"Sport" mode??
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Mountain Mode helps save some battery power for later and assists in going up hills. I get that.
Sport Mode on the other hand... I'll be damned if I can tell the difference between Normal and Sport, so I'm no help there.
Sport Mode on the other hand... I'll be damned if I can tell the difference between Normal and Sport, so I'm no help there.
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4,137 Posts
I just happened to come back here at the right time.... Sport Mode reprograms the "go" pedal to be sensitive right at the beginning of the depression. It "seems" as though the "beast" has been woken up! In reality, what would have happened when the pedal was depressed 1/2 to 3/4 of the way down, now happens at the very top of the depression scale. No more power is unleashed. It is just that the "go" pedal has been made more responsive to your demands.
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1,342 Posts
It's for higher performance. I don't know if it engages the second motor sooner than normal mode or if it just allows you to use more power. I tried it the other day, put it in sport mode and then put my foot down. The power meter showed me burning 120KW and you could see the battery level drop, but it was fun. I could feel the G forces, it wasn't as quite as extreme as my old Hemi but it was still noticeable.
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In Normal or sport mode, when you mash it to the floor, you get the exact same results. As jbakerjonathan correctly states, it's just an accelerator remapping to make it harder to hypermile (makes the car "feel" quicker, but 0-60 times will be identical).
Sometimes when coasting where regen is happening, when you mash it to the floor, there is a slight pause before the car takes off to give time for the clutches to all be in the right state to accelerate. I wonder, if you are in sport mode, whether regen might be affected to allow you to take off right away. I'd have to play around with the car a bit to see if I can get that lag to disappear.
Sometimes when coasting where regen is happening, when you mash it to the floor, there is a slight pause before the car takes off to give time for the clutches to all be in the right state to accelerate. I wonder, if you are in sport mode, whether regen might be affected to allow you to take off right away. I'd have to play around with the car a bit to see if I can get that lag to disappear.
Pretty much what has been said about remapping the go pedal. Best way to "see" the difference is to accelerate at a mild to moderate speed, and switch over from normal to sport. When sport mode engages you'll observe a boost in acceleration. It's not significant, maybe a 30% increase, but it is noticeable. It doesn't offer more power but "compresses" the distance you need to push on the accelerator to achieve maximum output from the drive train. My experience is you only have to push the pedal about 1/2 to 3/4 rather than all the way to the bottom limit.
Mountain mode just makes the ICE turn on to maintain or build up to about a 40% charge in the main traction battery. Although it's 40-45%, you will show 5 bars, or half of the battery grayed out to indicate the buffer established for mountain mode. If you are above that, you will continue in normal EV mode until you've exhausted enough of your battery to drop to that level. If you are below the 40% threshold, the ICE runs at a higher RPM to maintain speed and provide additional power to charge the battery to the minimum level.
Mountain mode just makes the ICE turn on to maintain or build up to about a 40% charge in the main traction battery. Although it's 40-45%, you will show 5 bars, or half of the battery grayed out to indicate the buffer established for mountain mode. If you are above that, you will continue in normal EV mode until you've exhausted enough of your battery to drop to that level. If you are below the 40% threshold, the ICE runs at a higher RPM to maintain speed and provide additional power to charge the battery to the minimum level.
That is true for Gen 1, for Gen 2 Volts Mountain Mode will only build up a 20% battery reserve.
It is definitely more responsive in sport mode, but once you're at about 50% of your pedal travel, there isn't anything more the drive train can give as you're pretty much at 100% output. It's just remapping the accelerator pedal to reduce the travel necessary to achieve maximum power. Normal mode will give the exact same performance as sport, you just have to mash all the way down on the pedal to do so. This can be verified with the DIC turned to the power output/regen tab. That said, I don't believe sport mode does anything to adjust regen from what is already programmed in for D and L in normal mode.
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13,358 Posts
The volt has you fooled. You can get the same responsiveness in Normal by mashing the accelerator to the floor.
Alas, for an electric car, they should also add grandpa mode, the opposite of sport mode to cause you to drive slowly and hypermile. Basically remap the other direction but still give you bat out of hell, drive it like you stole it responds when you floor it. Just remap 50% accelerator movement to 25% t'hrottle, 75% to 50% throttle 85% to 75% throttle and WOT to WOT.
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6,863 Posts
When I owned my 2014 Stingray and 2013 Volt both had a SPORT MODE setting. In my Stingray SPORT Mode adjusted several different areas of the car, transmission shifting, steering feel, exhaust mode, Electronic Limited Slip Dif, traction control, active handling and even the suspension tuning if I had opted for the MRC suspension some other areas buried within the drive train you could feel instantly. It changed the entire character of the car with the flip of a switch.
Sport mode in the Volt just re-maps the throttle. It's like some audio products where the amplifier was outputting 80% of the amps rated power with the volume control set to the 10 O'clock position, then very little gain after that.
I was hoping in addition to throttle re-mapping Sport Mode in the Volt would firm up the electronic steering maybe relax T/C settings since it's electronic and should be easy. Maybe that's something GM is saving for future Volt's.
Sport mode in the Volt just re-maps the throttle. It's like some audio products where the amplifier was outputting 80% of the amps rated power with the volume control set to the 10 O'clock position, then very little gain after that.
I was hoping in addition to throttle re-mapping Sport Mode in the Volt would firm up the electronic steering maybe relax T/C settings since it's electronic and should be easy. Maybe that's something GM is saving for future Volt's.
I did not say the Volt performed better or had higher performance in Sport mode rather than normal. The car is not fooling me. I should have said the throttle input is much more responsive in Sport mode, and it is. The difference is night and day from Normal mode.
The car responds instantly with the slightest throttle input in sport mode, whereas in Normal mode, it's much more gentle or smooth.
Yes if you floor the accelerator, you will get the same exact power output. I never debated that.
Responsive ≠ more power
I thought the grandpa mode was normal
But yeah, you're right, there should be some sort of Eco option.Normal, Eco, Sport, Mountain, Hold.
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Mountain mode is the same as Normal mode while your battery level is above a certain level (40% gen1, 20% gen2). When your charge drops to that level, the ICE will run to maintain it.
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All sport mode does is remap the accelerator so that the tip-in is more aggressive (more of the throttle is at the lower end of the pedal). There is no more actual power or performance. It really is a worthless mode unless one is incapable of using their entire foot travel... On some GM cars it also tightens up the steering, which would be of value, but not on the Volt...
"I thought the grandpa mode was normal But yeah, you're right, there should be some sort of Eco option.
Normal, Eco, Sport, Mountain, Hold. "
The 'Normal/Eco/Sport' control should be separate from the 'Mountain/Hold' control. I would love to be able to drive in 'Sport, Hold' mode.
Normal, Eco, Sport, Mountain, Hold. "
The 'Normal/Eco/Sport' control should be separate from the 'Mountain/Hold' control. I would love to be able to drive in 'Sport, Hold' mode.
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The mode that's missing is Recharge which would fully recharge the battery, Mountain mode only charges up to 2 bars which is pretty useless even for it's intended purpose, i.e. climbing a mountain, when I went up Mt Washington I used 9KW, Mountain Mode only charges the battery to about 2.5KWh. On the highway the difference between driving on battery and using the ICE is barely noticeable but on streets and back roads driving on battery is much nicer than using the ICE. I would like to be able to fully recharge the battery when I'm on an Interstate and then switch to Normal mode when I get off. The Sport Mode apparently is just a marketing gimmick designed to fool you when you do your test drive but given that all of these modes are just software and are therefore free I don't mind if they keep but adding a Recharge Mode, or changing the threshold in Mountain Mode, would be a real improvement. My guess is that they didn't put it in because they don't really understand how the car is used. They think it's just an economy play but that's not true, EVs have inherent performance advantages and many EV drivers, myself included, bought them because of their driving characteristics not to save gas.
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They should add one more: SS (Super Sport) mode where you get the horsepower from 2 electric motors and the ICE, like the CT6 PHEV and ELR can do. I'm not sure if the ELR employs both motors and the ICE, but they're doing something to get better 0-60 times.
Yes a recharge mode would be cool.
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