Ahh, the blogger round table. At GM's Centennial celebration yesterday, GM chairman sat down with a group of bloggers to talk about - what else? - the Volt. Lutz took questions about the car and gave a upbeat assessment of where the overall program is now; he didn't even knock wood when he said that the battery testing has not given them any problems - guess he's not superstitious. One thing that Lutz said would help GM sell more Volts would be government incentives, specifically $7,500 incentive for each person who buys one. By the looks of it, the he won't quite get that amount.

Over the next few years, here's what will happen with the Volt program: There will be 50 or so Volt powertrains in Chevy Cruze bodies cruising the streets gathering data in the next few months. They are currently building three a week. Next year, about 100 Volts that look like the Volt will be out and about and in 2010 there will be a "pretty huge fleet" testing. Basically, Lutz said, everything's on track for the late-2010 production date.

We also hear how those leaked photos hit the web - yup, GM was embarrassed.

Have a listen to all this a lot more (31 min):

The big news of the day is obviously the unveiling of the production Chevy Volt. I mean, this is the car that you should be able to buy in two short long years and a few months. We've been following the development of this car for a long time now (since January 2007, for goodness sake).

But what if we were political pundits instead of bloggers with a thing for cleaner cars? Considering the amount of BS those pundits have spewed here in the U.S. during this seemingly endless presidential race, I can't help but think of how today's Volt reveal could have been, if people like Hannity and Colmes were here with Limbaugh and Olberman. My nightmare imagination runs wild after the jump.

As part of the GM Centennial celebration today, the General hosted an hour-long panel discussion that purported to look ahead 100 years and discover "Future of Transportation," according to my handy-dandy GM event schedule. The panel certainly was an hour long and did feature all of the listed guests, but the discussion rarely ranged past the 20-years-in-the-future timeframe. Still, if you didn't know anything about how the U.S. and the major automakers are going to shift away from gasoline-powered vehicles, it was a good condensation of the current state of affairs into 60 minutes.

Hosted by Joel Makower, co-founder and executive editor of Greener World Media, Inc., the panel also included: John Casesa, managing partner of Casesa Shapiro; GM VP Larry Burns; Don Hillebrand, director of transportation research at Argonne National Laboratory, "Who Killed The Electric Car?" director Chris Paine; and Mark Duvall, program manager of EPRI. The panelists took questions from the audience and from the online community (as the event was streamed live at GM Next). Click past the jump to see what the discussion was all about.

Of all the areas we visited during our day at the GM Technical Center during the Volt tour, the design center was the one place where I really, really wished we could have had a camera. I'm sure you would have all felt the same way. We've all seen the teaser image above, but in the E-Flex Studio Tim Grieg, the Volt design manager, and Bob Boniface, the design director for the Volt and the E-Flex systems, are looking at the Volt every day. The good news is that we can describe a few things. giving Grieg and Boniface a listen in the audio clips below is probably the best way to get a visualization, but let me see what I can tell you about the way the Volt will look.

The interior, as it stands today (and this is all subject to change, of course) certainly tries to look somewhat futuristic. Not as spacey as some of the discarded possibilities, but Greig did emphasize the spaciousness that the designers are going for. Lines from the dashboard will continue into the doors to not give the eyes a place to stop and feel constricted. If you remember the T-shape battery we saw in the BSL, imagine how that shape will influence the way the passengers will feel in the cabin. For the driver and front passenger, riding in the Volt won't feel too different from a car today. The battery that pushes the dividing console into the passenger compartment will not be low (on top of the battery need to go the cup holders and all that), and this will be really noticed by the back seat passengers. Don't expect five people to fit comfortably. The shifter is, in my initial opinion, going to cause a few groans. When the car is in park, the handle disappears into the lower dashboard and there is a space to reach your hand in and grab the clawlike shifter. I did not like the look at all. The driver's information screen will have four settings, depending on how much information the driver would like about the energy usage of the vehicle. GM told us that we should see an interior teaser shot sometime later this year.

Listen to Tim Grieg:




As for the exterior, Boniface seemed to delight in not showing us the whole thing. The evolving clay model sat under canvas with bumps added to not give us a real idea of what's going on under there. What he did tell us was that GM is learning a lot about how the improved aerodynamics help the mileage of the car. The majority of the design work on the Volt is now finished, and the team isn't likely to make any major changes any more. ABG visited the Design Center back in December, and there's a lot more information on how this team works in this post.

Listen to Boniface describe what the Volt looks like today:

• Next: Breezing through the GM Aero lab/wind tunnel

In commenting on the battle royal taking place on the testing benches at GM between two contending battery suppliers, "Maximum" Bob Lutz said Tuesday it was a "horse race. An apt analogy in a sense because the two teams, Continental Automotive Systems, using cells from A123 Systems Inc., and Compact Power Inc. who are using cells developed by its parent, LG Chem seem to be neck and neck in performance. No one has stumbled as the two sprint down the final stretch to the, oh, what's that? The finish line has been moved? O rly?

Apparently, GM feels the need to hold off on making the final battery supplier decision, that had been announced for April, as it continues to weigh the pros and cons of each product and conduct more testing. In light of the postponement of mule day, I suspect there is something they aren't telling us. Regardless of the exact timing of the conclusion of this contest, we are now taking bets in the comments section.

[Source: CNN Money]

While GM has never given a firm delivery date for the Chevy Volt, late 2010 has been when production was expected to start. In an online chat yesterday, GM CEO Rick Wagoner admitted that, while GM has been working hard on getting the Volt ready, "2010 would be great, but (we) can't guarantee that at this time." According to CNNMoney, Wagoner said that GM has "put massive resources [to get the Volt] into production as soon as possible" but that those resources might not be enough. As AutoblogGreen readers probably know, getting the PHEV Volt into production means overcoming all sorts of technology problems (see lithium ion batteries) and serious aerodynamic tweaks.

[Source: CNNMoney]

When General Motors unveiled the Chevy Volt back in January, here's what our own Sam Abuelsamid reported as far as possible production numbers:

GM's goal was to create an electric car that would not force users to plan their travel around the next charging session, while still providing all the capabilities of a standard four door, standard compact car and produce it in quantities of 100,000+ per year.

In August, we were talking about 60,000 Volts per year, something the president of Advanced Automotive Batteries said was "totally ridiculous at this point. To reach that level by 2010, they'd need to be placing the orders right now."

Well, now that GM has gotten its hands on some of the Volt's prototype lithium-ion batteries, the talk of how many Volts might be available each year is back in the news. Alas, there's nothing new to reoprt. WIRED's Chuck Squatriglia sees GM's Bob Lutz talking about a range between the numbers we've heard already. Lutz didn't give concrete numbers, but did say, "it's a very safe bet it will be produced in the tens of thousands. This is not sanctioned, not an official GM number, but in the first full year of production I would like to see between 60,000 and 100,000 and then go up from there."

Guess we'll have to keep waiting. 2010 is a long ways away.

[Source: WIRED, Chuck Squatriglia]

The Chevy Volt is still at least three years from Job 1 but there are almost surely parts of it prowling the streets of Southeast Michigan. Whenever a new vehicle is developed there are components that are ready for testing out of sequence. Long before all the necessary parts to build full prototypes are ready, the bits that are available will be bolted onto other existing vehicles so they can be evaluated. When GM first showed us Volt at the end of last year they told us that parts such as electric motor would be derived from other programs already in progress such as the fuel cell Equinox which are already out and about.

Other parts, like the electrically-assisted steering and the electric air conditioning compressor, will most likely be shared with current hybrid programs such as the Two-Mode hybrid Saturn Vue. The E-Flex platform is derived from the Global Compact Car architecture which under-pins the Chevy Cobalt and Opel/Saturn Astra. Since the next generation of these cars are already in development, suspension components and other pieces are being tested on those vehicles.

In the next couple of months, prototype battery packs will begin arriving in GM's labs for integration testing and then installation into the first mules. Those initial mules are expected to be based on Malibu body shells to provide extra space for prototype components and tons of instrumentation. GM has promised us an early ride in these mules sometime next spring. Stay tuned.

[Source: Blogging Stocks, thanks to CTGentelman for the tip]

In his previous role as Director of Advanced Vehicle Design at General Motors, Bob Boniface led the team responsible for creating the exterior design of the Chevy Volt. We spoke to Bob about the Volt's styling back in January after the car was unveiled at the Detroit Auto Show. Bob is now leading the team working on production cars based on the E-Flex architecture and he's also touring the country with the Volt. The most recent non-auto-show stop for the Volt was in Boston, the place where Bob started his design career two decades ago. Over at GM FYI Bob shares his thoughts on working on the Volt and helping to make it a reality.

[Source: GM FYI blog]

Now, this is good news. Coming out of this week's UAW strike at GM, the papers are full of stories figuring out the details of what each side got. The short, short version is that GM got to pawn its health care obligations onto the union, and the union got GM to promise to try and keep jobs in the U.S. Well, guess what? GM's list of commitments for future models at domestic plants is out, and the Chevy Volt is nestled in there. It's destined for Hamtramck/Detroit. Specifically, courtesy of Automotive News (subs req'd), we have this (see also Crain's Detroit):

Detroit/Hamtramck, Mich. - Buick Lucerne and Cadillac DTS continue until 2010, Global Delta MPV7 beginning in 2009, Global Delta Volt beginning in 2010, Global Epsilon Chevrolet beginning in 2012.

So, starting in 2010, GM will build the Volt right in its hometown. At least, that's the story as of today. Bad news for Lordstown, good news for pretty much everyone else.


UPDATE: of course, we should mention that the contract still needs to be approved by the UAW.
[Source: Automotive News]

Here is one reason why blogging can be so fun: take two stories, blend, and voila! More questions! The first story that I'm writing about is one which was covered here on our site. See here: "Lordstown, Ohio could be the home of the Volt". The other story in question is this one: "Chevrolet Volt: Where Will It Be Built?" over at Edmunds Auto Observer. Read both, then come back.

(Maestro: the Jeopardy theme begins now)

So, just what role did the Volt play in the UAW's contract negotiations and strike with GM? Small cars like the Chevy Cobalt and Pontiac G5 are low-profit vehicles that GM needs to compete in certain market segments. The Volt, despite being based on similar architecture, may turn out to be a bit more profitable. If not profitable in money, at least in market perception. Depending on how many GM is able to manufacture and sell, it could be a huge home run for GM, the UAW and the factory that is making it. In other words, the Volt is one vehicle that the UAW would like to see built in the States.

[Source: AutoblogGreen and Edmunds Auto Observer]