Years of speculation on the final shape of the Chevy Volt will come to an end this month.
Automobile Magazine explains, "General Motors said it will show media and employees a production version of the Volt at its headquarters in Detroit as part of its 100th anniversary celebrations, which officially take place on Sept. 16th." The car that will make an appearance at the celebration "will accurately reflect what the Volt will look like when it hits the streets, but will not be an actual preproduction model."
The Volt is the car that GM believes can save the company from high gas prices and low sales numbers. The Volt is a "series hybrid" -- GM engineers claim it can travel up to 40 miles at highway speed on battery power alone, meaning many Volt owners would rarely use gasoline at all in their daily driving. But the final shape of the vehicle has been the subject of months of speculation on the web -- speculation GM has fed by releasing images of small parts of the car.
The production version we see this month may be close cousin to the Volt mock-up that lit up the web with speculation when spy photographers caught it on the set of the movie Transformers 2 recently. That model wasn't a working Volt either, but a Volt body prototype on a Malibu chassis and drivetrain.
GM-Volt.com, an enthusiast site not connected to General Motors, points out that "GM is planning a worldwide webcast at 830 AM on the 16th, so that might just be the ideal moment." The Volt may also make an appearance at the Paris Motor Show in October.
GM's decision to show the Volt at its anniversary celebration is a sign of how severely the automotive industry has changed due to skyrocketing gas prices. Autoblog points out, "Ford Motor Company celebrated its centennial in 2003 and used the occasion to debut an equally exciting yet very different vehicle," the Ford GT supercar -- which managed about 14 mpg.
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