Of mice and men (…who own Volts)

My Volt started acting strangely one day. It seemed that, at highway speeds, if I crested an overpass, I would gat a warning of “Loss of traction.” Shortly after that, if I pressed on the brake, it seemed like I had no brakes at all, then a split-second later they would work.

For that split second, my heart would race.

Then, two new alerts would appear on the main dashboard display:

• Service Stabilitrak, and
• Service BrakeAssist

I had seen these two alerts before, when I drove to the Chicago Auto Show. I had drifted into the “rumble strip,” that serrated patch between the lane and shoulder on some highways, which causes a rumbling or buzzing sound (hence the name). During that drive, I was mortified, thinking I would not make it to Chicago with my Volt.

I contacted OnStar and the person I spoke with said he could verify the diagnostic, but if I would pull off the road, shut the car completely down for two minutes, the alerts might reset.

I did as instructed, and when I restarted my Volt, the same alerts were shown. That lasted about five seconds and they disappeared as promised.

Whew!

This time, it was different. The performance of the Volt was compromised. The first day this happened, I wrote it off as a freaky patch of pavement. I stopped, powered down and the alerts vanished.

Great!

The next day it happened several times and became quite worrisome. I called my wonderful Chevrolet dealer (Classic Chevrolet in Grapevine, Texas) and let them know I was coming in. I’ve mentioned before that my blogging has become less voluminous, due to preparing our home for sale. Well, now realtors are showing it, and when they do, I take Koko, our greyhound, away from the house.It was during one of these outings that I decided to take my Volt in for service. Koko was lying upon her doggy bed, which was over a blanket, in the back of my Volt. A showing was in progress, so I could not take her back home but I felt I had to get to the dealership before I had an accident or the problem grew worse.

I pulled in to the service bay and unload Koko and let their Volt specialist, Tim Foote, know what was going on with my car. They don’t allow pets in their loaner vehicles, so I sat at a picnic table near the front entrance to the showroom and awaited the verdict. My salesperson, Kevin Reese saw me sitting outside, so he cam by and chatted with me for a bit. After about an hour, Tim called my iPhone and said it was going to take a bit longer for them to locate the problem, so they would set me up with a loaner so I could be on my way. The service manager was kind enough to loan me a vehicle even though I had Koko with me. It was a Chevy Tahoe and it was HUMONGOUS! He mentioned he had seen what looked like mouse droppings somewhere under the hood, so he was concerned that a mouse may have partially eaten through a wire and that locating the damaged wire could take some time. Of course, my first thought was, “I bet that isn’t covered under the warranty!” I had never heard of such a thing before, so I went home and Googled mouse eating wires and found TONS of horror stories of damage to cars, aircraft and homes, caused by mice chewing through wiring. There were even pictures of houses on fire, presumably caused by this problem. Now, I really started to sweat. Would this be covered by my car insurance? Homeowner’s insurance? How extensive could this be and at what cost to repair?

The next day, I went to pick up the contracts on the house we decided to build (long story there). I drove the Tahoe. I had forgotten what driving an ICE-equipped car was like, especially one this big. There is a definite lag between the time you push down on the accelerator and when the vehicle responds. I was so used to the Volt’s instant torque that at first, I thought something might be wrong with the Tahoe. Then there was the shifting of the automatic transmission. Remember what that was like? That feeling of anticipation as the RPMs of the engine approached the speed requiring a shift. It sort of feels like cresting a hill, straining along, shift, relief. I drove through sections of highway currently under construction. As the lanes got narrower, I felt like I was holding my breath or sucking my stomach in, to squeeze through. And the engine noise! I was driving with the windows down at one point. I passed a car and the reflected sound of the engine rumbling was so LOUD!

I’ve only been driving a Volt for 7-1/2 months and I am already spoiled! This switch to electric propulsion is going to be faster and more enduring than most people realize. I doubt I will ever own a vehicle powered solely by gasoline ever again. Most EV owners I’ve spoken with feel the same way. It’s this “sticking power” that’s going to change things. I think we’re already experiencing the tipping point, where owners of EVs are telling their friends how great it is. Many of those friends will at least test drive an EV the next time they shop for a vehicle. Once you’ve experienced that, unless you need the deep throated rumble of a gas engine to feel fulfilled, you will feel a pull toward electric vehicles.

Well, back to my Volt…

It turns out there was a connector that was not fully connected during assembly. Over time, through road vibration, it must have worked itself apart enough to have intermittent connection, causing the computer to think the tracking sensor was faulty. Once this connection was found, cleaned and reconnected more securely, all was well. I stood in the service bay with Tim, while a valet went to retrieve my Volt from the dealership’s charger. It was so nice to see it (and not hear it) pull up to us. It had been washed (it needed it) and was a sight for sore eyes. The bill came to zero dollars.

I got in, patted the side of the battery pack like you’d pet the side of a beloved dog, started her up and felt exhilaration as the pressing of my foot against the accelerator was instantly translated into motion. Ahhhhhhhh…..