Florida Man Scores His Chevy Volt in Washington DC Market

Happy Volt Owner in Tampa, Florida











Here is a great testimonial from a determined Chevrolet Volt driver who resides in Tampa but got his Volt in the Washington, DC market. Not sure where he plans to get his car serviced should the need arise, but he has his Volt!

From GM-Volt.com:

A year ago I had to make a decision. The lease was up on my Infiniti G35 and I had to decide what car I was going to get next. I love the G35, so much that I have had three in the past 10 years. I didn’t want to get locked into another 3-year lease, and I didn’t want to buy. I wanted an electric car. My wife has a Ford Escape Hybrid, and we love that car too – but I wanted an electric car, not just a hybrid.

I researched online and there were virtually no options. Most of what I found were conversions or conversion kits, or were concept cars with no future launch date. Then I found Tesla. Wow, what a car. There just happens to be a dealership near me, and they let me take one for a drive. I immediately called my wife and asked “Do you want to go for a drive in an electric car?”. The Tesla is super fast…and super expensive. It was a great experience to drive it and made me even more motivated about getting an electric car, but clearly not practical for me or my wallet.

I also found the GM Volt blog started by Lyle. I immediately added myself to the wait list (#749). This car looked real, affordable, and would allow long road trips for business or vacation too. But it was not coming out for a year.

So I called Infiniti and they let me extend my lease for a year. I religiously followed the GM Volt blog, and was a little devastated when I found out Florida was not a launch market. So I got creative and ordered a car from a dealership in the Washington DC area, red with white trim. Here is the timeline of my volt getting home to Florida.

December 9: I was told by GM that I would probably not be taking delivery until January. That was cutting it close to the end of my lease, but still doable. No Volt for Christmas though

December 14th: I got another call that the Volts were shipped priority and would arrive this week! So I bought a plane ticket to DC to pick up my Volt and drive it back to the sunshine state.

December 19th: Bought $20 worth of gas for Infiniti @ $3.05/gallon, hopefully last gas purchase for that car.

December 20: Downloaded “Road Trip Lite” for iPhone. I plan to track all fuel purchases for the Volt. I know the GM app does that, but this includes odometer, date, charts and more.

December 22: Landed in DCA…very cold here. Dealer picked me up at airport and drove me to the dealership. Everyone came up to meet me “The Volt owner is here”. The dealer hid the Volt in their “car wash garage bay” as everyone was trying to test drive it and sell it. Funny.

Volt #169 is mine!

The dealer walked me thru the car: we setup onstar, I downloaded app, I connected the iPhone to the build in Bluetooth, and I connected it to the USB port allowing control my iPod from the built-in touch screen (sweet) and I was on my way.

December 23: Left Baltimore at 6:10AM. Still lots to learn about the dash, controls, and features. Nothing like a 1,000 mile trip to learn a new car.

The generator kicked in early in my trip, before DC actually. I didn’t really even notice it for a few moments, it went really smooth. I noticed a slight high-pitched whine when generator charges the battery (immediately after I took my foot off the accelerator). Curious if anyone else hears this.

Fillup #1: Hallifax NC. 6.57 gallons, $3.079/gallon, $20.21 total. Guy at gas station asked me about it “I didn’t think they needed gas”, we talked for a moment.

Fillup #2: South of the Border (I know 4.82 gallons, $2.959/gallon, $14.28 total. Two more people “nice car”, one wanted to see under the hood, I obliged.

Fillup #3: Savannah, GA. 8.16 gallons, $3.099/gallon, $25.28 total.

Total: Baltimore to Tampa $59.77

During the next couple days I gave many “demo drives” to family and friends. Everyone is really impressed. But this new car category takes a lot of explaining. GM will need to do a lot of work to get over this education hurdle for the mainstream public I think. The good news is everywhere I go people are asking me about it

In addition to the OnStar App, I have also since downloaded the Chevrolet app, which includes the entire user manual. I also scanned the the mobile bar codes (QR codes) in the manual to view instructional videos available. Well done Chevrolet.

December 26: Finally home. The last leg of the trip I only got 46mpg, and I felt disappointed. Then I realized I was disappointed in 46mpg!!! The standard is now high, and I love it.