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Introducing myself : Wife and I just took delivery of a (non-HOV) 2012 Volt – formerly was driving a 2002 VW TDI beetle on b100 biodiesel. Have a 28 mile commute and just did the first drive yesterday. Made it home with about 10 miles range left. Wife asked how it was and I replied “uneventful” which I think is quite a compliment for such radical technology. Got the quad zero lease deal and are happy with it.
I’ve been reading the site for months, checked the FAQ, but still have some questions – apologies if these are obvious:
Bluetooth/OnStar: with my iphone paired to the car, is there a way to make a voice call using OnStar? I’d like to be able to say “Call XXX using Onstar”? Whenever I’ve tried to make a voice call using a voice tag, it always places the call via my cellphone rather than onstar.
EVSE Level 2 chargers: What’s the current thinking re getting a 240 charger installed? We live in SDGE territory.
TOU billing: we use a few KWH shy of the top tier in SDGE, so that the volt will probably push us into the $0.28/KWH billing. I’m thinking of TOU-2 billing with a separate meter installed, but am not sure how much that would end up costing. Anyone done that?
Closing the Hood: I opened the hood and had a hard time closing it to get it to latch. Eventual solution was to drop it closed from about 3 feet up. Is that the way to do it or is mine slightly out of adjustment?
Website/apps: confused about the overlap of the various ontstar, myvolt sites and the and iphone apps: what’s the best/easiest thing to use for an iphone user?
Driving home from the dealer, entered CS mode and noticed at times a really high-pitch whine. I’d guess it’s up at 8KHz or higher. Normal? Is it something you get used to? Or do we just have to get old enough to lose our high pitch hearing?Oh, and just for fun, some of the “Sh*t Salespeople Say”:
Did you know that the Volt has special wheels which generate power at the hubs. Normal wheels wouldn’t work.
OnStar can make calls anywhere, since it’s a satellite phone system.
The Volt has a 3 gallon gas tank
The Volt’s 1.4L engine never connects to the wheels, it’s a ‘pure generator’ that charges the battery. -
I have to say I have no idea about anything regarding the Volt but wanted to comment about the Chevy dealership experience, which in my mind ranks up there with some of the worst. It’s sad that you are going to a dealership where often times you know much more about the car then the person selling it, and on top of that they often look and act like they just got out of prison; Chevy seriously needs to raise the bar on its dealership experience, I have said it before creating GM owned and operated superstores would be awesome a one stop shop…
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Welcome to the forum, @sunflower100 — and congrats on the Volt!
What you’ve described — the uneventful part of the commute — is exactly what this car does so well! No range anxiety, no thinking/switching on the driver’s behalf. Just seamless, efficient transportation. Now, to answer some of your questions:
– As far as I know, the system will default to using the cell phone over OnStar. Try pressing the “phone” button on the mirror to make a call using the built-in OnStar cell. Or un-pair your phone.
– I’m not familiar with your region first-hand, but I’d get the 240 charger asap. It makes the charging process that much faster and more enjoyable.
– I wouldn’t be of much help in regards to the TOU metering, but I wonder if SDGE would charge you for installing the second meter, though.
– The hood should latch after being “let go” from about 6-8 inches in the air. Weird that it wouldn’t for you… perhaps it was a one-time thing? I’d give it another try.
– Download the OnStar RemoteLink app from the Apple App Store (I’m assuming you’re using the iPhone). It gives you info about the volt (range, charge status, trip A/B information, oil life, etc.) as well as the ability to remote-start, lock/unlock doors, and to activate horn/lights. The app also gives you the ability to send a destination to the car from the phone (lookup or address book destination) and have the route guidance start automatically when you start the Volt.
Here’s some more info:
http://gmauthority.com/blog/2011/08/onstar-adds-navigation-component-to-remotelink-app/The RemoteLink app is all you need. There’s also the MyVolt website that I personally haven’t used, but it just replicates what’s available on the app.
– The high-pitched whine is definitely not normal. I’d have that checked out asap.
PS: oh man — those dealer quotes are awesome! I recently heard this one, albeit not from a dealer: “You can’t even put a gun rack into the Volt.” I’m sure you know the source of that one
:))
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