What a beautiful car. I "saw" it on the Jay Leno Garage video, which is linked to in an earlier blog post, and it looked great. But to see it in person was even more exciting. It has such an aggressive design. It looks better than the multi-100-grand cars in the exotic cars section with Aston Martins, Jaguars, and Lamborghinis. Since Fisker (the CEO of Fisker Automotive) himself designed many Aston Martins it should be no surprise that the Karma has exceptional style. With a 50 mile range and a generator, like the Chevy Volt, this car will give you no range anxiety. I bet it is a wonderful ride.
The surprise of the show for me was the Coda. It is a sharp looking car with a 36 kWhr battery. They were claiming 150 miles per charge. I've heard from other sources it is going to cost $40k, but the salesman told me it was going to be closer in price to the Leaf. He said it was going to be in Oregon in April/May. The salesman also told me the battery chemistry is superior and it will last 20 yrs or 300,000 miles. If that is true, it is quite a breakthrough. But it sure isn't what the warranty says (10 yr, 100k miles). For now, I'm going to chalk this up to sales over positioning. Nice car. Looks kind of like a Toyota Corolla or a small Volvo.
The Coda spec sheet says it has a 36 kWh Lithium Iron Phosphate battery system with 728 cells. With a recharge time of 6 hours from a Level 2 (240V, 30A) charger that is faster than the Leaf. A 36 kWh battery is much larger than the Nissan Leaf's 24 kWh battery or the Chevy Volt's 16 kWh battery. This car will be one to watch, especially if it is priced competitively with the Nissan Leaf.
The Coda had a full trunk. No battery or electronics taking up trunk space. It has a top speed of 85 mph, which is less than the other electric cars, but we aren't supposed to drive that fast anyway.
So ends my electric version of the 2012 Portland Auto Show.
The Chevy Spark is not electric. You can even see the tailpipe in the picture.
ReplyDeleteYou are correct that there is a tailpipe. But I could have sworn the sign said something like "Chevy Spark Electric coming in 2013." Maybe they just meant it was going to be electric soon and will look the same. I'm not sure.
DeleteThey have been taking the gas Spark around to shows and mentioning the forthcoming EV model.
ReplyDeleteCoda - I wish American car companies would make something like this. Not as elaborate as the Leaf or Volt in style but rather more in line with mainstream needs. The battery size should be optional with 24kWh and 36kWh so those who don't need the extra size can save a few $k.
Fisker - nice but a little impractical to be much more than a 1-2 thousand per year seller. Expensive, heavy, not great mileage but very pretty. Turned a lot of heads at the Philadelphia car show. I have some doubts if they survive to make the project Nina model.