Life with Chevy Bolt EV

[phb10186]

We just got our Bolt EV about 2 weeks ago. In general, it is wonderful. Two EV-centric niggles: no light in the charging port, and no coasting in D.

We are a tall family, and we fit in the Bolt EV better than any other car (let alone any other EV!), so there's that. It is the longest range EV that we can afford - it is expensive, but with the incentives we get, we can do it.

It is practical - we require a hatchback. It is nimble. One general niggle: on some bumps cause a noticeable jounce, that may be a from a slight under-dampening in the rear suspension?

Having an EV with this much range - is a revelation! Even with the "hilltop reserve" setting, we see a range of ~290 miles. Which is amazing.

I agree that 290 miles is clearly better than 70, and if I did a high mileage, I would choose something like that - however GM have not released it in the UK, and the closest thing I could get is a Hyundai Ionic, which has also had extremely good reports, so it sounds like whatever future people want, its parity with what they were used to with their old ICE cars - and I totally understand that comfort zone.

With this sort of range, and more manufacturers getting in to the EV segment, it's actually quite easy to see that Tesla may end up a victim of their own success - especially when the likes of people such as GM, Toyota and Hyundai can make the car part of the EV better and/ or cheaper.

I read somewhere (annoyingly cant find the link) that Toyota are planning a 200-300 mile EV with half the battery size of the Model S, meaning that things are about to heat up quite soon, and the competition is going to get a lot more fierce - be interesting to see what that does to Tesla sales. Not that I dislike Tesla as all - I just think they are very expensive for what you get, and relatively speaking, there's a Toyota dealership on every street corner.

 

[PV1]

Awesome!

Wow, 290 miles with Hilltop Reserve, that's considerably better than what I'm getting. I usually see around 280 at full charge and 250 with Hilltop Reserve.

My only complaint so far are the automatic lights and the fact that I can't manually override its night time setting. If I manually toggle the lights off, the screens stay dim.

 

[wmcbrine]

I read somewhere (annoyingly cant find the link) that Toyota are planning a 200-300 mile EV with half the battery size of the Model S

I'll believe that when I see it. I think at this stage it may be more "musing about" than "planning".

Let me put it this way: Toyota do not deserve for you, or anyone, to wait for any new EV they might someday produce. They're late to the game -- they pushed hydrogen fuel cell over BEV for years, and have even trashed BEV technology in ads. Such BEVs as they themselves produced (two generations of RAV4 EVs) were a handful of token compliance cars. Currently they build one PHEV (Prius Prime), with just about the worst pure-EV range of any PHEV made.

 

[phb10186]

I read somewhere (annoyingly cant find the link) that Toyota are planning a 200-300 mile EV with half the battery size of the Model S

I'll believe that when I see it. I think at this stage it may be more "musing about" than "planning".

Let me put it this way: Toyota do not deserve for you, or anyone, to wait for any new EV they might someday produce. They're late to the game -- they pushed hydrogen fuel cell over BEV for years, and have even trashed BEV technology in ads. Such BEVs as they themselves produced (two generations of RAV4 EVs) were a handful of token compliance cars. Currently they build one PHEV (Prius Prime), with just about the worst pure-EV range of any PHEV made.

I agree with you 100%. The only things i'll say are things we all know, and are that:

1. Toyota invested loads into HFC, and wanted to wait, but the market moved to EV as the tech was more accessible.

2. The sheer amount of batteries needed creates a very long lag phase for full EV roll-out, and we are really still at the beginning of that curve still I think.

3. Toyota, for the the most part, have been innovators in the production process, rather than technological innovators mostly - so the main point I was trying to convey is that if they were to make the move to high volume EV vehicles, it could be appreciated that that would change the EV market a fair bit. Toyota tend to produce vehicles for the masses, and not vehicles where the technology leads to a a super-normal price point, as they are a high volume producer in every way.

4. It would be wrong to believe that a company like Toyota will not have been working very hard behind the scenes to perfect BEV technology.

 

[tigger19687]

I am hopefully picking up a Bolt Premier tomorrow.
I just need to have something that goes further and my truck is getting old. Better to sell it while it is still worth something.

Le Sigh, I liked the 'i' but not being able to go far because you can't turn on the Heat is killing me. hahahaha

Now if they would have more FREE CCS chargers !

 

[iwatson]

I am hopefully picking up a Bolt Premier tomorrow.

Congrats! I am quite envious.

 

[tigger19687]

Anyone in MASS looking to buy a Bolt EV needs to go to https://www.massenergy.org/drivegreen
I got $5,500 off MSRP, no qual or anything, just had to ask for it at Quirk Chevy in Braintree. They have the BEST people and I was in and out in 2.5 hrs WITH a trade in. Small hang up with cleaning the Bolt that still had all the covers on it.

This is the table with all the discounts/dealers for the Drive Greeen with Mass Energy. They have other electric cars too
http://massenergywebservices.com/drivegreen/table-all.php



I couldn't wait for the Tesla 3 to come out. too many back ordered so this has 238 mile per charge.
Drives nice.
No I will donate my i-MiEV to WBUR talk radio. I doubt anyone around wants it and I already transferred the plates to the Bolt.

 

[tigger19687]

Neil,

How did the Bolt do with the Frost the other day ?
I am very disappointed that normal cabin warming didn't un-frost the blades as on any normal car. Including the 'i'. But I think I needed to change the settings on how the pre-conditioning comes on. Will have to see how it works on the next frost/ (shhh, snow).

Still enjoying the car except for the front seat so I added more foam which has helped. Feels about as stiff as the 'i'.
Drives Great ! More of an insulated car then the 'i' that felt like a tin can.

No more Range anxiety, recharge once a week at a CCS in Lowell (about 15-20 min from home). This is the only FREE CCS around and I am not sure how many Chevy dealers have the CCS or if you can use them if you didn't buy it there. One Chevy dealer in Nashua NH let me use theirs when I asked them to turn it on. They didn't know anything about it :roll:

Plenty of room inside including the trunk, sub-trunk and sub-sub-trunk :lol: . I also cut out some of that black foam in the sub-sub-trunk area and shoved extra storage things like 1st aid, small jumper cables, thin blanket and small tire pump that came with the 'i'.

Drive in L all the time and don't like the paddle, just personal choice. Barely ever touch the brake pedal.

Bought Bright Blue Premier for $42,509, - 5500 (mass energy savings) - 2500 state rebate - 7500 Fed tax rebate - 700 from Costco gift card = $26,309 I am very happy with that.

I also got $10,000 from my trade in of the Truck so $16,309.
I won on that trade, it needed tires (about 1,600+) and the Fuel pump was starting to go with a fix price of around $2000. So the 10k they gave me was fine......... no I didn't tell them about the pump issue. Book is about 15k and selling myself might have had it sitting around for a long time. Not bad for a 12 y/o truck

I did donate the i-MiEV and can't wait to see what they got for the donation.

I can't really tell you how well I do on miles/driving. I think I get about 4+/- per kW according to the car and mileage varies when I actually look. But 240+ on the middle number. I have noticed 5+ on occasion but I am not trying.

I drive it like I did the 'i' .......... I stole it. And after looking at how much I paid for it, I DID !!! hahahahah

 

[PV1]

Now that we're getting into pre-heat season up here in the northeast corner, I've had to adjust my habits a bit from the I-MiEV (though I might be driving Bear this winter, depends on how the Bolt handles snow).

For starters, pre-condition works whether the car is plugged in or not, which means I can defrost at work (for that matter, cabin heat works while charging, too). However, one glaring difference is that instead of 3 pre-programmed modes, the function simply turns on the HVAC with whatever settings you left it at except for fan speed and the state of the Heat and A/C button (I believe it defaults to auto fan speed and auto-enables the heat or A/C). So, if you left the vents set to the dash, that's where the air will come out when pre-conditioning. I have to remind myself to turn the floor vents back on when I park for the night as I leave it set to the windshield only when driving to keep it clear.

Plus, since the Bolt has a 10 kW heater instead of 5, it doesn't take half an hour to get the car warm. There's enough coolant in the heater system that warm air continues with fan only operation for about 10 minutes, so I'm more comfortable while following the same routine of pre-heating and driving with fan only.

The heated steering wheel is a game-changer. So glad mine came with that.

Tigger, was your cabin settings set with air to the windshield? If so, and it still didn't defrost the wiper blades, you can either turn the wipers on and power the car down while they are moving (leave the stalk in one of the on positions; turning it off will park the wipers even after the car is off), or power the car down and manually move them up a bit so they are over the defroster vents. They will self-park when the car is started.

 

[tigger19687]

I had not really paid attention to what the setting were. I thought I had defrost on, but maybe not.

I was not aware that the wipers would stop 1/2 way up and then not go down with pre-heat, TY. This is the 1st car I have with preheat thing.
My 'i' did not come with the remote.

I too have the heated steering wheel. I have tried it and it does get HOT, but I am sure will be nice with a pair of gloves on


We are coming into that season, darn chicken waterer was frozen today at 35 degrees

 

[PV1]

I was not aware that the wipers would stop 1/2 way up and then not go down with pre-heat, TY. This is the 1st car I have with preheat thing.

The wipers don't automatically move with pre-heat. What I was saying was that if your HVAC was set to blow air on the windshield but failed to defrost the wipers, that you could manually move the wipers up so that they were on a heated part of the windshield. I don't know how effective the defroster is yet at thawing the windshield wipers as we haven't had real snow or freezing rain yet (had some flurries, but it was dry snow). I don't foresee any issues as the i-MiEV does a good job at thawing the blades.

Sorry for the confusing ramble.

 

[PV1]

I noticed something interesting this morning. Outside temperature is hovering in the high 20's low 30's and the car hasn't moved since Friday. This morning, I went out to the car and powered it up. While I was sitting in it, I noticed the power draw moved up from 1 kW to 2 kW. Looking at the energy screens, the battery conditioning segment started growing. The car was heating the battery . Not much, just enough to get it above freezing (heater only drawing about 1 kW).

GM's thermal management appears to be much more aggressive than Mitsubishi. But on the flip side, I'm not sure how I feel about battery power being used to heat the battery. I'll have to see if it does it again and if it does it while driving. It took several minutes of being on and not moving for it to start heating.

Since seeing this behavior, I've been able to verify what the three coolant tanks are for. Left-hand side tank is for electronics/motor, front passenger (right-hand) side tank is the battery, and the rear passenger side tank (tucked under the plastic trim between the hood and wiper blades) is the HVAC heater loop.

 

[tigger19687]

I too noticed the draw at 2kW but there was nothing on, no heat no nothing. It too was cold out.

So it must be to warm batteries. Not much of a draw but maybe worth it to keep plugged in over night ?

 

[NeilBlanchard]

Neil,

How did the Bolt do with the Frost the other day ?
I am very disappointed that normal cabin warming didn't un-frost the blades as on any normal car. Including the 'i'. But I think I needed to change the settings on how the pre-conditioning comes on. Will have to see how it works on the next frost/ (shhh, snow).

I didn't drive our Bolt EV that day. My son did, and he didn't mention any issues. When I have used the defroster, it works as expected.

 

[PV1]

Something tells me the Bolt won't be a good winter car. Likewise, pre-heated for 15-20 minutes with air on the windshield, but the wipers remained frozen to the windshield. Got them free, then had issues getting them to park correctly.

1/3 of my heater power went to the battery this morning, but seemed to only run while I had cabin heat enabled while driving, so it appears that we do have some control of battery thermal management.

It was only 28 degrees this morning, too. What's going to happen when it drops into single digits?

 

[PV1]

So, now that temperatures are in the single digits, I'm finding that battery heater power has increased, but not significantly. The bigger issue is that the wipers permanently have ice blocking them in (more of it has evaporated than has been defrosted by cabin heat). This morning, it was a balmy 0 F. Preheating worked like a champ, but I found that I can't move the windshield wipers by hand like I could before. They are stiff in the servos. I don't know yet if this affects normal operation.

I wonder how much cold weather testing GM did. I know the Bolt was rushed, but they nailed everything down pretty well except for the wipers. There's nothing to thaw the trough out.

 

[NeilBlanchard]

So far, this is pretty similar to our e-Golf and LEAF. Since EV's don't have excess heat, we tend to not run the defroster when we don't have to, obviously. The LEAF has a deeper trough, and the e-Golf has a more closed trough.

 

[RobertC]

What we like about our Chevy Bolt so far, besides the 238 mile EPA range, is how much fun it is to drive with one-pedal driving and 266 lb⋅ft of torque. It's very comfortable, roomy, and has a touch screen Infotainment center with Apple CarPlay.

 

[PV1]

Ah, that Cajun red . That's the color I wanted originally, but couldn't get my hands on. I still like my orange, though. It's different.

Although, I think my Bolt's cursed. Been driving i-MiEVs for 5 1/2 years now with hardly any issues. I've had the Bolt 13 months and have had 2 flat tires, one requiring a tow. :twisted:

 

[PV1]

So, more on this second flat.

Driving home from work a couple weeks ago, I just crossed railroad tracks on a corner and as I was straightening out and accelerating, I glanced down at the speedometer to check my speed (try to drive by feel, but occasionally check myself). I looked back up and just caught a glimpse of something dark in front of the car as it disappeared beneath the front end. Before I could react, I hit the object, a 6" X 6" X 12" block of wood :shock: . I hit the end of it with the inside edge and center of the left front wheel, immediately splitting the wheel nearly in two. Due to the weight of the car and the stiffness of the suspension, the car didn't jump or veer; the wheel ended up absorbing most of the energy of the impact. I quickly slowed down and pulled off the side of the road, not knowing what I'd find. I fully expected to see the fender all torn up from the tire. I got out of the car, and found a flat tire with a split wheel, no apparent damage to the car. Since there's no spare, I called my Dad to see if he could bring a wheel off of the C-Max. Of course, the bolt pattern is 2 mm larger, so that wouldn't fit. We ended up towing the Bolt back to my work, as it was a lot closer than home (rollback).

Calling around to different dealers, the price of one factory wheel ranged from $395 to $800. I ended up buying a full set of aftermarket wheels for $700, which gives me a full spare and two winter rims from the remaining 3 OEM wheels. I got the new wheels put on with 2 new tires (replaced both fronts as they were worn). However, the impact knocked the front wheels out of line, so I got it lined up.

For now, the Bolt is back on the road. The only remaining thing to figure out is there is now a mild rumble from the front end. I figured that it may be a wheel bearing.