Chevrolet Bolt

[GRA]

My brother-in-law in OR has a Bolt (*) and puts his full size bike in the car all the time, as he rides extensively. He removes the front wheel and folds the rear seats. It looked pretty easy for him, and he has a shoulder problem preventing him from lifting above his head.

(When we visited this year and he took us for a ride on the Banks-Vernonia trail, we had his bike inside and 2 bikes on the roof of the Bolt; I had to do the lifting to get it on the roof since he couldn't anymore)

(*) The Bolt replaced his '11 LEAF

BTW, how tall's your brother-in-law? I'm 6' but long legs and I guess arms, so I have a largish frame with the seat and bars way up in the air.

[jlv]

BTW, how tall's your brother-in-law? I'm 6' but long legs and I guess arms, so I have a largish frame with the seat and bars way up in the air.

He's about 5'10 with a slim frame. My wife is pretty sure the bike in the car didn't have either wheel removed; either way, one whole bike fit in the Bolt.

(but we unfortunately had to take a second car because we couldn't fit 3 of us in the car with the bike)

[Titanium48]

Worried that carrying the bike outside using a trailer hitch or strap on rack would mess up the aerodynamics?

[GRA]

Worried that carrying the bike outside using a trailer hitch or strap on rack would mess up the aerodynamics?

If that was addressed to me and not jlv, that, plus it's more hassle than it's worth for a single bike. I've got roof racks, and when my friend and I take our bikes on a trip we use his 4Runner instead of my Forester, because he has a hitch rack and I don't, and the gas mileage is about the same as my Forester with bikes on the roof.

When I bought the Forester I considered getting a hitch rack, but the only hitches available for it were for 1.25" rather than 2" balls IIRR, and the Yakima sideways swing-away hitch mount I wanted needed the latter class (tongue weight issues). Given that and that I preferred not to be hauling the weight of the hitch around all the time whether I was using it or not, I went without. Truth to tell, I haven't used the roof racks in years, and I've taken the car rails off the roof as well (except when I need to carry a kayak). With the back seats down, one or two pairs of skis will fit diagonally inside with gear no problem, even my long (210 cm) X-C skis, and as I'm not a scoutmaster anymore I haven't needed to carry more than two pairs for a long time. A Bolt being 11" shorter can't do that, although it might be possible to carry them lengthwise between the front seats.

[GRA]

I reserved a Bolt on Turo, but I'm still waiting to hear back from the owner whether or not it has the QC, so I'll know whether to cancel the reservation. I'm not sure if the owners just don't know how important that info is or if most of the Bolts listed on Turo don't have it, but I've only seen two of them which state in the basic listing that they have QC, although a couple of them mention "every option" and then tell me about a bunch of comfort/convenience stuff which is irrelevant. Unfortunately, neither of the ones which I've seen list it are available when I need it.

Update: It didn't have QC so I cancelled it. There don't seem to be any listed with QC through the end of the month, and it's unlikely that the snow will hold off until then (Hwy 120 closes for the season with the first snowfall), so i'll just have to wait until spring. Who knows, maybe there'll be a Niro, Kona or 2020 Bolt on Turo by then.

[GRA]

ABG:

2019 Chevy Bolt EV earns IIHS Top Safety Pick with improved headlight performance
The EV hatchback from Chevy also gains 21 miles of range for 2020

https://www.autoblog.com/2019/11/13/che ... -iihs-tsp/


Apparently they just needed to change the headlight aiming to have them upgraded from "Poor" to "Acceptable", and all Bolts produced after March 2018 have the new aiming. The Bolt also recently received an "Acceptable" rating on the IIHS small-offset crash test, and IIHS also rated the collision avoidance software highly, able to avoid collisions at 12 and 25 mph. I think that refers to AEB alone, but am not sure.

[Rebel44]

GM still needs to add ACC, better seats and improve DC charge rate to make Bolt more competitive.

[GRA]

GM still needs to add ACC, better seats and improve DC charge rate to make Bolt more competitive.

Those items certainly top most people's list of needed improvements, although I'd personally add not needing to pay for a bunch of other stuff to get AEB. I didn't personally have any issues with the Bolt LT's seats when I test drove it, but given my body type (tall and slim) I wasn't expecting them to be a problem. I can also live without ACC, but the charge rate definitely needs to be boosted, albeit to no more than 74 kW (with a later taper), or else to 100kW+ to avoid getting screwed by EA like the Korean makes do.

[cwerdna]

https://www.chevrolet.com/electric/bolt ... price/trim has now been updated for the 2020 Bolt.

[LeftieBiker]

When my lease is up in 2021 I doubt I'll be keeping my car, because I'd have to buy it and I probably won't live long enough for that to be worthwhile - especially since she doesn't want to inherit it. (Maybe I can get a lease extension or two, or snap up one of the last 2020 40kwh Leafs.) My housemate, after some fairly intractable problems with her Prius PHEV idling very roughly, is beginning to concede that maybe a BEV-only lifestyle is for us after all. We just aren't using enough gas in her car for its health, ironically enough.The likely scenario is: I lease another nice car (likely a Leaf SV unless Nissan comes to its senses about leather interiors) and she buys a car for mainly around town, with some longer errands. Why am I rambling on about this, in this topic? Depending on the used market values in 2021, we may get a used Bolt LT as that second BEV. The main obstacle, oddly enough, is that it lacks a "Granny Mode" to tame the power for drivers who prefer Prius-like driving. She wouldn't be able to drive a BEV with less than 150 miles of range, even though she never exceeds maybe 75 miles in a day, and the Bolt appears to have the best combination of range and cost. The seats also make it more of an around town kind of car...