Chevrolet Volt, Nissan LEAF, Toyota Prius Plug-in
Welcome to the podcast of MotorWeek television’s original Automotive magazine here’s your MotorWeek podcast host John Davis hello and welcome to MotorWeek podcast number 44 I am John Davis and joining me for today’s podcast in MotorWeek Central Studio C is our above average group road test producer and two willing reporter Brian Robinson
Thank you for that John and our over the Ed reporter Steven chapnik hey hey and staff Rider shamit Choy hi John all right coming up we’ll have our lightning round we’ll also dive into our MotorWeek mailbag and try and come out alive but first we have an electrifying program
For you today because we’re going to talk about modern electric cars the the year of the electric car 2010 is not only here but it’s grow going fast we’ve had a bevy of EVS of one form or another uh through our shop in the last 90 days
And uh we’re going to start talking about uh two of the uh EVS that have been full in the press and everyone’s talking about them and I’m Brian Robinson I’m going to start with you the Nissan Leaf you’ve had more time in it than anybody else on the staff so give
Us your impressions well of as you mentioned we have driven a lot of EVS so far this summer this the first one to me that feels like a real car that I would actually buy and live with on a daily basis it’s got 100 mile range uh which
Is certainly more than the other uh EVS to this point that I’ve driven it’s very fun car to drive uh as fun as electric car can be it’s got uh you know immediate acceleration as we’re all familiar with electric cars and uh I think they did a really good job with it
Now let’s talk about some of the uh uh things that have been uh people have been critical about the car and some of the things that we brought up in our road test um uh number one is this is a pure electric car so there’s no backup system and basically that means that
Some people are worried about being caught out and and not getting them home uh the 100 mile range is of course pretty much optimal conditions um the U when I was at the alaf presentation they were very honest and said you know under very horrible conditions like subfreezing and so forth and where
You’ve got to use the heater a lot or the car sat outside all night you could have as few as 60 Mi and at the other end in absolute perfect condition and your light on the throt model you could do about 120 Mi so any way you slice it
Though even at 60 Mi since most people’s commute is about 40 m around trip that’s pretty good they’ve done a lot to alleviate that range anxiety that seems to be the hangup with electrical cars how far can I go and uh as you mentioned with the climate control it’ll give you
Your mileage uh currently and it’ll give you an alternate mileage that you could get if you turned all the accessories off so that’s good they also have a button on the steering wheel which I thought was a really good feature and as soon as you uh press the button it
Brings up a what they call reachable area on the nav screen and it’ll put a map up and it’ll show you how far you could get uh with your current state of charge and even you know if there’s charging stations in the area you could make use of so that’s that’s yeah that’s
The thing I mean as said from the car itself infrastructure has always been the the big topic with electric cars there is none there is none I I believe what Nissan is I don’t know if I would use the word promising but they are hoping for is to set up uh charging
Stations at commercial locations rest areas and I believe they’re saying as many as 12,000 by next year is that about 2012 I think they’re saying so it’s pretty ambitious but if they can get those in place that again takes the range anxiety away yeah my problem is is
That you can’t buy this unless you’re a city dweller and you never go outside a certain you know limited area you can’t buy this as your only car it’s got to be your second car it’s a lot of money for a second car and actually that’s a
Problem I think with all of the electrics um so I think it has its place for instance my spouse Cheryl she never drives more than probably 30 m a day it would be perfect for her on the other hand if you’re at work and you get called away an emergency or something
That’s when I think it gives you a little pause I’m also bothered a little bit by the fact that their battery system is air cooled instead of having some kind of a cooling system like some of the others and while that is good in that more it’s simpler and probably will
Be easier to maintain I worry about stressing the batteries and heat so all of this stuff is going to play out uh the one thing that did impress me that you mentioned Brian is is how well it drives it is a it’s fun to drive it’s got a better acceleration is better than
I expected handling all every all of the above yeah when Brian got back from the trip the first thing I asked him was how how was it on the road and he not only did he say it was fun but he said it just felt like a normal car like G it do
It it feel it feels so much like a normal car that when you open the hood the electric motor even looks like a gasoline engine which just blew me away extremely quiet normal car though now Stephen you haven’t said very much uh you’re one of the youngest folks on our
Staff what how do you take this all this new electric car stuff I don’t know I I mean I’m I am young but I’m a conservative driver and probably you know maybe one a little bit to the extreme um I think these electric vehicles for me and other people who
Drive conservatively I think are fantastic um I just have a weird not it’s not a phobia it’s just a weird thing about filling up gas I just think it’s a dumb thing to do I think it’s a complete waste of time and I think you know what we’re going to talk about next
The Vault and and the leaf and all these electric vehicles I think it’s perfect for people like me because you know just plug in and you’ll never the gas never fill up and you know the the cost of charging up the Vault overnight is about three bucks and when you figure if you
Do commute 40 m a day that that’s pretty cheap it’s a lot cheaper than putting gas into the typical car okay let’s move on to the Chevrolet Vault and for those that aren’t familiar with the vault which means you probably Live on another planet uh the Vault GM
Says is an electric car but it does have a gasoline engine that turns a generator and uh it basically runs on electric current at all times but at one point uh in the cycle in an extreme condition and we’ll talk about a little bit later there is some help from the gasoline
Engine but here we have a car that has a 40m range under perfect conditions uh on electric alone at highway speeds and then the gas engine starts and it creates enough uh energy to keep the car going but an electric motor drives the car that’s why GM calls it uh an
Electric car uh I’ve had more time in it probably than anybody else in the show like a lot of the things we said about the leaf apply very it’s comfortable it’s uh spirited uh it handles well although I think it probably is handle doesn’t handle quite as well as the leaf
It certainly uh is uh would do most small families uh very adequate the big thing is with this gasoline generator and a 9.3 gallon gas tank if the batteries run down you can drive 300 more miles so there is no range anxiety however if you commute short distances
Every day say 20 you know 20 mi one way and you basically will never use much gas and the gas will get used up only to keep the engine you know fluid and and working well uh like the leaf it’s got a very modern interior uh one thing the
Leaf has that the volt does not have the leaf does have five seat belts uh the Vol has only four seats however neither even the leaf that fifth seat belt’s uh pretty small person has to be in that spot both are hatchbacks so they’ve got ver good versatility and uh the because
The volt has a smaller battery it will recharge faster overnight having said that it’s more expensive than the leaf so you know you get the extended range you can live with the volt as your only car um but it comes at an added price I was really surprised on the volt that
You the battery never gets charged from the engine well they they’ve gone back and fourth of that it charges a little they they first they said it was going to charge the battery then they said it didn’t charge the battery it just kept the motor running the most recent stuff
And I think this is part of the problem GM keeps changing its tune a little bit is apparently some of the juice from the generator does go back to the battery so there will be a point in time where you’ll your engine will stop running and
You’ll go back to battery power or no my understanding is that you would probably have to drive a very long way for that they still say quote unquote uh you know the best way to do it is to plug it in yeah I mean in terms of vote I still
Think that people are I mean you just outlined what the vehicle is I think out there people still don’t know exactly what this thing is when they hear gas gas engine in there uh they’re thinking hybrid this is not a hybrid though in one weird sense it is the powertrain is
Uh defined by two separate systems we’ll talk about that a little bit more because that actually is uh what our lightning round question is going to be about and then the second thing I just wanted to say John you’re talking about the price between the price difference
Between the two yeah you’re right the volt is more expensive but uh in terms of leases uh ah much much more Level Playing Field it’s a very completely Level Playing I mean they’re a dollar apart right and actually that brings up a very good point Shmi because I don’t
Think anybody should buy these cars if you can lease them that’s what I was thinking yeah I mean it it doesn’t make any sense because the Battery Technology and everything else is going to progress rapidly and by the time your three-year lease is over we could be looking at
Vehicles that have 50% more range and you’ll wish you had that right so my uh my guess is that most people will lease them another aspect of the leaf is uh lower maintenance cost as there’s no gas engine to or transmission you ever have to change fluid in or service in any way
So that’s true there and both cars have a long 8-year um battery warranty uh on the other hand the volt is a very complicated car it’s got two cooling systems uh uh so you’ve got to but you do have a situation where the batteries can be maintained
At a proper temperature regardless of uh what the climate is so I think you can make arguments back and forth for both uh you know one one basically will suit you if uh you’ve limited needs and the other basically can be a a complete car replacement uh and I think that we’ll
See more of both I mean the IM uh from Mitsubishi is going to come in it’ll be more like the AL Le we’ve got uh mini e eventually will turn into a production vehicle on the other hand the Fisker Karma is following the BT path so there
Are two solid choices for this new sort of generation of cars and that’s a good thing and there’s a third choice and that’s what we’re going to talk about next a lot of folks when you talk about uh electric cars they immediately say hybrids because after all you have an
Electric motor and hybrid vehicles that’s the definition it’s two powertrains and uh we recently had a chance to uh spend a little bit of time with a prototyped Toyota Prius plugin hbd and the biggest difference is uh that you actually can drive a more extended range because it has a unpure
Electric than you can in a regular Prius a regular Prius you’re limited to maybe a mile maybe two miles at very low speeds with the onboard battery the electric motors there just as a helper to the gas engine uh the Prius plug-in hybrid much bigger battery and uh
Several people on the staff including myself drove it uh 13 to 14 miles I think 13 and up to speeds of 70 mph on pure electric alone at that point the battery was exhausted the gas engine came on and you went about your business
So it’s sort in a lot of ways it’s this goes down the same path playing back to what you mentioned uh shmid about the Vault except the big difference is in The Volt of course you’re always running on electricity first and in the Prius up to now you’ve been driving on gas first
But with a plug-in hybrid you will be able to go back and forth fairly effortlessly uh it was impressive it was quiet it was so quiet went on electric power that I drove into a parking lot and had a a lady walk straight in front
Of me and stand there and I stopped and finally she turned around and definitely problem with electric cars parking lot situations yeah and uh there’s going to be some sound emitting I think that’s going to be mandated and can’t come too soon anybody else have any comments
About the the whole concept of plug-in hybrids I I mean the whole plug-in concept and and that’s that’s what it is I know we had a Tesla in a few few weeks ago and I took it home I plugged it into my house and the power shut off in in
The house you know I mean you know and but we not supposed to do that it’s not supposed to do that and I think that’s you know what what the vault is is going to do the leaf is going to do what you know you have a separate charging
Station um which will help with that um but but there’s also a cost to that it’s about $2,000 well that’s if you do the 220 now you must have plugged it into 110 a regular outlet yeah it it’s the only one of these cars that I think is
Truly practical for 110 is the volt because it has a smaller battery and it can charge up quicker but yes if you’re going to buy the leaf or a Tesla or any of these others in order to make the charging time acceptable uh you’ve got to have 220 and they are saying about
Two grand however there is you know just just like there’s government uh tax incentives on the cars there’s also a government tax incentive on getting your house wired right sure and the leaf actually is downright impractical with a 110 I mean I think it takes and so is
Tesla okay now we turn to our lightning round and actually this is exactly what shmit was talking about further we’ve got two minutes and critics have raised the question including some of our staff about the volts classification GM has called it an electric car from the start
While critics say it’s a plug-in hybrid which classification is best and what impact does such a label have on consumers considering buying a vault uh let me just start by saying and then I’m going to hush up most consumers that I’ve talked to think a hybrid is an
Electric car so they don’t necessarily make that definition uh the definition of a hybrid is typically two powertrains now if you go by that definition um the volt is a hybrid what GM is saying is you really only have electricity driving you except for very rare occasions so they call electric car
To be perfectly honest we call an electric car but I think my opinion is it is a hybrid it’s got two powertrains can’t argue with that yeah go ahead you better you should argue we’ve got a minute and 30 seconds long well I think what you said is
Exactly what people are saying that well you know what is a hybrid I don’t think really PE the the general public really care we’re the only on who well you critics we’re the critics are the only ones who really care what class of vehicle it is to say well this class of
Vehicle is this and that a consumer is going to buy a car because they like the car not because of it’s a certain class well everybody wants to put a label and everything you know is it hard rock is it soft rock is it whatever you know it’s yeah who cares
You know it’s a car and it gets this money miles per gallon and you plugs in it doesn’t plug in you know hey you want to buy it if you don’t I agree with Brian the only problem that it it creat is when we start to compare vehicles and
We start to you know we have segments in in automotive we have segments so when we want to say well it’s it’s leading its segment in so and so what what segment are we talking about are we talking about EVS we talking about hybrids you know what I mean and that’s
Where there’s a little bit of a gray area and you can get confused yeah and I but I do think what you’re what you’re saying is is that we are entering a new era of power train technology a lot of these cars are incredibly complex and
They cannot be put into a pigeon hole as we’ve done in the past I don’t think there was anyone waiting to buy a volt and then they found out well wait a minute it could be a hybrid not electric I’m not getting right no you’re right
That was that was good and I’m glad you all chimed in there because you’re going to leave me stranded out there but uh I think we all agree that if we had to to put it down on paper we’d say that the vault is a hybrid I’m I’ll sign up wait
A minute that’s what we said well no seriously no that’s fine yeah well you’re just pulling my chain you’re pulling my plug all right here let’s go on to our MotorWeek mailbag and see what we’ve got now the qu question comes from Chuck who’s out in Washington
State and here we go Chuck this was a a tough one when comparing the cost of cars how can a consumer determine the cost of Maintenance over the lifetime of the car we’re all keeping cars longer than we did in the past and this is becoming more important information in
Car selection a very very good question and a very tough one to ask answer I’m hoping you have a very good answer you know you’re throwing it back to me thanks throw me a life preserver all right Chuck um number one I think your question is one of the reasons people
Need to give a lot of consideration to the powertrain warranty on a car that the standard warranty from from the dealership from the manufacturer uh if you’re Hyundai or GM or kia or anybody with you know 100,000 mile powertrain that should be very attractive to you if the manufacturer
Cuts you off at about 50,000 they’re taking some value away from you or they’re forcing you to buy uh some long-term warranty insurance if you do think you’re going to keep your car a long time past whatever the powertrain warranty you are well might want to consider some kind of
Uh extra warranty protection as far as cost uh most cars are very reliable I think you can say a rule of thumb that uh Asian cars are particularly uh Japanese but also Korean and the domestic cars are going to be cheaper to maintain over their life than say a
European car uh where the parts tend to be more expensive I use as a general thumbnail that every mile you C drive a car are when you factor in depreciation insurance and everything else it’s going to cost you about 45 cents a mile over your life I knew you’d have a good
Answer and uh you know it may not cost you that now but five years down the road it might anybody else want I mean 45 cents I’m glad you came up with a number because I think in the end that’s what people want now Chuck is asking
Like you said a tricky question and I think what he’s looking for is like some sort of standardized index and there isn’t one no there isn’t but if we’re going to 45 cents I think that’s that helps you look at all the uh cars across a broad spectrum and you can make a
Better comparison that way obviously I was going to say well if you take care of your car you know regularly if you if you don’t you do something other than routine maintenance correct if you you know in Honda you mentioned Hyundai 10 years 100,000 miles they they know what
Kind of product they have you know you’re going you’re going to keep your car probably longer if you know you’re saying people are keeping it longer I know some people only want to keep a car for 5 years well they’re going to buy a car based on what the next 5 years is
For I think it’s it isn’t it’s not a simple answer no it’s not a simple answer but the more you pay for a car up front considering that almost all cars loose value the more it’s going to cost you probably over the long term yeah we people are driving their cars longer but
I think maintenance costs they certainly require less maintenance but than they traditionally have but uh you know the cost of the maintenance may have gone up as well well Chuck I hope that sort of gave you an answer and for your trouble uh you’ll be receiving a MotorWeek
T-shirt yes I still the fact we talked about the Prius for like three or four minutes and didn’t talk about recalls or anything like that I’m kind of excited I’m kind yeah I’m kind of uh that’s refreshing I’m glad we moved past for once we we didn’t talk about Prius Rego
I think actually uh hopefully a lot of people have moved beyond that they’re very good cars and uh you know it looks like they’ve got the next big thing in the wing well that car bring to to uh close our MotorWeek podcast number 44 and I want to give special thanks to our
Audio engineer Jim Bigwood our podcast Creator Bob mixer and as always with the Bell producer Michelle Parker almost on Q Michelle thanks very much for joining us for our MotorWeek podcast and be sure to check out motor week’s website at motor week.org and watch MotorWeek on your local public television
Station you have been listening to the podcast of motor week television’s original Automotive magazine for additional information on podcasts videos and showtimes visit our website at motor week.org and watch MotorWeek television’s longest running Automotive magazine series each week on your local PBS Station
In episode #44, going the distance in electric vehicles. John Davis and company compare the Chevrolet Volt, Nissan LEAF and Toyota Prius Plug-in Hybrid. Panelists include road test producer Brian Robinson, reporter Steven Chupnick and writer Shamit Cho
