03.02
Big news in the world of extended-range electric vehicles today as Opel officially debuted their new car, the Ampera, at the Geneva Motor Show. The car features an electric motor and batter as well as a small gasoline generator that extends the driving range to 500 km (about 310 miles) before having to be recharged. Dr. VW previously wrote about the influence Saturn had on the design of the Ampera, information that can be found in his post. Here is some more info on the car.
Set to be brought to dealer showrooms by late 2011, the Ampera represents GM’s hopes of keeping themselves sustainable in the global automobile market and away from bankruptcy. Powered by the newly designed Voltec drive system, the Ampera is able travel 60 km (just over 37 miles) on battery power alone. On longer trips, the small gasoline engine kicks in and recharges the battery, boosting range up to 5 fold. The sexy styling of the Ampera is derived from a couple of previous Opel concepts, most notably the GTC Concept. With such a sweet design and great practicality (it can be plugged in to any 230V household outlet for recharge), I don’t see how this could be a bad move for GM. Especially, with GM struggling so much worldwide, the Ampera looks to be a breath of fresh air in an already expanding electric vehicle market. Other companies such as Chrysler are releasing their own EV’s that can be read about in the original post.
Let us hope the companies stay around long enough to see their hard work come to fruition. Big_Blocker out.
[...] General Motors certainly has made a healthy showing at Geneva thus far with concepts like the Saturn-inspired Opel Ampera that blends fuel efficiency and attractive aesthetics. Chrysler introduced the 200c, a partial zero [...]
Big news in the world of extended-range electric vehicles today as Opel officially debuted their new car, the Ampera, at the Geneva Motor Show. The car features an electric motor and batter as well as a small gasoline generator that extends the driving range to 500 km (about 310 miles) before having to be recharged. Dr. VW previously wrote about the influence Saturn had on the design of the Ampera, information that can be found in his post. Here is some more info on the car.
Set to be brought to dealer showrooms by late 2011, the Ampera represents GM’s hopes of keeping themselves sustainable in the global automobile market and away from bankruptcy. Powered by the newly designed Voltec drive system, the Ampera is able travel 60 km (just over 37 miles) on battery power alone. On longer trips, the small gasoline engine kicks in and recharges the battery, boosting range up to 5 fold. The sexy styling of the Ampera is derived from a couple of previous Opel concepts, most notably the GTC Concept. With such a sweet design and great practicality (it can be plugged in to any 230V household outlet for recharge), I don’t see how this could be a bad move for GM. Especially, with GM struggling so much worldwide, the Ampera looks to be a breath of fresh air in an already expanding electric vehicle market. Other companies such as Chrysler are releasing their own EV’s that can be read about in the original post.
Let us hope the companies stay around long enough to see their hard work come to fruition. Big_Blocker out.