On January 6, General Motors held a live web chat for Chevy Volt owners to answer any questions Chevy Volt owners may have about the retrofits being conducted to resolve the potential risk of delayed battery fire after severe side impact accidents. To date, said Chevy Volt Marketing Director Christi Landy, 7997 Chevy Volts have been sold and have racked up more than 20 million real world road miles. In all that time, there has been not a single incidence of the type of battery failure that resulted in a fire during the severe side impact test conducted by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) last year. However, out of an abundance of caution, GM recommends that all current Chevy Volt owners have the modifications to the battery support and cooling systems done at their Chevy dealer.
GM told Volt owners that the modifications will take about one day to complete and will be done without charge to the owners. Furthermore, according to a statement by Landy during the web event, "Volt owners will get a loaner vehicle while the vehicle is in for service."
Landy advised customers that they will receive a notification letter from GM about the issue and once they have received it, they can call their dealer to schedule an appointment. Dealer service technicians will be fully trained on the procedure which involves strengthening the battery compartment, adding a bracket that prevents over-filling the battery coolant liquid, and a software modification to monitor battery coolant levels. The repair is not considered urgent as the conditions required for the delayed battery fire are both exceedingly rare (a single crash test result) and entirely preventable by properly discharging the battery after severe side impact crashes.
More than 1500 Volt owners participated in the online chat so, as you might imagine, the questions covered a lot of ground. One participant asked about the negative commentary made about the Chevy Volt on the Fox News Network by Mark Modica. Landy was quite blunt in her reply, "Modica's reporting is politically motivated, not always fact-based. Our greatest opportunity is for our owners - like Eric Rothbard did last month - to join their discussions, because it's highly unlikely they'll welcome someone GM."
Meanwhile, GM said, customer satisfaction among Chevy Volt owners is among the highest in the industry. This sentiment was widely echoed by those participating in the web chat with one owner commenting that he expects he'll need to buy another tank of gasoline sometime around June, based on his current experience with the car. Another estimated that, because he uses the car primarily for shorter trips that fall within the Volt's electric operation range, he is getting an effective mileage of about 800 mpg.
A full transcript of the Chevy Volt owner web chat is available online at this link.