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GM, Volkswagen Say Goodbye to Hybrid Vehicles

wsj.com

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Re: GM, Volkswagen Say Goodbye to Hybrid Vehicles

#151

Post by [deleted] »

sandworm101 wrote: post #139
xedeon wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You must be living under a rock. A Long Range Tesla Model 3 can easily do 1000km/day range using a supercharger and can now charge 75 miles in 5 minutes or up to 1,000 miles per hour ( https://www.tesla.com/blog/introducing-v3-supercharging ). EVs are being widely adopted in Europe, with Norway (harsh winters) taking the lead. I don't get the whole "EVs are only suitable in California" narrative. https://cleantechnic…

>> 1000km/day range using a supercharger. They can do that today. I;m driving a car from 2010. How are the 10+yo teslas doing? And when I say 1000km/day I mean 1000km in perhaps eight hours of driving, not eight hours of driving plus another eight hours of battery logistics. >> and I only drive to the office 3 times a week. So you have a part-time job in an office? That's part of the California narrative. You aren't…

[deleted]

Re: GM, Volkswagen Say Goodbye to Hybrid Vehicles

#152

Post by gwbas1c »

cmrdporcupine wrote: post #119
aaomidi wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Soon you'll be able to. Range anxiety goes away with time and planning. Fast DC chargers are going to be everywhere in the near future. They're already on every major highway except i94.

No offense, but deep in the mountains or out in rural northern Ontario, etc. where I'd like to go... will be the last place that DC fast chargers will go. I'm a big fan of the EV movement, I'll own a BEV someday, but I feel that GM and EV-boosters in general have thrown the Volt-type range extended EVs under the bus. It is an amazing technical achievement and with the right marketing and product development could tak…

> (I don't consider the Volt a PHEV, btw, but a range extended electric vehicle. It is the only "plugin hybrid" on the market that can operate purely electric without using the gas engine. And even when the gas engine kicks in, it performs like an EV.)

Not true at all: Prius prime, Pacifica Hybrid can all run on the battery without the engine.

I can get 30 miles on my Pacifica hybrid without the engine turning on, I even drive it at highway speeds without the engine turning on.

Re: GM, Volkswagen Say Goodbye to Hybrid Vehicles

#153

Post by cmrdporcupine »

gwbas1c wrote: post #150
cmrdporcupine wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is no maintenance or reliability compromise. Go look at owner's reports.

I had a Leaf for 4 years and had no scheduled maintenance. The only thing I had to do was rotate the tires, put air in them, and put washer fluid in. I assume the Volt requires at least an oil change every year?

No, it only needs an only change when the number of hours logged on the motor necessitates it, or every 2 years, whichever comes first.

I've had my Volt for 2.5 years, almost 70,000km. Have done one oil change. Only one visit to dealer, which was oil change and some cleaning of the brakes since they barely get used.

Re: GM, Volkswagen Say Goodbye to Hybrid Vehicles

#154

Post by hundchenkatze »

amyjess wrote: post #35
floatrock wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hopefully not as the "Volt". It's a shame the car didn't work out, but the Bolt/Volt naming thing was a source of endless confusion.

The most annoying thing about that naming scheme is that Chevy also makes the Spark, which is 100% gasoline-powered. What was their rationale in greenlighting that name?

They offered a Spark BEV from 2013-2016 model years, maybe they intended to offer the battery only option sooner.

Re: GM, Volkswagen Say Goodbye to Hybrid Vehicles

#155

Post by gwbas1c »

jedberg wrote: post #58

I'm trying to replace my 2012 SUV with another SUV. I've been looking all over for a plug in hybrid SUV, and there aren't any good ones. I want the plug in hybrid because 95% of the time we do less than 30 miles locally, but once in a while we drive a couple hundred. I would be fine with an all electric SUV with a decent range, but those don't exist either. The model X is not sufficient, and is also terrible for ever…

What don't you like about the Mitsubishi Outlander?

(For me, I needed 3 rows, so we just went with the Pacifica Hybrid. Handles well in snow even though it's just a front wheel drive minivan.)

Re: GM, Volkswagen Say Goodbye to Hybrid Vehicles

#156

Post by hundchenkatze »

dsfyu404ed wrote: post #45
amyjess wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The most annoying thing about that naming scheme is that Chevy also makes the Spark, which is 100% gasoline-powered. What was their rationale in greenlighting that name?

The spark was being sold under other names since long before the volt or the Bolt. When they started calling the Spark the Spark the Bolt was still several years off and they certainly didn't have a name for it at that point. The choice of "Spark" coincided with they giving all their small cars a bunch of active sounding names.

The Bolt may have been long off but the Spark name was announced in 2009 and started selling at the same time as the Volt. The Spark was available for the 2011 model year in Europe and for the 2013 model year in the U.S (with a BEV option). The Chevy Volt on the other hand was available for the 2011 model year. So they definitely seemed to be going for electricity themed names.

Re: GM, Volkswagen Say Goodbye to Hybrid Vehicles

#157

Post by core-questions »

xeromal wrote: post #142
sandworm101 wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> 1000km/day range using a supercharger. They can do that today. I;m driving a car from 2010. How are the 10+yo teslas doing? And when I say 1000km/day I mean 1000km in perhaps eight hours of driving, not eight hours of driving plus another eight hours of battery logistics. >> and I only drive to the office 3 times a week. So you have a part-time job in an office? That's part of the California narrative. You aren't…

At some point in history, there was only one gas station in the world. It takes time to build infrastructure. People like you seem to miss that. My Tesla can go 300 miles and charge most of that in about 15 minutes. Plug it in, walk into the gas station to take a piss and buy a snack and walk out. Done. I did that a month ago when I drove to vegas. It's not perfect, but it's incredible. There's a second thing that mo…

> People like you seem to miss that.

Unnecessarily rude, and clearly untrue considering the poster displayed an excellent understanding of the logistics of the situation. I don't think he or anyone else is opposed to the infrastructure catching up, but he's alive and working today and needs solutions that work right now.

Re: GM, Volkswagen Say Goodbye to Hybrid Vehicles

#158

Post by kube-system »

MegaButts wrote: post #99
hnModsRDanger wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is definitely no planned obsolescence. There are specifications. We don't buy overkill material. At worst, we stop tracking issues of they are too old, like after 5 years of use. Edit, due to HN limits. The person below me doesn't understand engineering and how specs work. You make your product at specific costs and quality. Not everything can be made out of titanium.

I'm guessing you're an engineer (please correct me if I'm wrong). And what you're effectively saying is cars aren't designed to last longer than their warranties, and in fact you don't even have data on what happens afterwards. It sounds like you're passively participating in obsolescence, even if it's not intentional. Apart from that, the people actually selling the cars absolutely have a financial incentive for the…

Literally every engineering project has to balance cost vs quality.

Typically, “planned obsolescence” refers to an intentional defect that is artificially added in order to prematurely cause a failure.

However, that doesn’t mean every failure is a result of planned obsolescence — defects can also can be expected under the normal course of a product’s lifetime.

Premium product lifetimes are a result of premium materials and construction, which cost a premium price. Choosing the correct materials to balance the expected lifetime along with other performance and price characteristics is good engineering practice, not malice.

Re: GM, Volkswagen Say Goodbye to Hybrid Vehicles

#159

Post by cmrdporcupine »

gwbas1c wrote: post #152
cmrdporcupine wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No offense, but deep in the mountains or out in rural northern Ontario, etc. where I'd like to go... will be the last place that DC fast chargers will go. I'm a big fan of the EV movement, I'll own a BEV someday, but I feel that GM and EV-boosters in general have thrown the Volt-type range extended EVs under the bus. It is an amazing technical achievement and with the right marketing and product development could tak…

> (I don't consider the Volt a PHEV, btw, but a range extended electric vehicle. It is the only "plugin hybrid" on the market that can operate purely electric without using the gas engine. And even when the gas engine kicks in, it performs like an EV.) Not true at all: Prius prime, Pacifica Hybrid can all run on the battery without the engine. I can get 30 miles on my Pacifica hybrid without the engine turning on, I…

No, you are not telling the whole picture. Those cars cannot run 100% on the battery, because the moment you hit the accelerator hard ICE kicks in. If you're gentle on the accelerator or avoid high speeds on the highway, yes, you can avoid the gas engine. But you have to work for it. It's almost impossible to drive those vehicles for extended periods of time without using the gas engine.

The Volt is designed explicitly so that the gas engine is never necessary. Top speed, hardest acceleration, etc. all is the same experience as a 100% pure battery electric vehicle. Until you run out of battery. And then it meets all the same performance characteristics, but with the ICE involved.

Re: GM, Volkswagen Say Goodbye to Hybrid Vehicles

#160

Post by gwbas1c »

bryanlarsen wrote: post #129
jedberg wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah the manufacturers don't seem to aim for the single car household in America. I guess they assume most of us either live in the burbs and have two cars or live in the city and have no cars. The truth is where I live I'm just too far to have single car. Most of the time we only need one car, but we have just enough cases of my wife and I needing to go two different places that it doesn't make sense to rent or Uber…

What's wrong with the Pacifica Hybrid? The Chrysler reputation?

I have problems charging mine at 240 volts, so I'm stuck with a long overnight charge.

Also, the entertainment system is glitchy. Yesterday I had to do a magic dance of turning the car off and on and opening and closing the screens to get them to turn on.

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