GMC is still putting out the old "mumbo jumbo" with respect to their new hybrid car, the Volt. Now they have changed their pitch regarding mileage. Recall that they were saying that it would get 110 MPG just a short time ago? The latest is that the battery is warranted for 8 years or 80,000 miles. That works out to only driving 10,000 miles per year. I do that on my John Deere lawn mower. The other game will be some kind of pro ration and the replacement battery will have a markup of at least 50%.
Check these numbers. My guess is that the "average" battery will not last more than 5 years and at 16,000 miles per year you will hit the 80,000 mile limit in those 5 years and get "zero" from GMC. Assume the battery will cost GMC %10,000 and they mark it upto $15,000 as a replacement, even if you stayed within the 80,000 mile limit and it failed in 5 years, you would only get a $5,625 credit against a new $15,000 battery. GMC would be out only $625 and they would have had your money for the past 5 years. I feel this is just a way to pull the wool over the eyes of our non-mathematical citizens.
Recall from my past Blogs on the GMC Volt that they always say the life of the battery is, "upto" 5 years or 8 years. "Upto" is a lot different than average. Any time you hear one of these "upto's", you can figure that the average life or performance is no better than 2/3 of their number.
The other claim is that the car does not produce any carbon dioxide and is thus clean. That is bull shit. Over 50% of the power generated in the USA is from coal and the GMC Volt has a gasoline engine that drives a generator. I assume the gas engine produces carbon dioxide just like all gas engines. 90% of the energy used by the GMC Volt is from burning coal, natural gas or gasoline. Figure that one?
The latest spin was when Obama visited the battery "assembly" plant in Michigan. They said that the battery will be stamped, "Made in the USA". It is my understanding that the battery will be made in Korea and only assembled here. To be called, "Made in the USA" that it would have me meet some minimum domestic content figure. When they use tires made in Japan or China, can you call them, "Made in the USA" if we put them on the rims here?
There has not been much volume yet, but soon we should start to see older used hybrids on the used car market. It should be very interesting how much these older hybrids go for and with how many miles on them. You can bet that the dealers will be trying to do every thing they can to keep the prices up and will be putting all kinds of spin on what they have to say.
When I went to the official GMC Volt web site, 99% of what they showed were pictures of the Volt. In my book a picture of a hybrid car is "not" worth a thousand words. I would like to see numbers without all the spin and slight of hand. I would like to have put more numbers into this Blog, but they just are not available.
