
Chevy starts manufacturing the Bolt - _1
https://www.engadget.com/2016/11/05/chevy-starts-manufacturing-bolt/
======
neals
So if we put 'branding' and 'we love Elon' aside, where does this put Chevy
and Tesla on the map of innovation and competition? Is Tesla still years
ahead? Or has Chevy bought enough tech to have a comparable/better offering?

~~~
johnm1019
I would say Chevy is years ahead because not only are the Bolts they are
building today going on sale before the end of the year[0], they have years of
experience and billions in assets designed to help them build cars. Tesla says
the model 3 goes on sale "late 2017". By then we'll have the 2018 MY Chevy
Bolt, which could be just as good or better? Or cheaper?

[0] [http://finance.yahoo.com/news/gm-starts-
producing-200-mile-2...](http://finance.yahoo.com/news/gm-starts-
producing-200-mile-230051013.html)

------
ebbv
This article contains a basic factual error. It mentions the BMW i3 as a long
range EV. It's not long range in pure EV form, it's no longer than the Leaf.
It only gets longer range when you add the REx which is a small combustion
motor and turns the i3 into a hybrid like the Volt.

Right now the ONLY choices for long range EVs are the Tesla Model S and Model
X.

~~~
semi-extrinsic
What is the (completely arbitrary) limit for "long range EV" these days? Note
that the 2017 BMW i3 now has a range of 112 miles _without the range
extender_.

~~~
dogma1138
Probably the one set by Tesla which is 200 miles or more.

Personally I would set long range EV even further in all honesty, basically a
"long range EV" to me would be one capable of doing 6 hours a day @ 50mph
which is 300 miles (with a small emergency reserve say 10-20 miles to get to a
safe location). 6 hours is about what you should get in a daily drive of 8-9
hours including rest and comfort breaks.

This gets less important as fast charging stations become more and more
common, however it's still the case that a true long range EV should provide
you with the ability to do a full day drive with overnight charging only.

This isn't a requirement for EV to be viable for most people, It's not even a
requirement for myself I just won't count them as long range transportation
unless they either have a complete coverage of charging stations or a large
enough battery to allow you to drive just slightly below highway speeds for
effectively a day.

------
hyperbovine
> The biggest limitation is cross-country travel. While Tesla has its
> Supercharger network to power some long trips, it's harder to guarantee that
> you can drive coast-to-coast in other EVs.

How is this relevant? Most Americans will do this once or twice in their whole
life.

~~~
codeulike
They are using coast to coast as an example. What they mean is 'any journey
over 200 miles'

~~~
semi-extrinsic
How often do you drive on a trip lasting more than 4 hours? I'd guess about
zero to four times a year?

Because realistically, unless both your starting point and destination are on
the same highway and there's no traffic, 200 miles will take 4 hours without
breaks.

If you can then stop somewhere with fast charging for your Bolt, after a 30
minute break (that you probably should have taken anyway), you have another 90
miles of range.

If we take an example, LA to SF is 385 miles and cursory googling says the
quickest route takes around 6 hours by car. In a Bolt, you'd have to stop for
charging for an additional ~90 minutes. This is only 20 minutes more than what
people on the Tesla forums report needing to do the trip in their Model S P85.

~~~
codeulike
Totally agree. I drive a Leaf and long distance is fine - with a bit of
planning the charging happens on the breaks you would have had anyway.

------
kleigenfreude
I'm still waiting on the Flybo Total Electric, a 4-speed manual electric car:

[http://auto.indavideo.hu/video/En_ettol_felek](http://auto.indavideo.hu/video/En_ettol_felek)

Seriously though, think of all of the additional torque you could get with a
quad motor Tesla and a clutch. Electric manufacturers are wimping out by
saying it's enough already, and it would be hella fun.

~~~
JshWright
For some niche "fun" car, sure. For a mass market vehicle, they would be nuts
to increase the number of moving parts by a factor of 4 or 5.

~~~
kleigenfreude
The reason that carmakers dropped manual was not the number of moving parts or
that they wore out quicker. If anything, the car wearing out faster sells more
cars and service. Instead, it was because not enough customers wanted manual:

[http://www.autoguide.com/auto-news/2015/02/why-
lamborghini-t...](http://www.autoguide.com/auto-news/2015/02/why-lamborghini-
trashed-the-manual-transmission.html)

For a more in-depth analysis of this, see:

[https://www.quora.com/Why-is-the-market-for-manual-
transmiss...](https://www.quora.com/Why-is-the-market-for-manual-transmission-
cars-declining)

However, there are still many that prefer manual, despite things potentially
wearing out more quickly. And- you don't _have_ to design a clutch that allows
the driver to wear out things more quickly. You could still allow the driver
to select the level of torque but only adjust for that in a way that would not
cause damage.

~~~
JshWright
This is not a manual vs automatic situation. It's "multiple gear ratio
transmission with a clutch, etc" vs "single fixed gear ratio". The fact that
electric motors have their highest torque at extremely low RPMs, which falls
over fairly linearly as power increases means that multi-speed transmissions
simply aren't necessary.

Why add a bunch of unnecessary complexity? It's just more stuff to break (not
to mention more up front cost).

~~~
kleigenfreude
> Why add a bunch of unnecessary complexity?

1\. By adding an additional lower gear to an electric truck/4x4, it could
provide even more torque at low gears to allow it to carry more load and go up
steeper inclines.

2\. By adding an additional higher gear to a car, it could go faster and
accelerate faster at the top RPM end(s). For example, see how the acceleration
drops quickly. That wouldn't happen if you were to keep switching to higher
gears:

[http://static4.consumerreportscdn.org/content/dam/cro/news_a...](http://static4.consumerreportscdn.org/content/dam/cro/news_articles/cars/CRO_Cars_Hellcat_Chart_06-15.png)

The reason they didn't do this in the Tesla was a technical problem, but that
could be remedied:

[https://forums.tesla.com/forum/forums/adding-second-gear-
spe...](https://forums.tesla.com/forum/forums/adding-second-gear-speed-
above-100mph)

"The roadster originally was developed using a two speed gear box. However,
they had problems getting it to handle the massive instantaneous torque that
the motor could produce, so they went for a single speed."

~~~
JshWright
Like I said... It's a reasonable thing to do for niche vehicles. For a mass-
market vehicle it is completely unnecessary, and only adds complexity and
cost.

~~~
kleigenfreude
> only adds ... cost.

Note: while I think this is probably true for electric vehicles that don't
offer this option, this is inaccurate for gas vehicles. Manual transmission
cars are still cheaper currently _and_ are sold by major manufacturers. Major
manufacturers will typically pass on additional cost to the consumer.

~~~
JshWright
Manual transmissions are not cheaper than a single fixed ratio power-train.

The comparison is not between an automatic and a manual transmission. It is
between _any_ transmission and "no" transmission.

~~~
kleigenfreude
When I was comparing cars in the last year, the manual transmission variant of
a car was cheaper than the automatic variant. Why would they continue to make
a car that cost more to build and charge less? I think maybe your experience
and knowledge in this is specific, but you're generalizing? Otherwise, large
automakers are doing non-sensical things...

~~~
JshWright
This is a conversation about _electric_ cars... I don't understand why you
keep comparing automatic and manual transmissions... Obviously the manual is
cheaper in that comparison. That is completely irrelevant when talking about
electric cars. The properties of an electric motor make a multi-speed
transmission of any sort unnecessary for 'normal' use (for a _very_ wide range
of 'normal').

Yes, a manual transmission is cheaper than an automatic, but both are more
expensive than "no" transmission[1], which is why electric car manufacturers
aren't bothering with them for mass-market vehicles.

[1] Obviously there is still gearing transmitting power to the wheels from the
motor, but in the case of electric cars, it can be a single fixed-ratio set of
gears, rather than multiple sets of gears and one or more clutches...

------
billhathaway
I was really surprised that Chevy expects to make less than 30k Bolts in the
first year. I wonder if that number is capped by anticipated demand,
manufacturing ability, or trying to maximize number of vehicles sold with the
tax credit.

------
Shivetya
Really they need to stop comparing expected yearly sales of any care with the
promised orders for the III. Those are not comparable. GM's big issue here is
that if they don't want another black eye is they need to get this to all
fifty states quickly.

I do believe that creating a CUV is a far more ideal and popular platform than
sedans. though if the III makes it in numbers to all markets before GM does
with the Bolt I know which one will get my money

~~~
ebbv
The Bolt will be available nationwide before the Model 3 is delivered to a
single customer.

The main problem GM has is that Tesla has built a proprietary charging network
that the Bolt doesn't have. So even with 230 miles of range you still can't
just get up and do a road trip in the Bolt as easily as you will be able to in
a Model 3.

~~~
Waterluvian
If we had proprietary gas stations today, it would be just insane. This seems
like something the government needs to regulate if the companies can't do it
themselves.

~~~
j2bax
I wouldn't be surprised if Tesla opened up their network to other vehicles for
a fee. Obviously that might require some retooling but according to Musk, he
wants us to move away from ICE vehicles no matter what it takes or who gets us
there. If this is true he has to know that a proprietary charging network is
really not acceptable.

~~~
dangrossman
Tesla's network already has hours-long lines at popular locations. They're
going to be increasing the number of Tesla vehicles on the road by an order of
magnitude very soon. The window of opportunity for selling access to their
charging network has already closed.

------
adventured
GM is sitting on $25.7 billion in cash, I can't imagine why they haven't built
out a nation-wide charging network yet. Seems foolish to be that far behind on
a fundamental piece of infrastructure while you're moving into selling
mainstream EVs. Here's hoping they aggressively catch up.

~~~
dangrossman
For the same reason there isn't a network of GM gas stations. They're not in
that business, and companies that are have done the job already. There are
more CCS fast charger stations than there are Tesla Supercharger stations, and
the Bolt isn't even on the road yet.

As far as catching up (while already ahead): [https://www.whitehouse.gov/the-
press-office/2016/11/03/obama...](https://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-
office/2016/11/03/obama-administration-announces-new-actions-accelerate-
deployment)

------
eliben
The article mentions Lyft drivers getting their hands on the Bolt first. How
does that make sense? Is a range of 200 miles really sufficient for the needs
of a Lyft driver? Wouldn't it mean no more than 3-4 hours of driving per day?
[wild guesstimate]

~~~
mnwg
You think a taxi averages 50-66mph over 3-4 hours?

~~~
eliben
Depends where it's going, I guess? Other factors like A/C take as much power
in stop-and-go as when driving. As I said, rough estimate. I would assume a
typical taxi would drive more than 200 miles per working day; isn't this a
reasonable assumption?

~~~
taxicabjesus
> I would assume a typical taxi would drive more than 200 miles per working
> day;

Depends on how much time you spend on the freeway. For me, a typical 12-hour
shift covered about 200 miles. Some days I didn't work the full 12 hours;
other days I 'got lucky' and had to cover a lot of ground.

One of my better fares was a guy who'd pissed off his girlfriend by (probably)
getting obnoxiously drunk at the Lakers/Suns game... It was 89 miles to get
him home, then I had to drive 94 miles to get the cab back to the day driver:

[https://goo.gl/maps/4xFsvJtHzLK2](https://goo.gl/maps/4xFsvJtHzLK2)

That story was at the close of this kuro5hin.org (RIP) diary:

[http://www.taxiwars.org/2012/04/22-degrees-of-
intoxication.h...](http://www.taxiwars.org/2012/04/22-degrees-of-
intoxication.html)

------
codeulike
Have they released detailed pricing yet?

