Source: AD #2259 – GM Pulls the Plug on the Volt, ZF Uses Blockchain For Car Sharing, Can Tesla Hit Its Goals? – Autoline Daily . . . The data house [Autoforecast rjw] says the Volt will go out of production in 2022 at GM’s Hamtramck plant in Detroit. It appears that instead, GM is going to put all its efforts behind its aggressive plan to intro 20 battery electric cars by 2023. Even though the Volt was completely redesigned last year and sales shot up 60%, it didn’t last. This year sales of the Volt are down over 12% and fell 33% last month. Looks like GM decided it was time to pull the plug on its plug-in. . . . Whether it’s good or bad, there’s no company in the auto industry right now that can grab headlines like Tesla. The company has struggled building the Model 3. At the same time, it’s introducing new products like the Roadster and a semi-truck. So with all of that on Tesla’s plate, on the new episode of Autoline This Week, John and his journalist colleagues discuss if the EV maker can reach all of its ambitious goals . . . So I'm left with two hypothesis: battery break-through - there has been a major improvement: (1) significant, 50% (?), reduction in costs, and; (2) significant improvement in battery charge rate and charging technology. out to meet Model 3 challenge - high profit margin luxury cars have already been decimated by Tesla who sold them tax credits for the ICE luxury vendors. But the Model 3 is existential threat to their upscale models, their bread-and-butter $30-60k SUVs and cars. Only by capturing Tesla sales can they compete and survive. The research papers are full of improved and interesting battery chemistries yet we still see the same battery plateau in cell phones, laptops, and even flashlights. But the other hard problem is charge rate. Around town, overnight charging works between 120 - 240 VAC charging for ranges of 30 to 150 miles. Fortunately, 80% of most trips. But the remaining, long distance trips are a problem. A practical cross country trip means the block-to-block speed should approach the 75 mph Interstate speed. But even today's Tesla with access to the SuperCharger network is in the 55 mph range. Worse, Tesla's competitors do not understand this. Regardless, I've always known plug-in hybrids solved the "what you can buy" transportation problem. We grew out of an efficient ICE Camry, to Prius hybrids, and now plug-in hybrids, a BMW i3-REx and Prius Prime. Today's BEV are nice but fail in cross country use. Bob Wilson
Well, Tesla's ambitious goals are just kinda shaking up the sleeping auto giants, like probably Toyota, that has gone into some kind of partnership with Mazda, and Panasonic I think, in to developing solid state batteries. But in my view, its gonna take years for those auto companies to catch up with teslas pace in the EV industry.
bad news for the ev industry, no matter how you slice it. car sales are down all around, and gas prices aren't helping ev's. good thing we didn't lose the tax credit.
Rumor mill says that the Volt will become a defacto crossover and or CUV/SUV platform after 2022. GM model lineup churns slowly but the volt going away in sedan form is because nobody buys cars, likely by the time GM kills every car platform and is tooled for land barges gas prices will skyrocket and they will again have the wrong models for the market.
I disagree with the "years" needed to catch up with Tesla. We see rapid adoption and progress in the phone market. Apple bowled over the entire industry with the introduction of the iPhone in 2007. Google released Android in 2008 and had a very equivalent phone by 2009 running Cupcake. Why? Because the parts for phones are commodities joined to software, not mechanical parts like auto engines and drive trains. The same will hold true for electric cars. Battery technologies will be quickly cloned/purchased and electric drive trains are significantly simpler than ICE-based systems, or even hybrid systems. Current manufacturers can easily adapt electric and battery technology to existing designs, reducing weight and gaining battery space by elimination of the ICE.
But don't you think its because of the "years" thing, that GM is trying na opt its priorities to catch up with Tesla in the EV industry? Dxta
I "semi" agree with you on the part as commodities argument. But what most people don't think about when they talk about Tesla's huge lead is their charging infrastructure. Their lead can't be overstated enough.
There are 7000 ish total stalls for Tesla cars to supercharge in the US There are 10’s of millions of gas pumps in the US So although Tesla has a good start and it looks good as a PR move it has No where near the capacity to even support a fraction of the 30,000,000 vehicles that drive long distances each day of the week. So Tesla isn’t really “relevant “ when it comes to our transport system, We shouldn’t kid ourselves, At best the Supercharger network is symbolic. Their lead is nothing in the grand scheme of millions of vehicles in a very large system
The SuperCharger network grows with the size of Tesla sales and not available to non-Tesla EVs. Meanwhile, the other EV makers are NOT installing either an open or proprietary network for the cars they sell. They are expecting Blink and Chargepoint to fill the gap. Bob Wilson
VW is funding 3rd party infrastructure involuntarily, my worry is that any infastructure will decay and not be maintained until well after the EV evolution.
So you are saying 30 million vehicles won't be able to use just 7,000 Supercharge stalls? Darn, I truly thought that would be possible. LOL How many garages and overnight parking stalls have access to an electrical plug? Probably only about 7,000 of those as well, right?
Tesla has shown it's commitment to keep stalls working properly. Ones that don't work are fairly rare. Usually they get fixed pretty quick if they aren't. Meanwhile, it took Chargepoint MONTHS to fix one of the 2 stations near me.
It seems as though many folks believe there is no reason you can’t only own 1 EV car and nothing else. They go on to say that I can drive anywhere I want because there is a supercharger 100-200 miles away from my destination, They then say on a 3000 mile vacation I can just fill in the gaps via an overnight charge off 110 vac at a motel along the way. The supercharger network inevitably comes up as the there is no reason... Reality is this is 100% BS, you can’t expect intralata EV travel via the supercharger system, many areas are dead zones. And My first car over a decade ago was EV, I agree EVs are for most everyone that owns more than one car, they work great for local travel but there is no infrastructure for long distance travel and the amount of infrastructure necessary is immense before we can seriously say with a straight face that the supercharger network is adequate.
LOL at the recurring argument that you can't get "everywhere" you want with a Tesla. Yes, I agree, there are certain trips that don't work well with the current infrastructure. If you regularly need to do those trips a Tesla is not for you. I find that I rarely need to go off road, therefore, I don't own a 4 wheel drive vehicle. Also, it would be nice to haul something whenever I want, but I find a truck would be a waste of my money for the few times I use it. Ask the people that drive across the country in a Tesla if the current Supercharger network is insufficient. Just talked to one the other day. There are so many now that you can often skip some of them.
I am very curious, why do you say, . No one here said any such thing. I also don't believe anyone would say that of someone else. It is correct for me, but I would never say that about everyone.
That seems a bit of an exaggeration - Google reckons there are about 114,000 gas stations with about 8 pumps per station, resulting in about 1 million gas pumps in the US. (the figure is declining). Google also indicates there are 74 million single family homes - I expect a large proportion of those would be able to support overnight charging so any EVs at that address would not need to use the Superchargers on a regular basis. kevin
