No "Mr. Fusion" canister? Color me disappointed.

When's the "classic" Chevy Volt supposed to hit the market?

@EQC: Supposedly by 2010, but a recent statement by GM indicated it *could* take longer. If the Volt is a solid performer (i.e, actually gets 40 miles on electric alone at highway speeds) and costs less than $40,000 then GM could truly have a revolutionary vehicle on their hands. I would buy one in a second.

@EQC: lol. god question!
i'm still waiting for the diesel/electric hybrids they have in europe that get 100mpg

The Volt's got to get people amped up at ohm before we see any kind of amplified need for more Hydrogen capacitance.

What happens to the canisters in a hard collision?

Those hydrogen tanks better be damn sturdy. I'm fine with driving around on top of a 16 gallon tank of flammable liquid but driving around with 2 presurized vessels filled with highly reactive gas seems a bit dangerous. Ford better not make a hydrogen car or we'll have the pinto II.

@bandit: yeah i should have hit refresh.

@strider_mtk

I'm not sure what my reactance might be to that, I might prefer to change my name to Henry and drive a Farad instead. On the hand, if it beats out the Tesla the Volt may turn out to be a joule.

itll be a cold day in hell when I buy an american made car.

does anyone remember the GM HY-Wire where they basically had a skate board for the powertrain and they had such great ideas like you could put a sedan body on it or take it some where and change it to a small pickup or a hatchback. Why is it car companies always scale back awesome ideas to mundane realities?

@bandit:
Demonstrations have been shown that pressurized hydrogen burns more like a blowtorch when the cannister is punctured, unlike propane which will explode concussively when the cannister is breached.

A gunshot was used to demonstrate this, and was shown on the science program Nova. The hydrogen tank only had the small blowtorch-like fire as the gas escaped through the bullethole, but the propane tank went ker-blooie when shot.

People need to realize that hydrogen doesn't react the way they think it does. In fact, none of the deaths from the Hindenburg (the most common, and most misconceived, example) were the result of the fire, but rather from the people jumping from it. Everyone who rode the blimp down to the ground survived. Just watch the old films of it, it was not really explosive, but rather slow-burning (albeit impressive to watch).

@ImTheKing:

So much for an open mind eh?

It's fairly well agreed that they've dropped the ball for a decade or so, but by all accounts that I've read, the quality has improved dramatically. If memory serves me correctly, Buick took several JD Power awards last year.

Regardless, if Detroit is trying to get back in touch with the market, and is genuinely willing to invest their resources into the next generation of vehicles, why the open-ended rebuke?

@Walter: Hydrogen isn't as explosive as most people tend to believe it to be. Heck, under the proper conditions you can throw lit cigarettes and matches into gasoline and it will extinguish them.

@Christibyte:

They were showing this off at NextFest in NYC two years ago. As far as I know they're still working on it. The Volt is Chevy, not GM.

@wikkit: My previous vehicle was a '99 pontiac. Single worst, most unreliable vehicle I've ever owned. So, I went Japanese this time. I couldn't stomach the thought of going through the nightmares of that again. I purchased a vehicle from a company with a record of making quality product, that sill makes a quality product.

The only thing that made me consider another GM vehicle was the warranty. I'll wait to see how the repair records and depreciation rates for the domestics are before considering one again.

@wikkit: Uhm, who do you think owns Chevy and applies technologies in a cross-branded manner?

@wikkit: Chevy is a GM brand.

@Xavoc: I swear that wasn't there when I posted...

@ImTheKing:

I have three cars right now. Two American made and one Japanese made.

I have had little to no problems with the two American made cars. One is a 2000 and the other is a 2002.

The Japanese made car (a 2003) however has been a service nightmare. It has been at the dealership more times than I can count and one of the stays at the dealership was for almost 30 days! Luckily I bought the extended warranty on it (which I never do). It's going to expire this year and I'm having a heart attack thinking about dealing with this car out of warranty. Most likely going to sell it.

I'm sure everyone has their own story/reason for car brand preference... this is just my story.

@Xavoc:
From what I've read, it's within the last few years that Detroit automakers have been cleaning up their quality issues. It may be a load of steaming dog crap, I don't know. I own a Japanese car (American built) and would continue to do so until American car makers have earned a more solid reputation for quality. My point to IMTHEKING is that there's always opportunity for change. There was a time when Japanese cars were crap. I think the sort of dogmatic close-mindedness that seems rampant in the comments anymore at Gizmodo is surprising considering the audience is predominantly young well-educated people.

@kromekoran:
I'm aware that Chevy is a GM brand, thanks.

@bandit: ...the same thing that happens to your head...explodes.

Wanna bet that we're about 5 years past Peak Oil when this thing finally becomes available?

@Xavoc: yeah i've seen that episode of mythbusters too. i've also seen the video of the hindenberg engulfed in flames. i just don't want my teeth in an ashtray someday. it would make a good anti smoking ad but still. i choose life.

@wikkit: I guess I firmly believe that no vehicle should go through 37 tail light bulbs in 8 years due to poor design. The bulbs never actually burned out, the plastic surrounding connectors simply melted instead.

3 sets of brake rotors, 2 alternators, 1 water pump, 1 power steering pump, 2 lower intake manifold gaskets, 3 serpentine belts, blower resitor pack, CD player, gas-tank sending unit (gauge), a couple of electrical harnesses...

Most of this was in the first 4 years of owning the vehicle.

@Xavoc: My 98 Grand Prix has 189,000 miles and runs perfectly. Every car company makes lemons. Look at "Crujones'" post.

Your 98 Grand Prix is powered by a 'bulletproof' 3800 pushrod motor. It's a nice engine.

GM revised the specs and installation steps for the LIM Gasket 3 times by 2001 when the warranty expired. They changed the part a couple of times during that period. And the blower resister pack. The tail light bulbs were simply poorly designed. The serpentine belt issues were caused by the various coolant leaks. The brake rotors were a known issue, and the parts were later revised to use better metal.

Trust me, I didn't have a lemon. Just the first year of a new car design with a lot of electrical flaws, and some older known ones.

My sister, and my father both had the same sending unit issue w/ their gas guages on their GM vehicles.

@EMoShunz: "i'm still waiting for the diesel/electric hybrids they have in europe that get 100mpg "

Yeah, the Europeans are waiting for those too. Huh?

The Volt gas/electric will be an amazing car. Keep an eye out for it, because GM is dumping a motherload of cash to make it a reality. Imagine this ... 40 miles on electric only. This will take care of 90% of your driving needs. What about the long trips? It will have a built in gasoline/ethanol engine that will create electricity to drive the car for 600 more miles. That is a 640 mile range. And if you use ethanol, it could be totally foreign fuel independent.

@AlexNC: Not really. Ethanol is not as efficient as oil, so your gas mileage will decline.

Ethanol is not a magic bullet for fuel, and will increase the cost of food in the meantime as production is ramped up.

100% electric is superior!
(soon as we invent decent batteries)

@superbad: i just read in pop mech at the grocery store the other day that gm's europe brand opel released them last year, and peugeot apparently has had them for 2 years.

@bandit

Look at it this way. A lot of taxis have been using propane for years... And from all the comparisons and tests I've seen (one at least done somewhere in Europe where I think they're closer to releasing hydrogen cars from what I dimly recall), hydrogen is way safer.

Wow, I gotta say the chevy volt is way overdue for the american market. I just found a sweet site with pics, videos, wallpapers and more here:

[www.chevy-volt.net]

I am in LOVE with the concept of using hydrogen as an altenative energy source, but one thing that concerns me is this: If we stop buying oil from foregn sources, won't the price of oil inflate beyond the avearge consumers budget? Sure, there is always synthetic oils, but there are a lot of other applications that require oil. Can all of these applications, including industrial, use these synthetic oils? Just somethiing to think about...

I really hope to see H2 as an alterative become a reality very soon.

Joe
MightyJoe469@Yahoo.com