[Geoff]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=wgk5-eB9oTY#!

Elon Musk talks about Tesla and the planned "Supercharger" network at the opening ceremony of the Superchargers. Answers questions about Electric Car "limitations".

I believe the Volt can not accept a Level 3 charge, is this correct? Maybe Tesla will provide an L2 plug or two? Maybe GM will put in a similar set of chargers?

Driving forever for FREE is a very compelling sales pitch.

Geoff

 

[CarZin]

This is the beauty of the Volt design. You don't need to deploy vast networks of chargers to quick charge. At some point, you have to ask the question, how much effort and money is it worth not to from time to time burn a gallon of gas. Leaf owners, when they ask me when I bother to lug around an engine I don't need very often get this reply: "because I'd rather haul around an inexpensive engine that gives me limitless range when I want it, than a battery pack that is twice as large as I need it to be and a lot more expensive that have limited range"

I think pure electric cars, until batterys are super cheap, are really a niche, more more so than a car like a Volt.

One step at a time...

 

[Geoff]

This is the beauty of the Volt design. You don't need to deploy vast networks of chargers to quick charge. At some point, you have to ask the question, how much effort and money is it worth not to from time to time burn a gallon of gas. Leaf owners, when they ask me when I bother to lug around an engine I don't need very often get this reply: "because I'd rather haul around an inexpensive engine that gives me limitless range when I want it, than a battery pack that is twice as large as I need it to be and a lot more expensive that have limited range"

I think pure electric cars, until batterys are super cheap, are really a niche, more more so than a car like a Volt.

One step at a time...

The point of my post was to get people thinking about the notion of FREE Power available everywhere through PV installations as commonplace as gas stations are today. Also to consider the genius of the marketing pitch "drive forever, for free".

The more electric cars there are on the roads the more this sort of charging infrastructure will be convenient and available. As Volt owners we are not limited by range but I believe we would all prefer to run electric over gas and would benefit from widely available charging.

Think forwards, not backwards.

 

[RCB268]

But, regardless, you have to 'love this guy' Musk!

http://www.youtube.com/embed/5EjG-1U3wqA

Iron Man!

 

[Zythryn]

This is the beauty of the Volt design. You don't need to deploy vast networks of chargers to quick charge. At some point, you have to ask the question, how much effort and money is it worth not to from time to time burn a gallon of gas. Leaf owners, when they ask me when I bother to lug around an engine I don't need very often get this reply: "because I'd rather haul around an inexpensive engine that gives me limitless range when I want it, than a battery pack that is twice as large as I need it to be and a lot more expensive that have limited range"
...

That all depends upon how often you need that extended range. If you need it once a decade, is it worth carrying around all that extra weight and displacing all that cargo/passanger space all the rest of the time? I would say not.
If you need that extended range twice a week? Yes, I would say it definately is purely from a convenience aspect (although one might also say sending just a little bit of money out of our economy and into the hands of our enemies is still too much).

If your driving patterns allow you to avoid the gas engine, you can easily use a skateboard design freeing up a TON of room for both passangers and cargo.

All that aside though, the drive free forever really isn't the case IF you want your car to last as long as possible. Quick charging the Model S is generally not recommended for longevity of the batteries. Doing it once in a while is no big deal, but doing it all the time, I would guess, could shorten the battery life.

I would like to see Tesla add, or allow other companies to add some L2 chargers to their supercharger areas.

 

[DCFusor]

Solar panels aren't free, neither is land to put charge stations on. So which "other people's money" makes it "free"? I'm afraid I have to call B$ here. When are people as a whole going to figure out that those other people are us - and our wallets?

I agree with CarZin on this - I like the Volt just as it is. I don't burn gas often, but often enough to make the design worth it in all regards.

 

[Noel Park]

Solar panels aren't free, neither is land to put charge stations on. So which "other people's money" makes it "free"? I'm afraid I have to call B$ here. When are people as a whole going to figure out that those other people are us - and our wallets?

I agree with CarZin on this - I like the Volt just as it is. I don't burn gas often, but often enough to make the design worth it in all regards.

I'm with you. I call B$ on Elon every time he starts up about his car, LOL. I'm sort of impressed with the rockets. The car, not so much.

 

[CarZin]

Elon is just a hyping machine. He is an innovator, but he has yet to produce an affordable electric car, and you aren't going to do much with helping people accept electric cars when they are going for 100k a pop.

I think General Motors, hands down, has this better figured out than anyone else. I don't want them to change a thing except to produce the Volt on a Crossover platform and a sports car platform. Hell, add it on a truck platform as well.

Think forwards, not backwards.

I am forward thinking. I wouldnt have been on this site since 2008 and have purchased a volt if I wasn't. I am in innovator in my own field. I simply see a logical series of steps for getting mass EV adoption, and I don't think quick charge stations are going to make adoption much better. When it comes down to it, people are scared of battery replacement costs. I think that is the number one barrier. Give it a few years, and we may be beyond that.

 

[Geoff]

As of now you get "free" charging only when you by a Tesla.

You can also get "free" cloud space on Google and a host of other sites. You don't pay any money but your information and data is valuable and is used for advertising, translation and other purposes. This is the non-cash price of "free".
This "free" storage wasn't available until forward thinking companies figured out a way to make it work.

Along comes Elon Musk with the forward thinking and resources and balls to try out "driving for free". To avail yourself of this benefit you only need buy a Tesla. If you don't buy a Tesla then you don't get "free" power. I don't see any part where your wallet is plundered.

Consider if GM did a similar thing, do you think this strategy might help sell a lot more EV's? Might it put electric vehicles in a more positive light? Could it be of some direct benefit to you some day?

Think forward, not backwards.

 

[bonaire]

Tesla has something like a $600/year service fee. I think it ties in with maintaining the warranty. Nothing is free.

 

[Excalibur]

That all depends upon how often you need that extended range. If you need it once a decade, is it worth carrying around all that extra weight and displacing all that cargo/passanger space all the rest of the time? I would say not.

Not to sound argumentative, but using the choices available to go out and purchase and take delivery as of the timestamp of this post there are the following options:

Telsa- very pricey, all electric, great range. This fits your statement perfectly and I'd agree here who needs an ICE since this has great range, but there are some deltas, charging with a special cable from what I understand being one of them. That aside, if you don't want an ICE backup, this is your car if you have the means!

Leaf- you sure as hell better have something with the Leaf because it was IMHO, sent out into the world like a shotgun shot. Batteries are not conditioned and in some cases are failing and/or degrading prematurely in certain conditions. That said, can you really count on the miles you got at delivery to be close to the mileage you'd get after say 6 months and a hot, hot summer?

Volt- great commuter car, but also able to drive cross country if need be using gasoline once the 40 or so miles have been depleted.

You have a 350 mile trip to take? You gonna do it in Telsa, you might not make the distance. Leaf? Not even close. Volt, prob can not only make it, but also have some gas left to create a few more electrons.

My point is, with what is available to take delivery of.... today, the ONLY car that you can drive like your regular ICE powered vehicle is the Volt. You don't need to buy a second car to do the longer distance hauls. It's a car that can live in both spaces....a great commuter car with all the bells and whistles and not use a much, if any gas for a LONG time, and at the same time a long distance vehicle capable of doing what any other conventional car our there can do, which the others on the market right now can't say.

That's why I haul an internal combustion engine in a manner similar to that of a locomotive.

When the day comes I can charge my car, get about 350-400 miles and charge it in 15-20 minutes and go another 350-400 miles, all electric is ready for the mainstream. Until then, we have what we have.

 

[Ladogaboy]

My assumption is that this will be a benefit for early adopters. Basically, if you are one of the people who buy the first x1,000 Tesla S models, you will be given free access to the charge network. Anyone after that initial stage will have to pay for their usage.

I am curious how difficult it would be to make a J1772 adapter that would allow Volts to charge off that network. If the station were in a convenient location, it might be worth the time to stop.

 

[stresstool]

I am curious.

How much does the Volt's ICE weigh? How much would enough batteries weigh to make the range of a BEV Volt equivalent to that of the ICE'd Volt? Or, put another way, how much additional electric only range would one get with batteries that weigh as much as the Volt's ICE and/or take up the same amount of space?

 

[Tmac]

Geoff
I share your enthusiasm about the superchargers
Yes volt drivers can drive anywhere but most of
Us would rather drive Electric
I think the supercharger network
Shuts up all the EV naysayers and ends the range anxiety nonsense
As said before most of us Volters have gas phobia

Go GM go Tesla go Ford
I want them all to do well!

More forward thinking would be linking Solar PV to your
EV lease or purchase

Peace

Tom

 

[comanchepilot]

well, if they are like gas stations where a level 3 charger 'gasses' you up in 5 min - then why would they be free? Shouldn't I then pay for the power and cost of installing and maintaining the charger? A charge would cost you $2.50 or $3 and off you go for 38-45 miles. . . .

 

[Ladogaboy]

I am curious.

How much does the Volt's ICE weigh? How much would enough batteries weigh to make the range of a BEV Volt equivalent to that of the ICE'd Volt? Or, put another way, how much additional electric only range would one get with batteries that weigh as much as the Volt's ICE and/or take up the same amount of space?

Including all components and gasoline, probably 600 to 800 lbs. Meaning, at best, replacing all of the ICE components would net you the battery mass to go another 100 miles or so. Basically, a total range of maybe 150 miles.

 

[artsci]

Got to be careful dumping on Elon and the Model S. As best I can tell, there are quite a few Volt owners who have reservations for the Model S, me included. The Model S is far from B$ and that's not my opinion. All of the reviews and test drives have raved about the car. Musk is a game changer. His work was one of things that got Bob Lutz to push very hard for development of the Volt, and Lutz has said that for all to hear. If the world evolves to all electric cars, we'll have Musk to thank for pushing the envelope. By the way, posters on the Tesla web site are very positive about the Volt.

 

[TwistnShift]

Tesla has something like a $600/year service fee. I think it ties in with maintaining the warranty. Nothing is free.

THIS. If you don't pay that maintenance fee, you void your warranty. The longer I pay attention to Tesla -and believe me I've been paying attention to them for a long time- the more I see them failing at every corner. They've lost their head start on the EV market and thats all they really had going for them.

 

[DonC]

I can appreciate that Tesla owners love phallic gadgets! However, other than that, it's unclear why anyone should take this seriously. I'm looking at the panels. How many kWh are they going to produce? Maybe 40 kWh on a good day. That's good for what, one charge? Half a charge? How about on a cloudy day? Better yet, how about a cloudy day in the winter in Oregon? Ba ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!

You can pretend with a few. No big deal. If you start rolling out enough to matter then it's going to cost a bundle for even a limited number of charges.

Got to be careful dumping on Elon and the Model S. As best I can tell, there are quite a few Volt owners who have reservations for the Model S, me included. The Model S is far from B$ and that's not my opinion.

They're calling BS on the charging stations not the car.

 

[volt11]

Got to be careful dumping on Elon and the Model S. As best I can tell, there are quite a few Volt owners who have reservations for the Model S, me included. The Model S is far from B$ and that's not my opinion. All of the reviews and test drives have raved about the car. Musk is a game changer. His work was one of things that got Bob Lutz to push very hard for development of the Volt, and Lutz has said that for all to hear. If the world evolves to all electric cars, we'll have Musk to thank for pushing the envelope. By the way, posters on the Tesla web site are very positive about the Volt.

I agree 100%. The Tesla is impressive, and the people on this forum sh!t-talking against it are not thinking very clearly IMO, and that's being polite about it. In fact they sound a lot like the people who rail against the Volt, just using a different set of bad, cherry picked and sometimes misleading arguments. (For example, the Tesla S starts close to $50K for the base model after tax credit, with levels in between; it's not just a $100K car.)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=wgk5-eB9oTY#!

I believe the Volt can not accept a Level 3 charge, is this correct? Maybe Tesla will provide an L2 plug or two? Maybe GM will put in a similar set of chargers?

Driving forever for FREE is a very compelling sales pitch.

I agree, it's a great sales pitch, and really much more than that. It's visionary.

Even with an "adapter", there's no way the Volt can use L3 (direct current) stations, and you can be sure there will be some kind of special enabling card or device distributed just to Tesla customers for the superchargers.

To the question, "maybe GM will put in a similar set of chargers?" Not a chance. Just try and get your own dealer to return your car to you with a full charge every time, and they're all supposed to have 2 240V chargers on site! My car saw the service bay quite a bit, and I think the only time I ever picked that car up with a full charge was when they did the big battery brace recall (and that includes when I first took delivery.) While you may think that's unrelated, it goes to policy and procedures, and that goes to corporate commitment.

Of course Voltec can go the distance on gasoline, so the need for Tesla style stations doesn't exist. But the Spark EV will not have that luxury, and I can pretty much promise you GM will be just like Nissan, Ford, Mitsubishi and others who are leaving the infrastructure problem to "somebody else". Also, it's likely the Spark EV is going to be a limited market "compliance car", with not even the commitment level to EV of the Nissan Leaf. Meanwhile other than the Volt, GM is badly lagging in the hybrid and plug-in hybrid arena, and eAssist is getting some pretty poor press as an inadequate substitute. This is an area where Ford is starting to kick ass.

Also IMO, GM's business level interest in Voltec has been dialed back significantly, and major Voltec people within the organization have left the building. Not they they won't continue on with it, just that I have my real doubts at this point that GM will put sufficient resources, promotion, and effort behind it to maintain their leadership position in car electrification. This is where GM usually fumbles the ball, sorry to say; like with the EV1 they have moments of brilliance, but their ability to think long term and consistently execute is notoriously poor once the finance guys get involved, and I'm personally not seeing where they've turned that around more than slightly since bankruptcy. I hope I'm wrong (but I doubt it.)