What else "cut" for the 2014 $5k MSRP drop?

5829 Views 34 Replies 10 Participants Last post by Fyodor, Nov 29, 2016

VoltenRock

Discussion Starter · Nov 25, 2016

Found a NEW '14 sitting on a dealer's lot locally. With a motivated dealer, running the numbers could make me owe LESS after tax credit than what's left on my '13--wouldn't mind getting paid to drive a new car! It's also a later build date, so it may have the 17.1 kWh battery. Getting a few extra EV miles is not bad either.

However, my '13 is solid and I'm wondering if anything else was "cheapened" on the '14 Volt for the $5k MSRP drop. I couldn't get a solid answer from searching besides the following:

--eliminated automatic charge door opener (actually like this, but can deal with it)
--eliminated two-tone accents on the leather seats (a personal preference I really like, and will decide in-person if I can part with my ceramic white accents--fortunately this particular '14 has the white center stack)

Anything else? Is the gas door still locking?

I know GM shaved costs somewhere and am wondering if there are other things "unseen" that may make the car less reliable or less of a keeper than the solid '13 I have now.

21 - 35 of 35 Posts

canehdian

· #21 · Nov 27, 2016

Fyodor said:
Your car is two years newer than mine. I have a quite different entertainment and nav system, ( with the HDD and no MyLink) so the car might know where it is but it doesn't seem to tell my clock.

Programming that capability in, using the location and the date, might get a little complicated. It would be easier to pick up the local time externally. Even pushing a button twice a year is not a big problem.

It's actually easy, time and position is provided in the GPS signal. It's the DST offset that is not, which is probably the issue with the system (if GPS is the source of time), and it waits for onstar to give it that info instead of try to calculate based on position and date.

llninja said:
So I think to summarize the 2014 got rid of the remote charge door unlock button, added battery life, added some sort of talk to text feature in the mylink. The removal of under carriage panels and the sticker cover swap were done in 2013.

In short, if the decision is between a 2013 and a 2014, get the 2014. 13's had quite a common problem with heaters, mostly fixed for '14. The significant changes happened between 2012 and 2013 years and not 2013 and 2014.

Fyodor

· #22 · Nov 27, 2016

canehdian said:
It's actually easy, time and position is provided in the GPS signal. It's the DST offset that is not, which is probably the issue with the system (if GPS is the source of time), and it waits for onstar to give it that info instead of try to calculate based on position and date.

Yes - exactly that. Even here in North America not all regions go to DST - Saskatchewan for one - and the car would have to have some kind of table programmed in to look up which is which. Overseas some kick in at different times and some never. My car could get that info from OnStar but if it does it doesn't pass it to the clock, so I reset it myself. It's really not a big deal to someone brought up with spring driven clocks that had to be wound.

canehdian

· #23 · Nov 27, 2016

Fyodor said:
It's really not a big deal to someone brought up with spring driven clocks that had to be wound.

I agree it's not a big deal. But it's a feature my car shipped with (an extremely simple one, at that), and should continue to work.
The simplest of alarm clocks can do it on the correct day without a data connection at all, so should a vehicle with an exponentially more complex computer and radio system.

llninja

· #24 · Nov 27, 2016

canehdian said:
I agree it's not a big deal. But it's a feature my car shipped with (an extremely simple one, at that), and should continue to work.
The simplest of alarm clocks can do it on the correct day without a data connection at all, so should a vehicle with an exponentially more complex computer and radio system.

I'd personally like to see our government switch to the summer daylight savings time and never switch back. Twice a year we screw up people's sleeping patterns for this "tradition" that leads to all sorts of confusion. A few years ago Russia chose to switch and never do daylight savings again. Not that I'm supportive of all the things the Russian government does, this is one that made sense to me.

canehdian

· #25 · Nov 27, 2016

Preaching to the choir, there

Fyodor

· #26 · Nov 28, 2016

canehdian said:
I agree it's not a big deal. But it's a feature my car shipped with (an extremely simple one, at that), and should continue to work.
The simplest of alarm clocks can do it on the correct day without a data connection at all, so should a vehicle with an exponentially more complex computer and radio system.

I think you and I have differing ideas on what is simple. Those clocks you are talking about have considerable computing power built into them and chips with thousands of transistors.

Fyodor

· #27 · Nov 28, 2016

llninja said:
I'd personally like to see our government switch to the summer daylight savings time and never switch back. Twice a year we screw up people's sleeping patterns for this "tradition" that leads to all sorts of confusion. A few years ago Russia chose to switch and never do daylight savings again. Not that I'm supportive of all the things the Russian government does, this is one that made sense to me.

Agreed, and I don't want to go too far down that rabbit hole, but when we were taught in school about DST the justification was that it helped the farmers. Any farmer I ever met timed his day by the sun and worked dawn to dusk.

A few weeks ago I was out of synch with what I expected London time to be. Then I was OK and back to five hours. My daughter was 12 hours ahead, she's now 13 hours because in China and most lower latitudes they don't switch.

canehdian

· #28 · Nov 28, 2016

Fyodor said:
I think you and I have differing ideas on what is simple. Those clocks you are talking about have considerable computing power built into them and chips with thousands of transistors.

My $10 alarm clock has more computing power than the volt computer? Definitely not. It reads the time signal from FM, something the volt can probably already do (similar to other data streams from FM, e.g. current song playing) - they just didn't program it that way. Thousands of transistors is basically a pencil and paper compared to today's computers with millions and billions of transistors.

Sorry to OP for hijacking his thread with all this DST BS.

llninja

· #29 · Nov 28, 2016

Fyodor said:
Agreed, and I don't want to go too far down that rabbit hole, but when we were taught in school about DST the justification was that it helped the farmers. Any farmer I ever met timed his day by the sun and worked dawn to dusk.

A few weeks ago I was out of synch with what I expected London time to be. Then I was OK and back to five hours. My daughter was 12 hours ahead, she's now 13 hours because in China and most lower latitudes they don't switch.

I have a farm where I cash rent to a farmer to plant crops. They could care less about the light as they have lights, a cozy cab with heat and AC, and lots of gadgets like GPS and automated systems on board where the combine practically drives itself. I got to ride in the combine a few years ago when they were harvesting my land. It's an amazing dance of giant vehicles (combine keeps running, storing corn or beans in its container until another tractor with a trailer and auger pulls along side to transfer the combine;s contents, then that tractor rushes to the Semite truck trailer to dump, going back and forth until the semi is full. Then the semi leaves to get the grain to the grain silos while the remaining combine and tractor with trailer fill up, keep moving, until the semi returns. Moisture content is what causes them to stop, not the sun (though sun and weather have a great effect on moisture content)

Fyodor

· #30 · Nov 29, 2016

llninja said:
I have a farm where I cash rent to a farmer to plant crops. They could care less about the light as they have lights, a cozy cab with heat and AC, and lots of gadgets like GPS and automated systems on board where the combine practically drives itself. I got to ride in the combine a few years ago when they were harvesting my land. It's an amazing dance of giant vehicles (combine keeps running, storing corn or beans in its container until another tractor with a trailer and auger pulls along side to transfer the combine;s contents, then that tractor rushes to the Semite truck trailer to dump, going back and forth until the semi is full. Then the semi leaves to get the grain to the grain silos while the remaining combine and tractor with trailer fill up, keep moving, until the semi returns. Moisture content is what causes them to stop, not the sun (though sun and weather have a great effect on moisture content)

Yes, I watched one of those tractors at work in Saskatchewan. Amazing. It did drive itself on a route programmed into the GPS.

But what's a Semite truck?

llninja

· #31 · Nov 29, 2016 (Edited)

Fyodor said:
Yes, I watched one of those tractors at work in Saskatchewan. Amazing. It did drive itself on a route programmed into the GPS.

But what's a Semite truck?

Typo, semi truck with a grain trailer.

What's also making is based on realtime yields from this year's harvest, the tractor will dynamically adjust the fertilizer spray next spring to help the most needed areas.

Mister Dave

· #32 · Nov 29, 2016

Fyodor said:
Agreed, and I don't want to go too far down that rabbit hole, but when we were taught in school about DST the justification was that it helped the farmers.

The kiddies going to school don't wait at the bus stop in the dark.............. back in the day anyway.

Fyodor said:
Those clocks you are talking about have considerable computing power built into them and chips with thousands of transistors.

And they still can't keep the correct time.

llninja

· #33 · Nov 29, 2016

Mister Dave said:
The kiddies going to school don't wait at the bus stop in the dark.............. back in the day anyway.

And they still can't keep the correct time.

So instead the kiddies come home in the dark. Someday, we'll cover the everyone's rooftops with solar panels, enough so we can make our own daylight in the mornings and evenings and not need daylight savings time.

Mister Dave

· #34 · Nov 29, 2016

llninja said:
So instead the kiddies come home in the dark. Someday, we'll cover the everyone's rooftops with solar panels, enough so we can make our own daylight in the mornings and evenings and not need daylight savings time.

We got home a half hour ahead of dusk.

Fyodor

· #35 · Nov 29, 2016

Mister Dave said:
We got home a half hour ahead of dusk.

I remember mid winter in London going to school and coming home in the dark. DST didn't help at that latitude.

21 - 35 of 35 Posts

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