6th May 2022, 18:47
You should have gotten a few other quotes on the battery. It should not cost $5000. Why would a dealer pay you $2500 for a car that is worth -$5000? They can probably replace that battery for $1000.
7th May 2022, 17:23
In the final update on the actual car (posted the other day) the owner states that it was $4000 to replace the battery. $1000 difference is a pretty significant amount. Question is, which amount was it?
7th May 2022, 19:32
Where in the world are you that you can replace a hybrid battery for $1000? I’d like to move there.
8th May 2022, 15:07
Why not just say I am going out to buy a really great car this time? Give these used beaters a break. 4 of us are taking a nice Sunday drive today. Time for quality of life.
8th May 2022, 19:43
If a dealer would pay you $2500 for the car, the battery must cost them around $1000-1500 max to fix. Why even buy the car at all if the battery would cost more than about $2000? $2000 battery + $500 other reconditioning on the car = $0 in profit when they sell. Not happening.
9th May 2022, 19:38
Again the cost of a replacement battery pack is $5000 minimum. They don’t exist for $1000 to $1500.
10th May 2022, 19:04
So how is this dealer still in business if they pay $2500 for a car that needs a $5000 repair? Fair question.
11th May 2022, 18:02
Well... the dealer had zero clue the battery had an issue. They would have only know if they had actually taken the car out for a long drive - which they didn't. My guess is that they aren't dumb: The car was probably worth about what they paid - which is what they can probably get for it via an auction house. The battery was initially around $4,000. By the time I finally got around to getting serious about it, for whatever reason the costs had gone up since the last time I had looked. Could be the global supply issues. Keep in mind this was for a REBUILT battery. A NEW battery was going to be over $7,000, which is significant.
Anyway... the new car has been great. We took it on a all-day drive out in the sticks and the map had us take a shortcut which turned out to be a barely paved, 1-lane, heavily rutted road. The Volt would have never made it. The new car did a great job.
17th Aug 2022, 18:12
Here is an update after 5,000 miles, which is enough to get a better feel for it. We have since taken the car on a few long road trips. Some trips that took us to some remote areas with poor roads. Here are some takeaways.
A: The oil is indeed a LOT easier to change. I did have to run it up on some ramps since the drain plug is way back and with 8" of ground clearance it wasn't comfortable trying to squeeze under to get at it. The oil filter makes a lot less of a mess since it's on top and pointing down so the oil drains out of it as you drain the engine.
B: Fuel economy ain't that bad. Is it amazing? Not really. But in real world driving it's getting close to 33 MPG.
C: It's got a HUGE gas tank for a smaller car. 16.6 gallons! That's more like what some trucks hold. As a result, we can take it on a road trip, fill up at home and still have some left when we get back
D: It WILL actually go off-roading and do it well. It does not look like something that will, but whatever the Subaru engineers did works because we were on some rather iffy looking deeply rutted, poorly maintained dirt and gravel roads. It worked like a champ. It was hilarious being on some of these roads with Jeeps and other "real" 4Wd type vehicles.
E: The seats are comfortable on long trips. Usually when I'm driving for 5-6 hours I am very ready to get out of the seats when done. I did not feel sore or fatigued with this car
F: Turning radius is very good. I can turn it around on a narrow street easily.
G: It has decent acceleration. No, this is not a sports car. But when I stomp the gas if I need to get on the freeway or get out of the way it's pretty peppy.
H: The paddle controls on the steering wheel for imitating a manual transmission? Not super useful. I have only used them once when we were on some very steep roads and wanted to put the transmission into crawl mode.
All in all? Is it the world's most amazing car? No, but it's also IMHO a very well designed, laid out and sort of useful, no BS kind of practical vehicle. It's utilitarian and does what you would expect it to do.
8th Jan 2024, 19:51
Two years later we still own the car. We had not really driven it that much and as of now has close to 30,000 miles. So barely broken in. That will change as my wife got a new job and the miles are going to start stacking up.
Now that the car is driven mostly freeway, the fuel economy has crept up to 36MPG. Not amazing, but not awful.
So far all I've done is change the oil. It's the least messy vehicle I've owned to do so. My truck has an upside down oil filter that is located in an awkward area and always spills oil everywhere. The one on this car is right under the hood and right side up, so when you drain the oil, it drains as well. I can change the oil in about 10 minutes. I remember I was worried about oil consumption as my brother's Subaru burned a lot and was recalled. So far this one doesn't use any. It uses a very thin, 0W-20 oil which I was sort of suspicious about, but it's what it calls for.
This car uses a lot of plastic for the exterior. Despite living in a very sunny part of the country, it so far hasn't faded that much. But I suspect that the headlights will do what all of our other cars do and start to haze in 10 years.
I am probably going to change the CVT fluid at 50k. But looking online it's not a straightforward job and unless you actually flush the transmission you can't just drain all of the old stuff. I also found that the filter is not easy to access and is inside the transmission and not serviceable unless the transmission is taken apart. There is no filler neck and instead you have to remove a plug on the side and use a syringe to shoot in the new fluid. Things like that are annoying.
We have taken the car off roading on a number of occasions. Sometimes on roads that didn't look at all passable. It's one of the few SUV type vehicles that will absolutely go off roading and do it well.The weird pancake engine means a lower center of gravity. And the all wheel drive system works very well and it's hard to get it to actually slip. There is good undercarriage protection too and it keeps the engine and transmission from being damaged.
So it's fine. Like the last review it's not a super-exciting car, but it's a very functional one that does what it does competently.
6th May 2022, 14:01
We got ZILCH for the Volt. But... the Volt was about to turn into a 4500 pound brick because the main battery was on its way out. We got $2500 for it. But it needed $5,000 for a new battery. So I felt it was fair.