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[NEW2elec]

https://www.forbes.com/sites/brookecrothers/2017/03/12/chevy-bolt-ev-long-distance-troubles-on-an-800-mile-road-trip-report/#4cff9a03c980

So the Bolt is rated at about 240 mile range.  The lady talks about it taking 11.5 hours for a 800 mile trip when it would only take 5-6 in an ICE car.  Now there is no doubt in my mind she only used charging stations and no outside the box options and that's what killed her time.

Do these cars need extra fast chargers?  She also didn't use the RV park options I'm sure .

But the biggest eye popper for me was the $88 for the charging.  That is some price "shocking" on some of the cheapest energy there is.

Over all feels like a hit piece on pure EVs saying the hybrid Volt is the better option.  They have set up the worse use possible for the car and crap on the results.  Maybe they can do a Baja run in a 911 and see how that turns out.

[mrwilsn]

The Forbes article is based on an article in Green Car Reports.  Forbes really cherry picked the negatives from the article without providing the relevant context.

If you read the source article it really says more about the pitfalls of the charging infrastructure.  Several stations used didn't support the Bolt's max 80kW charge rate.  RV park option wouldn't be very helpful at only 12kW.  Even the 'slow' fast chargers being used were 21kW.  It probably won't shock EMF readers to find out the Bolt doesn't do 238 miles per charge if you drive 80 mph (the speed being traveled on highways for the trip) but to most people that's a new concept.  It will surprise most people how much range can decrease between 70 mph and 80 mph.  The total trip time could have actually been shortened if the driver had just slowed down a little....it's counter intuitive that the increase in efficiency at a slightly slower speed would be enough to make slowing down actually reduce your trip time because of recharge times.

While the Bolt is a great car with the potential to be a game changer, if GM doesn't get together with other car makers to get more chargers (they could at least start with dealerships which is far from ideal but at least a start) it will be hard for the Bolt to make it past the environmentalists and early adopters.  Chevy got their low cost 200 mile range car to market first but Tesla's big advantage is the existing fast charging infrastructure which is growing.

http://www.greencarreports.com/news/1109117_chevy-bolt-ev-800-mile-trip-in-238-mile-electric-car-shows-challenges-remain

[BrianTRice@gmail.com]

The total trip time could have actually been shortened if the driver had just slowed down a little....it's counter intuitive that the increase in efficiency at a slightly slower speed would be enough to make slowing down actually reduce your trip time because of recharge times.

Quite right. On a Zero, that speed is about 40mph unless you invest heavily in charging (gets you to 55mph) and then aerodynamic improvements (gets you to 70mph), but even then that point of diminishing returns is inevitable.

[hubert]

LOL!

One month ago, when I bought my ZeroS, I had to ride it 300mi from Paris to ALsace. Took me 1.5 days at a cruising speed of about 40mph. This was my calculation to get the best overall trip time, taking into account the very long charging time using the internal 1.1-1.3kW charger.

The GM Bolt is much expected in Europe too, as a game changer, or a potential alternative to the TM3. It will be put on the market under the brand name OPEL Ampera-e, Opel, former (or still) german car maker and part of the GM group, which has been recently sold out to PSA, Peugeot-Citroën, french automotive group. The "Opel" cars are sold in the UK under the "Vauxhall" brand. Complicated marketing!

By now, the best range/cost ratio is owned by the Renault ZOE which is Europe-only. It has a 40kWh battery and a real-world range of 300km (180mi). Unfortunately, in some countries like France, it is sold virtually battery-less with a mandatory battery-rental scheme which make things complicated and costly on the long term. This is the only reason why I did not acquire one. The i-MiEV remains the best possible EV at the "entry-level".