Rumor: GM To Put Chevy Volt Program On Hold, Cut Engineering Staff Tomorrow — Nobody has substantiated this, but it is possible. Every time the oil prices plummet, as they are doing, all these “alternative” concepts die overnight after someone runs the numbers and realizes that they are going to lose their ass if the project continues.
UPDATE: GM says this story is a ludicrous hoax. And, indeed, nothing happened. (see comments)
Rumors of tomorrow’s “important changes” at GM have approached a fevered pace, but the latest one we’ve heard is coming directly from someone who’s directly related to someone who could be directly affected if the rumor is true. So, it must be true, right? Anyway, we’ve just been told by the family of a Chevy Volt engineering team member that not only is the untouchable Volt program on hold, GM’s even letting some of the engineering team, aka “the chosen people,” go.
Found by Aric Mackey.
Interesting choice John made. Ireland. The Titanic was built at the Harland and Wolff Shipyards in Belfast in Northern Ireland in 1912.
He wanted the plant near the port to speed up shipping. They forced him to put it out in the field someplace, so there it sat like a new outpost on some ancient battlefield.
The car. Backbone chassis, standard Lotus design practice. ERM (tough stuff) technology, used in boats and aircraft. Smart. Slippery with Cd of 0.35. Suspension, independent all around and no power steering needed so one less power wasting belt. Stainless panels bolted rather than bonded to make repairs easier.
http://www.entermyworld.com/cat/articles/motortrend/mtmay81c1x1.jpg
GM builds to make bodywork as costly as possible as the car is also designed to rust out and be a disposable item to keep consumers locked into monthly payments. They could make more on financing than the crappy cars and trucks themselves. The Lotus suspension made it handle well. GM answered with the Fiero, a more modern Corvair which handled like, well like a Corvair.
Half Baked in Spin City
Dave M. :
April 17th, 2007 at 8:42 pm
Hold on….before y’all drown in your tears while waxing nostalgic, keep in mind that GM CHOSE to sell the Corvair half-baked, just like they’ve done time and again. Fiero, anyone?
While the Corvair may have been tremendously innovative for it’s time, after so many incredible engineering victories post-WWII, this may have been the first evidence of the future for GM. If I’m not mistaken, the Tempest of this era started as a platform for innovation, soon to be abandoned for the same old, same old.
45 years later and they still haven’t learned their lesson…..
Styling wise GM was a real leader in the 1960s. Many of the other vehicles from that era look just horrible, but GM made some of the nicest looking cars ever then. The Corvair will always be a classic design. The regret is that GM didn’t really get it quite right the first time. Counting on underinflated front tires to force a car into understeer is hardly great engineering.
Corvairs handling issues, the old Copper Cooled Chevrolet disaster (1923, they recalled all of them!), the Vega linerless aluminum block, the buggy original Cadillac V4-6-8 (which was the first displacement on demand engine), the horrible V-8 diesel of the the 1980s and so on. Why such a large company with so many talented people has such a long history of releasing almost but not quite there products on the market should be a business case study in itself.
Of course history was repeated with the Fiero many years later, which in V-6 form was also one tail happy beast. In my nearly 30 years of driving only one car ever got away from me, and that was a Fiero which I had borrowed while my car was in the shop. Damp road, slight curve, bump in the road while accelerating from a stop (though still under the speed limit) and whoosh, spin city. Nobody was hurt, but the car was nearly a total loss.
http://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/in-defense-of-the-chevrolet-corviar/
The Caddy V-4-6-8, now there’s a classic case of the computer controls running the asylum.
“Coming on the heels of the ill-fated V-8 diesel was another equally problematic engine. This was the variable-displacement V-8-6-4, and it was another costly stopgap prompted by government Corporate Average Fuel Economy mandates (CAFÉ). Note:(Ironically, GM revived the idea in the early 2000s — though not for Cadillacs — as “Active Fuel Management,” which interim technical advances made utterly reliable and virtually invisible to the driver.)” How stuff works site.
Formerly DOD
“Active Fuel Management (formerly known as Displacement on Demand) is a trademarked name for the automobile variable displacement technology from General Motors. It allows a V6 or V8 engine to “turn off” half of the cylinders under light-load conditions to improve fuel economy. Estimated performance on EPA tests show a 5.5%-7.5% improvement in fuel economy.” Wikipedia
Flip it and ship it. What an idea this was.
“One innovation of the original Vega was that it was designed to be shipped vertically with its nose down. For example, the battery had fill caps at the back to prevent leakage during transit. Special rail cars known as “Vert-A-Pac” cars were built with hangers to carry the first Vegas to market in this vertical arrangement. One of the notable locations where these cars were unloaded was at the now defunct Sawtell Auto Ramps in Atlanta, Georgia, located on the former Southern, now Norfolk Southern mainline to Macon.”
Build all new rail cars to ship the cars vertically. Who came up with this idea?
“Although outsold most years by the Pinto, Chevrolet sold over two million Vegas during its lifetime. Consumer Reports rated a 1971 Vega above the Pinto and the Gremlin, but had reservations about the Vega’s workmanship with similar reviews for subsequent Vega tests through 1974 and a subsequent test of a similar Pontiac Astre in 1975.” Wikipedia
It was better than a Pinto, but those blew up when rear ended and the Gremlin was, “Time magazine noted two definitions for “gremlin”: Defined by Webster’s as “a small gnome held to be responsible for malfunction of equipment.” American Motors’ definition: “a pal to its friends and an ogre to its enemies.” The mechanics stayed busy!
Too dangerous denim.
“Gremlins also received the option of a Levi’s interior trim package, which included spun nylon upholstery made to look like denim (fire safety regulations prohibited the use of real cotton denim). Details included removable map pockets, burnished copper denim rivets, and red Levi’s logo tabs.” Wikipedia
Nylon doesn’t burn you until the car sits in the sun all day and you sit on hot nylon and wish the seat was real denim.
Maybe we can make blue jeans at the empty GM plants.
That’s BS! I was so looking forward to looking into one!
This, if true, is idiocy.
If GM is cutting back because fuel prices are down, they are idiots, because oil prices will come back with the economy.
If GM is doing it because they are short of cash, they are idiots because they should cut something else, as this technology is what will save them.
Frankly, we need to move awy from oil for energy as much as humanly possible. I would rather give my money to an alternate-energy startup in New Mexico than some f**ktards who are trying to kill me all the time.
The consumer public has demonstrated time and again early adopters will accept “growing-pain” shortcomings in advanced technology (hell, that’s Apple’s business model) if the design philosophy is compelling and the product performs within the envelope of its competition.
As long as the Volt delivered on most of its promises at a reasonable price point, there will be those who would buy it for the statement, if nothing else. (I was in Los Gatos last week and there were so many hybrids around I thought a Prius was being raffled off each week by the town.)
GM is being penny-wise and pound-foolish if they truly decided to put the brakes on this project.
That’s it GM. Stop new product development to stay with a product line that got you in trouble in the first place.
Now I understand why these executives deserve their millions.
It’s time to let them manage themselves out-of-business.
Does this mean GM and it’s accompanying wrench monkeys will be leaving Oshawa? Best thing that could ever happen to any town.
Photo of the week. Vert-A-Pac.
http://www.trainboard.com/railimages/data/886/Car_11.jpg
GM flipped before it finally flopped.
GM with BOTH BARRELS IN MOUTH NOW !!! Cancel the Volt ??? WHAT ARE THEY THINKING ??? If they are thinking at all !!!
This vehicle was never going to be released anyway. Just another PR stunt by a completely out of touch GM.
I’m not too worried. It will a while before ANY company puts out an electric vehicle that is actually a viable replacement for my primary gasoline vehicle.
The railroad is looking at building a new freight hub out my way. They want the state to pay millions of dollars to raise bridges higher up for taller rail cars or they won’t build the new hub here. I haven’t heard much more about it. The state can’t even fund repairs for the bridges we have and they just closed another bridge because a beam cracked. The whole country is going to hell. We’re rebuilding bridges in Iraq after spending billions to blow them up. The best days of the USA are over with folks. Bush screwed us and the grand kids on top of it. Look at leaving the USA or at least think about it. It’s going to become a big welfare state as the debt spirals out of control. You’ll get a stimulus check and then the welfare rolls will swell as more people are out of work.
sounds about right.
GM could cost the U.S. more than terrorism. It’s more like a bomb than a barrel in your mouth. You’ll end up with ashes in your mouth when this goes off. They’re losing something like $250 million a week and it’s not going to improve. It’s like big steel. They never closed a profitable plant. The problem was that the plants were not profitable and massive layoffs couldn’t be avoided. Steel was more strategic than automobiles and it went down hard. Two guys make a ton of steel in an hour with automation. Robots replace autoworkers and you get a cheaper product with less labor and waste. Build something like a Ferrari and go high end if you want to do handwork. There’s a new idea for the Corvette. All handcrafted and world class. It will take more time to build. A bunch of small shops making individual components that are high quality. More competition and less monopoly. Be your own boss vs. be a union boss.
Michael Moore threw GM under the bus a looong time ago…it’s his fault.
In fact, everything’s his fault.
Would not surprise me one bit.
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. GM has been blowing smoke up everyone’s, including politicians asses for years with the VOLT and they are going to use every excuse in the book to ensure they don’t have to mass produce it.
If Obama is smart he would tie the total amount of bailout funding to total amount of actual alternative vehicle production.
That’ll shut’m up!
If this does in fact turn out to be true, I say let the US companies rot and die off. I would like to see them rebuild from ground up with no Unions and what not but dying is fine with me.
If they continue to make these decisions there is no reason to support them. As others have already pointed out above this post, they could have had a lead but choose to “milk” the public on fuel base vehicles instead. And now that oil is dropping, they want to milk us some more. Only problem is there are so many things screwed up now most people are a different take on what is important.
Follow-on book, “Who Killed the Volt” expected soon.
Hi. I work for GM PR. I can tell you that this posting, and this rumor, are categorically false. While our industry certainly is facing challenges not seen before, the Chevrolet Volt remains a high priority product program at General Motors. There is no intention to delay the development of the Volt program or reduce staffing. We remain committed to our late 2010 timing.
Unfortunately, Jalopnik irresponsibly chose to report a pure rumor without checking with any sources or confirming its facts. The fact that this site picked up the rumor and repeated it just compounds that error. But we do not plan on delaying development of the Volt nor are we reducing staffing. It just ain’t so.
[Christopher Barger is the GM Director of Global Communications Technology. – ed.]
#49 Christopher Barger:
From the sourced article: “We’ve put in a call to GM PR to ask them about the veracity of our tipsters claim, but we’ve yet to receive a response. We’ll let you know when we’ve got more to tell you”
So why haven’t you got back to jalopnik.com?
LOL!
I saw it coming too, which is why I bought the car with the world’s most advanced power train ever built for a car.
For all those holding out buying a Prius, the next generations will have better handling and style, since Toyota no longer has to worry about the little things anymore like transmission, motor, and batteries.
Many “teaser” pictures on PriusChat.com, it’s starting to look & feel like a Honda Accord.
IMHO, Honda’s VTEC is tech marvel #2, assisted by a electric motor is an after-thought (Insight).
#1
Now $50 billion
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=aWj2UUIE4ofU&refer=worldwide
Sad.
40,
It’s always half-empty to you. It must suck to see the world through your eyes.
This poorly sourced article is inaccurate. The Volt program is one of the only vehicles at GM that’s not being delayed. http://greenfuelsforecast.com/ArticleDetails.php?articleID=633
# 53 smartalix puked, “It’s always half-empty to you. It must suck to see the world through your eyes.”
No, just waiting for an electric car that actually replaces my existing car. Why would I want an extra car? Are you brain dead? Why waste resources to buy an expensive extra vehicle?
Go see the Wizard.
Why are we bailing these morans out? They are deliberately and consistently engineering their own failure. Let them die. Give the money to Tesla Motors, a truly great American car company.
#57 “but just like when we put a man on the moon we need to decide on one way to get there and then get there asap”
Funny, but you don’t see us on the Moon anymore…
Wonder why.
This is a strategy to get the bailout money.
Now they can go in front of a Democratically controlled government and say, “Unless we get bailed out, we won’t be able to produce electric cars!” The gov’t will freak out and hand them the cash, for this reason alone.
There’s been no indication that they’re mothballing this. They’ve printed ads, for crying out loud.
It’s a psych out.
#58… huh? whats your point… my point is we actually know how to get somewhere… lets work at getting there. if obama is going to bring change… then bring it on… the national lack of urgency is really alarming… we can’t just keep limping from crisis to crisis. i’m not blaming obama on that 4sure… he hasn’t even taken office… but we need a leader that will get a little radical right now and get out in front of this mess… fix detroit, get us off oil and out in front of the green rev thats coming would do alot for this country to say the least… can he do it?? he said he will and nationalizing detroit would go along way in that derection.
# 60 faustus said, “#58… huh? whats your point… my point is we actually know how to get somewhere… lets work at getting there.”
I’ll tell since you are not familiar with the space program at the time.
The gov’t poured $ into Von Braun’s design as it could be accomplished with minimal new technology. It was unfortunately too costly and was not practical for continued usage.
Typical. Gov’t programs have almost never resulted in new viable technology. Majot advancements almost always come from the private sector, hence the US being the patent capital of the world…
#61 Paddy-O,
Just curious Paddy, how’s that private sector lunar landing program going? We got to the moon in 1969. To my knowledge, the private sector hasn’t made it to LEO yet.
So, maybe there is a place for government sometimes.
Yeah. I know we haven’t been back since, but isn’t that also largely due to a fickle population that didn’t even bother to turn on the TV and watch, let alone want to fund, the space program by then?
How do you define the cost effectiveness of science anyway? We didn’t go to the moon to make it into Aruba. We went there to learn, and learn we did.
Now we have a tendency to do so with unmanned probes. That’s not “profitable” either. But, we keep learning. Ditto for hubble and other large telescopes, few (zero?) of which are owned by the private sector.
Wait a second…
People still buy GM cars?