Whoops, missed that. Ok, efficiency king for vehicles with at least a 60 kWh battery.
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Whoops, missed that. Ok, efficiency king for vehicles with at least a 60 kWh battery.
The BMW 60ah has the size and range of the Spark EV, but is priced 70% higher.
The fact it's light weight gives it good city MPGe doesn't fix it's lack of range. So it saves 10 cents a day in electricity, that's simply not significant when compared to all the drawbacks.
Most efficient highway EPA rating for a BEV with a combined EV range of over 81 miles.
The Bolt is (officially) the most efficient highway cruiser EV. And overall efficiency king as well.
The Bolt EV has better highway MPGe than the 2017 BMW i3 that has the bigger 33 kWh battery. The old i3 was 111 MPGe and the new one is 106 MPGe highway.
Red Sage
The Cybernetic Samurai
Yes. One of several arguments to buy something else instead. I'd be partial to the Fiat 500e if the BOLT and Model ☰ didn't exist.
I have a confession to make. The looks are starting to grow on me.
I will be terminating my account in shame. It was a pleasure discussing things with you all.
I will be terminating my account in shame. It was a pleasure discussing things with you all.
Hey, you're probably not the only one.
Another real world shot of a Bolt. Orange looks better than I thought it would.
stopcrazypp
Well-Known Member
For people interested in real world numbers, looking at the energy consumption on the screen (Wh/mi or mi/Wh) while going a certain speed will be most telling. Not sure if the Bolt will have such a screen though.
Looking at charging efficiency, from the EPA numbers, I work out:
Bolt: 67.4 kWh to fully charge
S60: 71.5 kWh to fully charge
S60D: 70.6 kWh to fully charge
Red Sage
The Cybernetic Samurai
I thought it would look good in a solid color all along. The multishaded, streaked, and bedazzled gray that GM chose to debut the final car design in was simply horrible. Still, I remain confused as to why traditional automobile manufacturers seem to have all got together and decided some time ago that electric cars must all be: BLACK, WHITE, SILVER, BLUE, or ORANGE. I don't believe any of them have been offered in GREEN since the crushing and shredding of the Honda EV Plus years ago. Just about NONE of them have been offered in RED.Hey, you're probably not the only one.
Another real world shot of a Bolt. Orange looks better than I thought it would.
diamond.g
Active Member
Having an electric motor with nearly twice the power probably doesn't help the Model S either.
Agreed. It's just bizarre that you can't get a BEV or PHEV in green. I do really like the shade of red on my 2011 Volt but I'm going with orange on the Bolt EV.
Interesting. I had crunched the Bolt number but hadn't thought to figure out the S60 and S60D numbers.
The EPA charge overhead has seemed excessively pessimistic in my experience with some existing plugin models. I've been too lazy to verify it, but my guess is that the charge overhead may represent a 50-50 blend between charging at 240 (at maybe the peak default supported amperage?) and charging at 120V at 12A which is much less efficient.
For example, my 2011 Volt is rated 93 MPGe with 35 miles of range. That implies about 12.68 kWh to fully charge but at 240V it really takes about 11.75 - 12.0 kWh according to various measurements. Charging at 120V takes about 13.3 kWh. The average of 12 kWh and 13.3 kWh is 12.65 kWh or almost exactly the official EPA number.
I know GM put some effort into improving the efficiency of charging the 2nd generation Volt at 120V since many people charge it that way. Maybe that work carried over to the Bolt EV charger whereas Tesla hasn't focused on that as much?
So, perhaps the charging efficiency at 240V and 30A is closer between the S60 and the Bolt EV than is indicated by the EPA numbers?
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Red Sage
The Cybernetic Samurai
The BOLT uses a 150 kW motor. That works out to 201.153 HP. Traditional automobile manufacturers like to limit the horsepower and torque output of their electric motors so that they can use off-the-shelf transmission components in the build. Note that the SPARK EV has 327 lb-ft torque (at least one report said 400 lb-ft torque for an earlier version) compared to only 266 lb-ft torque for the BOLT (I suspect the SPARK EV was dialed back a bit to protect its transmission). GM probably wants to make sure the BOLT does not smoke their entire ICE driven product line.
Not the car for this ole gizzer but I have say that 240 miles with more than a dozen more left in his tank is pretty impressive for $35,000. I'd be thrilled if the S60 had that range.
That's a whole lot of supposition going on...
The Bolt has a custom-designed motor which is different from the Spark EV motor and makes different design tradeoffs. The Spark EV motor was said by GM to be "off the shelf" and was used with minimal change. Unfortunately, I don't know what it was originally designed for.
Because the Spark EV motor was torque-heavy and it had a lower max rpm they used a lower gear reduction in it. The original 400 lb-ft motor torque in the 2014 Spark EV used an absurdly low final fixed gear ratio of 3.17:1. By contrast, the Model S rear motor uses 9.7:1.
In 2015, GM switched from an A123 battery to an LG pack, the max torque used on the motor fell to 327 lb-ft and the final gear reduction was increased to 3.87:1 leaving the torque at the wheels essentially identical.
The Bolt motor is 266 lb-ft with a gear reduction of 7.05:1 meaning that torque at the wheels is about 50% higher than the Spark EV while the vehicle weight only increased by 25%.
The Bolt EV has a completely new and custom gearbox design by GM (as did the Spark EV) so it doesn't share any ICE-based part limitations.
Garlan Garner
Banned
I wish Tesla would provide as much information on the M3 as there is available on the Bolt.
Chevrolet Bolt - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
erthquake
Active Member
Why? The Bolt was nothing more than a concept car a year ago. We know more about the Model 3 than we did the Bolt at a similar time before production.
