Chevy Volt

  • 2011 Chevrolet Volt and 2013 Tesla Model S [photo: David Noland]

    Now that the 2015 model year is fully upon us, the decade is half-over. And those kinds of milestones always lead writers to look back and assess how far we've come. In the case of automobiles, we see three different vehicles launched over the last five model years that have radically changed the landscape. READ: How Audi, BMW & Mercedes Plan To Compete With Tesla--And Why Two are new models, one is a radically re-engineered continuation of tradition. Each has its own pros and cons, so we're going to list them alphabetically. 2011 CHEVROLET VOLT The first high-volume electric car ever...

  • Bourgeois Chevrolet, Rawdon, Quebec, Canada   [photo: RoulezElectrique.com]
    A Third Of This Dealer's Sales Are Chevy Volt Electric Cars: How'd They Do It?

    Can any other franchised dealer in the world make the claim that full one-third of its sales are a single model of plug-in electric car? Bourgeois Chevrolet of Rawdon, Quebec, achieved that remarkable level in its sales this year of the Chevrolet Volt range-extended electric car. Now the dealership...

  • 2011 Chevrolet Volt, before lease return, Hudson Valley, NY, Aug 2014 [photo: David Noland]
    Life With Chevy Volt: 3 Years & 35,000 Miles Later, It's Over

    It was a sad day. After three years, 34,752 miles, roughly 7,500 kilowatt-hours of electricity, and 327 gallons of gas, I said good-bye to my 2011 Chevy Volt last week. Its lease was up, and there was no one left in the family to drive it. I've been at the wheel of a Tesla Model S for the last 18...

  • 2014 BMW i3 REx vs Chevrolet Volt comparison  [photos: David Noland, Tom Moloughney]
    2014 BMW i3 REx Vs Chevy Volt: Range-Extended Electric Cars Compared

    Until recently, the Chevy Volt was the only range-extended electric car available in the U.S. I've driven a Volt for almost three years now, and it's been a splendid car--quiet, smooth, peppy, and amazingly economical. New REx on the block But now the Volt has a formidable new competitor: the new...

  • Chevy Volt and Spark EV with Sen. Debbie Stabenow as GM expands Global Battery Systems Lab, Sep 2013
    Battery Maker LG Chem: Biggest Electric-Car Winner Of All?

    Let's say your company builds a crucial, high-volume component for advanced-technology vehicles. Suppose it emerged this week that you've now got contracts to supply two of the world's three biggest automakers. That would put you in a good spot, wouldn't it? First GM, now VW Group Yesterday, LG...

  • 2013 Chevrolet Volt  -  Driven, December 2012
    Could Less-Pricey 2016 Chevy Volt Undercut Plug-In Hybrids?

    The average new vehicle transaction price in the U.S. today is around $32,000. Now it appears that the upcoming 2016 Chevrolet Volt may possibly have two model variants, one of them targeting a base price of $30,000. That price could potentially equal--or undercut--every plug-in hybrid offered...

  • 2013 Chevrolet Volt, Catskill Mountains, Oct 2012

    Chevy Volt owners, and even Chevrolet itself, are usually quite proud of the amount of miles the range-extended electric car covers on grid electricity. The company said last week that 63 percent of all Volt miles driven have been covered on grid power, totaling more than half a billion miles altogether. But there's one set of Volts that appears to have driven almost exclusively on gasoline, only being plugged in rarely--if ever. DON'T MISS: 2016 Chevrolet Volt To Debut At Detroit Show, First Teaser Photo Released Based on two separate accounts, those are Volts purchased and run by large...

  • 2013 Chevrolet Volt
    Chevy Volt Electric Car: Only Current GM Model NOT Recalled This Year

    The current 2015 Chevrolet Volt, now in its fifth year, will be the last of its generation before a revised and updated 2016 Volt is unveiled next January and goes on sale later in the year. But GM's first range-extended electric car turns out to have logged another minor distinction in its list of...

  • 2013 Chevrolet Volt  -  Driven, December 2012
    2016 Chevy Volt Coming: A Look Back At GM's Range-Extended Electric Car (News Video)

    The Chevy Volt has been on sale for three and a half years now, and it's never quite lived up to the big expectations that GM and the world had for it. But this week, the company confirmed that a new 2016 Volt will debut in January, at the 2015 North American International Auto Show in Detroit...

  • 2016 Chevrolet Volt teaser image, with GM marketing chief Tim Mahoney, Aug 2014
    Marketing For 2016 Chevy Volt To Be Rethought, Use Owners As Evangelists

    It's no secret among owners of the Chevy Volt range-extended electric car that the innovative car's advertising and marketing has been muddled at best. Now, with a new 2016 Volt to be unveiled next January, Chevrolet's recently-arrived global chief marketing officer promises that a thorough...

  • 2016 Chevrolet Volt - first teaser image, Aug 2014
    2016 Chevrolet Volt To Debut At Detroit Show, First Teaser Photo Released

    General Motors confirmed this morning that the revised 2016 Chevrolet Volt range-extended electric car will be released at next January's Detroit Auto Show. And the company released the first teaser image of the car, showing a more rounded rear to the liftgate of what will likely continue as a...

  • 2014 Chevrolet Volt - IIHS small front overlap crash test
    IIHS Tests Small Cars On Small Overlap: Volt Does OK, Leaf 'Struggles'

    One of the toughest crash tests a car can face is the new small-frontal-overlap, introduced by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety in 2012. By crashing a vehicle so that only 25 percent of its front end contacts the barrier, far greater forces are transmitted through the car than in a...

  • 2014 Nissan Leaf, Bear Mountain, May 2014

    Well, chalk up another first for Nissan: It sold 3,117 Leaf electric cars in the U.S. last month. That's not only its best-ever one-month sales performance, but it's the first time any carmaker has sold more than 3,000 battery plug-in electric cars in a month in this country--ever. (August 2013 sales for the range-extended Chevy Volt were 3,531.) ALSO SEE: Watch The BMW i3 Electric Car Park Itself, As Owner Reacts (Video) The May result brings total year-to-date Leaf sales to 10,389, and increases the Leaf's U.S. sales lead among all plug-in cars for 2014. It also takes total Leaf sales in...

  • 2014 Chevrolet Volt
    Chevy Volt: How It Really Works Vs Common Myths & Misconceptions

    How badly does the public misunderstand the Chevrolet Volt range-extended electric car? Pretty badly indeed, if the comments received by Volt owners are any indication. DON'T MISS: Three Years Later, Most Consumers Don't Understand The Chevy Volt Last week, we wrote that Chevrolet admits most...

  • 2011 Chevrolet Volt MPV5 concept, Unveiled at 2010 Beijing Motor Show
    Will GM Offer A Five-Seat Hybrid Or Volt To Target Prius V, Ford C-Max?

    With the anticipated launch of the revised 2016 Chevrolet Volt range-extended electric car now less than a year away, expectations are that it will be a compact hatchback similar to the current model. Whether it has four or five seats remains up in the air, though the addition of a fifth seat would...

  • 2014 Chevrolet Volt
    Three Years Later, Most Consumers Don't Understand The Chevy Volt

    Chevrolet's range-extended electric vehicle, the Volt, has been on sale for more than three years now. Its sales of 58,000 units so far are still small compared to more conventional vehicles, but many people will have seen one on the road by now--and seen TV ads or information on the internet. Even...

  • 2013 Chevrolet Volt  -  Driven, December 2012
    Chevrolet Volt: Range-Extended Electric Car Ultimate Guide

    The Chevrolet Volt range-extended electric car has been on sale since December 2010--but it's still one of the most popular electric vehicles on sale. At the moment, the Chevy Volt is fairly unique in the plug-in car market, in that it's neither a traditional hybrid vehicle, nor a full...

  • 2012 Chevrolet Volt
    GM Is Serious About Electric Cars, Despite Grumbling By Advocates

    Sometimes memories are short. Electric-car advocates often forget that it took seven years from the first Toyota Prius hybrid, launched in Japan in 1997, until sales of the second-generation Prius started to grow in global markets. Now, General Motors appears to be the subject of suspicion and...

  • 2014 Cadillac ELR test car in New York's Hudson Valley, March 2014

    Let's get one thing out of the way up front: The 2014 Cadillac ELR is rather more than a "tarted-up Volt," in the words of more than one commentator. It's a quiet, smooth, adequately powerful and very stylish coupe with a luxurious interior, and it runs on GM's most advanced range-extended electric powertrain. On the other hand, it's effectively a two-person compact car--and it appears to be priced about $30,000 too high. As Consumer Reports concluded in December, the ELR coupe is simply "priced out of its league." MORE: Cadillac Scrambles To Defend 'Provocative' ELR Ad: Not 1-Percent At All!...

  • California Plug-In Electric Vehicle Driver Survey Results - CA Ctr for Sustainable Energy, Mar 2013
    Who Buys Plug-In Electric Cars, And Why? CA Report Explains It All For You

    Within two or three months, there will be more than 200,000 plug-in electric cars on U.S. roads--and we're learning more about who buys them, and why. California's Center for Sustainable Energy released a new report this month that depicts the owners of different models having different reasons for...

  • 2014 Chevrolet Cruze Diesel, test drive in Hell, Michigan
    Diesel Vs Electric Chevrolet: Cruze Diesel Vs Volt Sales In 2013

    This year, 2014, is going to be the big test for diesel engines in U.S. passenger vehicles. It's the first full year in which two popular cars--the Chevrolet Cruze compact sedan and the Jeep Grand Cherokee--are offered with diesel engines as optional equipment, complete with higher EPA fuel...

  • 2013 Chevrolet Volt  -  Driven, December 2012
    Chevy Volt's Next Range Extender: New Opel 1.0-Liter Three-Cylinder Engine?

    It's been rumored for a while that the next-generation Chevy Volt electric car would get a new, smaller, three-cylinder engine as a range extender. Now we've seen what that engine could be, in the guise of a 1.0-liter turbocharged three-cylinder engine unveiled by GM's German arm, Opel, at this...

  • Chevy Volt recharging on the street in Cambridge, MA   [photos: John C. Briggs]
    Electric-Car Drivers Charge Anywhere; Check Out These Photos!

    Plugging in your electric car to recharge the battery is simple if you have your own garage, carport, or driveway. If you park on the street, it's a little harder; there just aren't that many curbside charging stations yet. So electric-car owners can get very, very resourceful. We said it more than...

  • 2014 Chevrolet Volt
    2014 Chevrolet Volt Price Cut By $5,000, To $34,995

    The 2014 Chevrolet Volt electric car will carry a base price of $34,995, a cut of $5,000 from the 2013 model. That price includes an $810 destination fee, but not any optional equipment. Chevrolet has "made great strides in reducing costs as we gain experience with electric vehicles and their...

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