Future Models - Holden 2012 Volt

First look: Chev Volt morphs into Opel Ampera

Continental: Opel Ampera winds the Volt's styling volume up to 11.

General Motors to sell Chevrolet Volt as the Opel Ampera in Europe

27 January 2009

By MARTON PETTENDY

GM HOLDEN has vowed to release General Motors’ mould-breaking Chevrolet Volt econo-car in Australia by 2012, wearing the Lion logo.

Now its European affiliate GM Opel has gone one step better by revealing its version of the troubled US auto giant’s vital next-generation plug-in hybrid – complete with the German maker’s lightning bolt badge and an all-new, presumably more Euro-suitable name: the Opel Ampera.

Though it’s hard to be sure from the moodily-lit teaser image, an aggressive new front nose-cone, flanked by FPV-style boomerang-shaped lower headlight cut-outs, appears to be the most significant departure from the production Chev Volt, which emerged at GM’s centennial celebration in Detroit in September 2008 as a vastly different vehicle from the edgy Volt concept and goes on sale in the US late next year as a 2011 model.

No production or release dates were given in the press release issued yesterday (January 27), which simply heralded Ampera as the name of Opel’s “revolutionary extended-range electric car” ahead of its global debut at the Geneva motor show from March 3.

Left: Production Volt (top); Volt concept (bottom).

GM confirmed the Ampera will be powered by the same Voltec electric propulsion technology that lies at the heart of the Volt and also lurked within the Cadillac Converj concept that debuted at this month’s Detroit motor show – the same venue US luxury car rival Lexus debuted its opposite number: the Prius III-based 2010 HS250h, which was hailed as the world’s first dedicated luxury hybrid.

Previously dubbed E-Flex, the Volt’s drive system can run for 60km on lithium-ion battery power alone and is recharged via a standard power outlet. Beyond that, a small conventional engine generates battery power to drive the front wheels. The Volt concept’s generator was powered by a 1.0-litre three-cylinder petrol engine.

According to GM Europe: “The Ampera will be well-suited to the daily driving schedule of most European customers. For example, approximately 80 per cent of German drivers travel less than 50km daily.”

“With the Ampera, Opel will be the first European automobile manufacturer to provide customers several hundred kilometres of non-stop electric driving,” said GM Europe chief marketing officer Alain Visser.

GM announced a key step forward in its Volt plan two weeks ago by revealing it will manufacture its own lithium-ion battery packs from 2010 at a new plant in Michigan – not far from GM’s Hamtramck plant where the vehicle will be built - as part of a US$1 billion commitment to the Volt.

While Opel appears to have succeeded in overturning GM’s original plan to sell it as the Chevrolet Volt in Europe too, the UK will receive a similar (right-hand drive) version by late 2011, badged as the Vauxhall Volt.

If the British government’s plan to produce the Volt at GM Europe’s Astra plant at Ellesmere Port proves incentive enough for GM, the UK (rather than Opel’s Astra factory at Russelsheim) will produce the five-door four-seat mid-sized hatchback for Vauxhall, Opel, Chevrolet and perhaps even Holden.

As previously reported, given that from 2010 Holden will also produce a vehicle that is based on the Volt and next-generation Astra’s new Delta II small-car GM platform in the Cruze, there is also the possibility that Holden could build the Volt for local and export consumption by 2012.

Perhaps the most intriguing questions are: will Australia’s Volt be as bold as Europe’s Ampera and will it be nicknamed the Holden Sparky?

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