Chevy Volt to challenge gasoline shelf life
A gasoline-free life is a casual dream come true, but picture the moment when a car like the Chevy Volt burns through the last of its battery charge and the gas engine kicks in–only to sputter out because of stale gasoline. Fortunately, Chevy is working on a solution.
With most Americans driving under 40 miles in their daily commute to work, it’s very possible they may not need to use any gas on a regular basis. That means the gasoline in their tank will have ample opportunity to evaporate and absorb contaminants in the atmosphere, like water.
The Chevy Volt team is aware of the problem and Volt lead engineer Andrew Farah shared some perspective with GM-Volt:
We have talked about it. Remember its (the tank) a complete sealed semi-pressurized system. What make gas go bad is some of the volatile evaporate as well as the absorption of water. The good stuff evaporates and the bad stuff condenses. The tank is special to prevent this, but will it be enough? We don’t know. Over the next couple of years were going to do some work to make sure we’ve got that understood. But we still like to say,’ maybe you will change your fuel rather than change your oil’.
Chevy has also addressed the problem by reducing the tank size to 12 gallons and is considering even smaller sizes. That would reduce “needless” weight and encourage quicker fuel turnover.
The Chevy Volt may also come with a sensor installed that senses contaminants in the fuel like water and prompts the driver for action.
Though reducing the Chevy Volts tank size may help with stale fuel, it’s a delicate balance between providing enough range flexibility and minimizing maintenance. The reality is that people just want their car to work, the less maintenance the better.
Of course, an obvious solution may be to leave the Chevy Volt unplugged over night and drive it on gas the next day to clear out the tank.
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May 7th, 2008
Amazed at the premise of the Volt and 600+ miles on a full tank, but the gas saved here will just be wasted abroad. Further higher gas prices will really offset the use of less gas to get from point a to point b
Learn more at http://www.chevy-volt.net
May 12th, 2008
It does not matter how big the fuel tank is. What matters is how much gas you put in it. I would never put more than 3 gallons in unless I was taking a long trip and they do have what they call fuel stabilizer that will keep the gas fresh for up to a year.
May 15th, 2008
They could be attached to an inverter at home..Run the engine(which is just a generator anyways to top off the batteries and them put electricity back onto the grid spinning your electric meter backwards–should not have to be done very often–sensors indicate when it is necessary