes: 3   

I hope so but the price may be a huge problem -- $40K versus the Prius at nearly half that.

— bagwell (View Profile)

Posted on 7/11/2008 3:01:06 PM | reply to this comment | Votes: 2   

Well I think what GM is trying to do is to keep the fuel from going bad. I drive 300 miles a week on avg. So if I owned one of these cars I could do most of my driving without usig a drop of fuel. So If I only use a gallon a week it would take 7 weeks to burn a tank of fuel. 12 weeks if it had a 12 gallon tank. And if the car gets 50 miles to the gallon plus you have the 40 mile range you start with then a tank of fuel will take you 390 miles. Not bad. My truck can take me 340 miles at best. And last fall when I drove to the east coast about every 300 miles I was ready to pull over and walk around a bit. 300 miles at 70 mph is just over 4 hours.. I don't knkow many people that can drive over 4 hours straight.

— austintyson (View Profile)

Posted on 7/11/2008 8:36:17 PM | reply to this comment | Votes: 2   

bored sorry about the caps, did not even notice it until I was finished with writing it and did not want to start over.

2nd was you said was the American Greed well, this is not only a American thing Greed is World wide, I am am sick of hearing people say the greedy American worker, the Greedy American Auto makers, the greedy, fat, lazy, corporations so on and so on. Greed World wide companys are in business to make money, I just dont understand how people dont consider that Toyota Corp, or Mercedes corp, and so on and so on, do you not think they are Greedy???

— bestofallcad (View Profile)

Posted on 7/11/2008 10:53:40 PM | reply to this comment | Votes: 1   

mercedesbenz00z sorry to say I have owned 2 BMW's in the past a 325i and then a 525i, accutally both BMW where my wifes cars, both of these BMW's we had more car problems with then any other car I have ever owned in my life.

1st the 325i it was in the shop every 3 to 4 months for you name it. Just to name a few problems here is a small list: the radio display went bad 4 times, to the cv joints, to the sun roof visor going off track, to the car blowing fuses, to it stalling on the freeway, to the front power window motors going bad twice, this is just to list a few. Oh by the way we got rid of the car with only 32,000 miles on it.

Then we bought a 525I we thought okay lets see if this is better. Just 2,000 miles into it, the computer that controls the suspension went out, had to have it towed into BMW, the computer they needed to fix it took 2 weeks to get the part in, since the part was on back order. Because this computer part was a problem with the 525's, and by the way this was a quote from the service advisor " We do not recall our cars like the American Car companys do" Which I said to him "Great since you do not want to recall your cars, you are going to make me waite and I will not have my car for 2 weeks, so you can say you do not have recalls!! and you know this a problem with this car." "Some Customer service." After that it only went in the shop another 4 times for other problems the 525 was a better car then the 325 however both BMW's worst cars I ever owned. Thank God both of these cars we only had a 2 year lease so both cars are gone.

So you say I only no Cadillac for a Luxury car's well I am glad since I have owned a Cadillac cts 2003 which I only change the oil about every 12,000 miles and that is all, which when traded my 03 cts it had 67,000 miles I then bought my 04 Escalade which never went in the shop either for any thing but oil changes, I had to put a battery, and I had to put tires on it, I traded it with 76,000 miles, for my 2008 CTS, what a car the 08 CTS is WOW, it is Great car. I am just getting ready to change the oil it has almost 16,000 miles now.

I am sorry I am not brain washed like you commented. I would take a GM car any day because of the Great GM cars I have owned.

Last thing mercedesbenz00z everyone blames the goverment for all the troubles they may have, well it is all up to us to make things better, it is like voting your vote counts, so it is up to each and everyone to make a difference, not just one single entity.

2nd thing is the current economic problems are caused by the Real estate market, which the down fall of the real estate market, which the blame does go to THE BANKS.....

Example 2 years ago almost any one could get a home loan. Banks where so librial giving out loans. With their critiea for obtaining a home loan 2yrs ago, if you had a breath and had a 620 credit score you could have gotten a loan for a home. So called investors where obtaining 100% loans on 2nd, 3rd, 4th

— bestofallcad (View Profile)

Posted on 7/12/2008 12:34:36 AM | reply to this comment | Votes: 1