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Politics : Manmade Global Warming, A hoax? A Scam? or a Doomsday Cult? -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: joseffy who wrote (2332)	3/5/2011 12:14:26 PM
From: FJB	Read Replies (8) \| Respond to of 4326

Funniest Reading in Weeks: Chevy Volt Reviews I've been checking out reviews of the best-selling, coal-powered Chevy Volt on the big car sites and just had to share. "Since receiving my car two weeks ago, I have been commuting 15 miles each way to work. This car is rock solid on the road and I have 12 miles of electric range when I arrive home to charge it. It is great driving this silently to work and then charging it with surplus electricity from my solar system." "It's been cold here in the northeast, and use of the climate control, heated seats, and just plain effect of cold on the batteries does reduce range, to about 25 miles in my experience. This will certainly improve as winter passes, as other new owners in the forum in more moderate climates are seeing high 30's to over 40 mile range on electricity." "Just took delivery of a Crystal Red Volt (#679 off the production line), and it is a solid piece of engineering. We charged it up, off our free 220V Coulomb charge point, since it was delivered to the house, and did a 31 mile drive down the delta from Sacramento. Upon our return we still had 6 miles of EV range left... Our LEAF should arrive early next month. Both cars will charge from the same chargepoint and with our home's solar panel array." "I live in New York City and find that the electric range of this car was nothing but a scam. Since I bought the Volt, the best I could manage on electric power was 25 miles without the electric cabin heater, headlights, or radio on. When I'm leaving for work in the morning, it's dark and cold outside so I have to turn on the heater and headlights. This drops the electric range to about 9 miles after a full night's charge!!!! To make things worse, once the engine kicks in, I get about 28 MPG! After the 7k government credit, this car cost me 33k which is rediculous. A Prius costs 24k and will easily achieve 45 MPG." "I ordered my Volt from a dealer in California where I used to reside and paid a staggering premium not mentioned when the deal was made months ago. However, I desperately wanted this car due to all of the hype (giving me great expectations) and my unending commitment to saving energy and the environment... The Volt's price is certainly not worth more than $22,000.00 and it is over double that! The inflated price, slower than molasses engine, poor gasoline mileage and cheap Chevy Cobalt-like interior and exterior quality will likely only amount to a "GM Edsel" debacle... I now fear continued poor reliability, resale value, electrical problems, high fuel costs and an astronomical electric bill. My air conditioner at my home had to be shut off to allow for enough energy to address the thirst of the Volt and avoid blowing a fuse... or worse. this car is a lemon... and my worst nightmare." I also find it curious that there are no NHTSA crash test results available. But I'm sure that's just *cough...deathtrap!* coincidental. directorblue.blogspot.com Car Talk Message 27213298 from Weekly Standard Blog by Jonathan V. Last Hey everybody--it's the Age of the Electric Car! Sales numbers for the Chevy Volt are out and you'll never guess how many of these future machines consumers gobbled up in the month of February. Go ahead and try. I'll wait.Is that your final answer? Okay. Well the real number is: 281. Yup. 281 Volts were sold in February. That might sound terrible to you, but it's actually really strong. Because Nissan only sold 67 Leafs (Leaves?), and the Leaf is both cheaper and, as far as over-priced econo-boxes go, way better than the Volt. So really, the Volt is doing pretty great. In fact, if you had told GM execs last year that the Volt was going to out-sell the Leaf by more than 4-to-1, they would have been thrilled. Now if you wanted to be a Grumpy Gus and fixate on the bad news, it's true that the trend isn't great. In January, GM moved 321 Volts, so February represents a 12 percent decline. But again, there's a bright side: Leaf sales dropped by 23 percent! So actually, the Volt has better legs than its prime competitor, too. What, you want more good news? Okay, how about this: Because the Volt and Leaf sales are so . . . emerging, taxpayers saved money! The government gives everyone who buys one of the overpriced Volts or Leafs $7,500. So every electric car that doesn't sell is money back in our pocket! The only real problem is what these numbers mean for President Obama's goal of having 1 million electric cars on the road by 2015. At this rate, it'll take 232 years to hit that mark. But never fear. As Fred Barnes reminds us, Washington won't ever give up trying to influence how Americans drive. They'll think of something. Bonus Fun Fact: The Volt's 2011 production run was originally supposed to be 60,000 units. GM cut that number to 10,000 units. At this rate, the Volt is on track to sell 3,612 Volts this year. (Assuming sales don't decline any further.) Message 27213303