Electrifying! Chevrolet Volt to be seen at Paris

[Blake Noble]

Electrifying! Chevrolet Volt to be seen at Paris
Another early debut from GM.

Link to original Article @ Street Commodores

Britain’s Channel 4 has reported that show goers attending the Paris International Motor Show can expect a U.S spec production version of the Chevrolet Volt on display featuring all the interior goodies ready to rock and roll.

Obviously the E-Flex system that will power the Volt is still in its testing phase but it shows the rest of the car has evolved in leaps and bounds, ready for its 2010 deadline.

Early reports have tipped the Volt’s hybrid system to be a complete success with GM announcing an up to 40-mile range on battery power alone using a Chevrolet Malibu as a donor vehicle.

[loki]

ooooooooo will it be made of sand?! lol Silica power all the way!

[Sixty8panther]

Make a Hardtop and I'm buying one.

[C.H.U.D.]

Judging by how narrow it is, i'll guess that this prototype is on Epsilon

[Blake Noble]

For the dissenters, let me ask you, do you like your crow crispy or original?

[gm4life]

I think the Volt is cool but I really don't care at this point. Gas is still under 5.00 a gallon and I wouldn't be caught dead in a full-hybrid greenie moblie like this. But for GM's image this is wonderful and I am excited to see Prius buyers flock to this sucker. Go get 'em boys the full-hybrid market still has a door open and you name can be on it. Just don't screw this one up. (GM has done that before!)

[Drew Dowdell]

do you think we can get Enzl in here to say something nice about the Volt or GM?

[enzl]

do you think we can get Enzl in here to say something nice about the Volt or GM?

Yes, you can.

If the Volt displayed at Paris is "production ready", than GM deserves all due credit. But, lets keep in mind that "production ready" means that the car displayed is identical (allowing for minor detail changes) to that which can be purchased by the 2011 Model year roll-out in October of 2010.

I'll certainly be watching closely.

[Drew Dowdell]

With your finger on the trigger I'm sure.....

[Satty]

So GM is, once again, going to show a car thats extremely close to the production version a year or two before its available. That works so well, cause everyone is still super-pumped about the Camaro, nobody, not a single enthusiast anywhere, is bitching about anything about it. The Volt was hot as a concept, and it will probably be an awesome production car, but lets face it, by the time its actually on sale, it will be somewhat stale, Joe Dumbass will be thinking about buying a new car in 2011 or 2012 (be real, it takes GM forever to roll out new product, the first year or two will be very limited) and will look into the Volt and think, "Wow, it hasn't changed a bit since I first saw it 4 years ago" and move on to a more recently introduced Honda or Toyota or whatever. People are stupid, only stupid people deny that people are stupid. The production Volt should be kept secret until it is ready to go on sale. Show other E-Flex based concepts in the mean time, maybe a minivan/crossover or a coupe or whatever.

Thats it for my rant on that, the Volt will be cool, I have no doubt that it will do what its supposed to do, and do it well. But who knows what other automakers will come up with by then to trump what GM has already announced it projects to be able to do in 3 years.

[Camino LS6]

I don't think it will have the batteries in it, if I recall correctly from the story I read. The rest of the car is supposed to be production ready though.

[CSpec]

I agree with Satty. GM debuts model far too early. Compare that with a company like Honda, where the new model just shows up in dealers and all the press is about a car you can go out and buy right then.

[FUTURE_OF_GM]

So GM is, once again, going to show a car thats extremely close to the production version a year or two before its available. That works so well, cause everyone is still super-pumped about the Camaro, nobody, not a single enthusiast anywhere, is bitching about anything about it. The Volt was hot as a concept, and it will probably be an awesome production car, but lets face it, by the time its actually on sale, it will be somewhat stale, Joe Dumbass will be thinking about buying a new car in 2011 or 2012 (be real, it takes GM forever to roll out new product, the first year or two will be very limited) and will look into the Volt and think, "Wow, it hasn't changed a bit since I first saw it 4 years ago" and move on to a more recently introduced Honda or Toyota or whatever. People are stupid, only stupid people deny that people are stupid. The production Volt should be kept secret until it is ready to go on sale. Show other E-Flex based concepts in the mean time, maybe a minivan/crossover or a coupe or whatever.

Thats it for my rant on that, the Volt will be cool, I have no doubt that it will do what its supposed to do, and do it well. But who knows what other automakers will come up with by then to trump what GM has already announced it projects to be able to do in 3 years.

This is very odd...

For once I agree with everything Satty said.

[79VetteZ06]

Dreaming: "GM says that Chevy Volt will go on sale in February 2009 in a surprise move to shock everyone."

Bitchslapped to reality that will be February of 2012. Even Nissan who yesterday announced Li batteries plans to be in market next year. What are these bitches with 1,000 engineers blowing their dongs in Volt's ass doing?

[CARBIZ]

I'm with Satty on this one, too. What GM needs is a '57 Plymouth type of shocker. When Chrysler announced 'Suddenly, it's 1960,' it literally sent the Chevy design team and others back to the drawing boards to scrap their '58 line ups. In those days, of course, it was easy to react with all new sheet metal in under a year, but my point is that Plymouth (and the rest of Chrysler, for that matter) came out from behind and changed their boxy, boring image over night. Nobody had a clue what Exner was up to until the cars debuted.

That is the kind of knock out punch GM needs right now. Not another SSR debacle where they drag a vehicle through the auto show circuit forever, until people are so bored of it that that clinking sound is the sound of cancelled deposits.

Oh, yeah, and they might also want to skip the rust/build quality the '57 Mopars had, which nearly bankrupted the company.

Edited May 31, 2008 by CARBIZ