I looked online into the Chevy Volt. I also saw the CEO of Chrysler on tv showing 3 new electric cars. Those were a sports model, jeep and a regular electric car. They mentioned a van but I it's not shown on the web site below.

I found the Volt uses a 7 gallon gas tank. This is to power the 3 cylinder engine used to recharge the lithium batteries. Estimated range is about 300 miles including 40 just from the batteries.

Chrysler uses a 8 gallon tank to power their 1 liter engine for recharging their lithium batteries. Estimated range is 400 miles including the 40 on electric only.

I can't find the weight or tire sizes. I have a feeling these may be rather lightweight cars. I'm thinking in the 2500/2800 pound range.

I'm not sure if any uses a transmission. Each wheel will have it's on electric drive motor. Some will have one or two electric motors. Could be the Chevy Volt may use the 4 elec. motors. Volvo has one with 4 motors.

My guess, is the voltage to the wheels can be varied by the accelerator. When the lithium batteries are low enough the ice starts up and keeps the batteries at a 30% charge.

Could be they use the same wheel motors as generators when you use the brakes to recharge the battery. No doubt they would still have mechanical power brakes.

I do know the lithium ion batteries are half as light as the nickle hydride batteries size we use in our Camry Hybrids. The redone lithium batteries may be heavier if they beef up the amperage for more range in the plug in electric cars.

Camry hydride pack, 160 pounds.
Lithium Ion pack, about 80 pounds. (if the same size cells)

Prices quoted by the CEO of Chrysler was $40,000 and a that a few may be sold soon, 2009? Comment price estimates are $35,000 to $30,000 for 2010 or later.

I can't find these same details on the Chevy Volt. Both GM and Chrysler say their waiting for the new hybrid lithium batteries to come out. That sounds to me more like a year wait.

Honda supposed to have a new plug in car ready but are waiting on the batteries. Nissan may also have a PI electric in the works. No doubt Toyota will have a plug in electric soon, Prius or ?

I could have missed up on some of the details above, so forgive me if I did.

http://autoshow.autos.msn.com/autosh...mentid=6009554

 

Last I heard, the volt will use a single 120Kw motor connected thru a fixed gear set to the wheels.

For sure the Volt's battery pack will be more capable than the TCH, reports say it will weight about 400 pounds. I think also from trying to remember various details from articles, it will be mounted under body (not trunk like TCH) and have liquid cooling as opposed to the air cooling in the TCH.

 

I heard the motor is to charge the batteries ONLY.

 

GM announced today that the Volt will use a 1.4L 4 cyl engine instead and it will be used to drive a generator to power the car's motor primarily. Battery recharge will be secondary. Essentially, it really will be a PHEV, not an electric car with an onboard battery charger.

 

Another very important feature of the Volt, and the reason some people (not GM) still consider it a hybrid, is that it will still have an on-board gasoline/E85 combustion engine. Only in the Volt, this engine is the smaller one, and has only one task, it charges the battery pack when the stored power gets low. The motor is not connected to the wheels, it is only a generator. The brilliance of this feature is that you will have an overall driving range of 400 miles. The efficiency of this motor amounts to about 50 mpg, for each gallon you use to charge the batteries. The old EV-1 did not have this function.

 

These cars are a long way off but seem very interesting. It all depends on the lithium ion batteries, and as we know from the exploding laptops of a couple years back, lithium ion batteries are not the most stable of batteries. Unless this problem is solved in the near future, the plug-in hybrids will not be released on schedule.

 

as Regz says,
the volt's engine will not recharge the batteries. That came out today. It will drive the electric motor when the batteries are out. You will need to plug in to charge the batteries. It will have regen braking that will recharge along with plug in.

I think its a step in the right directs but I want to see full electric like the tesla become common. all electric is good, either that or all hydrogen.

 

jg013c:

The problem with the Lithium batteries has been found and there are a couple of fixes in the works. The problem had to do with repeated heat / cold cycles (charging / discharging and rest) causing internal damage to the dielectric separating the plates. When the plates shorted...

One solution involves a newer, more flexible polymer for the dielectric, mentioned in those Exxon (I think) commercials, that is being put into production shortly, IIRC.

Another fix came out of MIT where they came up with a new manufacturing process involving carbon nanotubes and an adaptation / refinement of inkjet printer technology. I read the announcement on Slashdot about 6 months ago or so, so it will take a while to get the bugs worked out and put it into production.

I'm operating on low sleep, due to a senile cat, so there may be a few missing, conflated, misunderstood, or just wrong things above. So please beware.

 

I read a while back that the lithium batteries are very sensitive to any overcharge. Normally lithium's have a wide range of heat and cold they can work in. I wonder if it's just the fast charge that may cause the overheating.

No doubt, by now they have the charging down pat to protect the lithium batteries. These type batteries soon should be the norm in the hybrid and electric plug in cars. Lithium's are rather light weight, contain higher voltage and can hold lots of amps.

 

We should see these cars spread across 2010 to 2012 from what I heard on television.

That would be a nice thought. Being able to drive off with a cold engine on batteries. Once the car is up to speed, at any time it could kick in to warm up while not having to accelerate. Having a car that would run on batteries in any parking lot would also save gas. My TCH usually does that but I find when in cold weather the engine tends to keep running.