[MasterElectrician]

Hello All,
I stumbled across this forum when searching the phrase "chevy bolt pre-ordering". I live relatively near the GM assembly Plant where the Bolt is scheduled to be assembled (Orion Assembly). Here in Michigan we pronounce Orion as 'or-ee-on'. It is named after the township it sits in.
I'm a recently retired master electrician and have actually worked at Orion Assembly Plant several times in the past including when it was built in the 1980s.
The lease on my 2013 Ford Focus Electric just expired and I'm looking forward to getting a lease on one of the first production Bolts to roll off the line at Orion.
About 2 years ago, my wife and I installed a 20KW grid-tied solar array that pays for nearly all of our electricity usage. Expect me to chime in on issues that involve home charging stations.

 

[ChevyGuy]

Hello!

Hello All,
I stumbled across this forum when searching the phrase "chevy bolt pre-ordering". I live relatively near the GM assembly Plant where the Bolt is scheduled to be assembled (Orion Assembly). Here in Michigan we pronounce Orion as 'or-ee-on'. It is named after the township it sits in.
I'm a recently retired master electrician and have actually worked at Orion Assembly Plant several times in the past including when it was built in the 1980s.
The lease on my 2013 Ford Focus Electric just expired and I'm looking forward to getting a lease on one of the first production Bolts to roll off the line at Orion.
About 2 years ago, my wife and I installed a 20KW grid-tied solar array that pays for nearly all of our electricity usage. Expect me to chime in on issues that involve home charging stations.

Welcome Aboard @MasterElectrician!

Have you pre-ordered the chevybolt yet?

How did you enjoy the ford focus electric?

That's interesting about the home charging stations, did you install that by yourself?

 

[Bazinga]

Cool! We have a master electrician on the forum now. Welcome aboard!

Heard the Bolt EV assembly has started already. Since you live so close to the plant, can you pick yours up from there?

 

[Roth33d]

Glad to have someone on the forum that was once in a field relevant to what's going on here. If/when it comes to issues with the Bolt, your insight on what could be happening will be valuable and probably well in line with what Chevy is dealing with.

 

[volta]

Cool! We have a master electrician on the forum now. Welcome aboard!

Heard the Bolt EV assembly has started already. Since you live so close to the plant, can you pick yours up from there?

I don't think this would be allowed because of how dealerships are involved in the sales process.

 

[MasterElectrician]

Cool! We have a master electrician on the forum now. Welcome aboard!

Heard the Bolt EV assembly has started already. Since you live so close to the plant, can you pick yours up from there?

According to recent reports, the Bolt is in 'pre-production'. This is where tooling, assembly procedures, and quality assurance is tested. Pre-production is a slow process where only a few cars are built per week and are frequently surrounded by engineers discussing the particulars of the assembly process. Most of these pre-production vehicles never leave the plant.

As to picking the car up from the plant... No... gotta use a dealer like everyone else. If I pick a dealer close to the plant, I'll have less transportation time to wait for the vehicle though. That's about the only advantage I'll get. I leased my Ford Focus Electric from the dealer across the street from the plant where it was made (Ford's Michigan Assembly Plant in Wayne Michigan). Still, I waited nearly 4 months to take delivery.

 

[MasterElectrician]

Welcome Aboard @MasterElectrician!

Have you pre-ordered the chevybolt yet?

How did you enjoy the ford focus electric?

That's interesting about the home charging stations, did you install that by yourself?

Thanks for the welcome!
I haven't found a dealer taking orders for the Bolt yet, but that could be because I haven't looked hard enough.
I absolutely LOVED my Ford Focus Electric! It had GREAT acceleration what with all that delicious electric motor torque. I'm retired, so I wasn't driving it to a job everyday but I easily could have. (I only put 4400 miles on it in three years... I just don't go anywhere. It still smelled new when I turned it in. In fact, it still had the windshield washer fluid in it that they put in it at the assembly plant!)
I did install my own home charger (of course). Had to add a Sub panel off my main panel to have the breaker space for a 2-pole 40A breaker. I needed the sub panel for some other circuits for other stuff as well. The charger itself I bought from Amazon. It came with a 50A electric dryer plug on it so I wired up a receptacle to plug it in. No big deal. Got a nice tax deduction for the charger and materials I bought too!

 

[ChevyGuy]

Nice!

Thanks for the welcome!
I haven't found a dealer taking orders for the Bolt yet, but that could be because I haven't looked hard enough.
I absolutely LOVED my Ford Focus Electric! It had GREAT acceleration what with all that delicious electric motor torque. I'm retired, so I wasn't driving it to a job everyday but I easily could have. (I only put 4400 miles on it in three years... I just don't go anywhere. It still smelled new when I turned it in. In fact, it still had the windshield washer fluid in it that they put in it at the assembly plant!)
I did install my own home charger (of course). Had to add a Sub panel off my main panel to have the breaker space for a 2-pole 40A breaker. I needed the sub panel for some other circuits for other stuff as well. The charger itself I bought from Amazon. It came with a 50A electric dryer plug on it so I wired up a receptacle to plug it in. No big deal. Got a nice tax deduction for the charger and materials I bought too!

I guess it hasn't hit the dealers yet for orders?

oh wow that's awesome haha, guess it wasn't a daily commute for you then?

Is there a tax deduction for that?? that's amazing! I wish I had something like that for home now lol

 

[Raymondjram]

Welcome!

I am an Electrical Engineer, with 40 years of experience in may fields, mostly large computer systems (my last job was an "Operating Systems Supervisor" with UNIX servers), but I also do simple electrical installations and repairs. As you can see in my signature, I have my own EMW JuiceBox EVSE installed and set up for 7.2 kW (the Bolt EV will use up to 6.6 kW), but I have no EV yet, since only the BMW i3 and the Nissan Leaf are available here in Puerto Rico, and I have seen and taken pictures of both, but I will not buy any import.

I have posted here several times for different threads, so read my posts and please comment when you need to. Many other forum members need some professional advice for wiring up their own EVSE when they get their first EV, and you can help plenty.

Having owned a Ford Focus Electric, you can also give your experiences with your "battery-electric vehicle" or BEV as they are commonly defined, which is what we may later experience with the 2017 Chevy Bolt EV.

Welcome again!

 

[Raymondjram]

I guess it hasn't hit the dealers yet for orders?

No, GM will not allow pre-sales through dealers for any vehicle that isn't in production*. The first Chevy Bolt EV production is slated for October 1st so after that date any GM dealer can get your order done and devliveries will be at least a month later, as Gen 1 and Gen 2 Volt owners have experienced.

* GM doesn't do the "reservation" folly that Tesla Motors does! Watch the news this week for "Tesla Fools Day" on Wednesday evening.

 

[Electric Mike]

Does that mean that there will be a big wait at first, or does GM have its production figured out so well that they won't have an initial backlog at all?

 

[DucRider]

If GM doesn't have a backlog, the specs and pricing on the Bolt will need to be very different than what has been announced to date. There will be some ramp up in the production process, but even if they were on pace for 50K/yr they could only produce <1K the first week. I can't imagine not having >1000 orders on the books in the first week. Any dealer with half a brain will order as many as they are allocated when the ordering process opens for them (which is before production begins).
The "go to your Chevy dealer and order what you want" is not the way it works with a dealer network. Dealers will order what they think will sell (or will make them the most money) and allocate to customers from their inventory/allocation.
After things settle down, you could "factory order" your exact configuration, but a very small percentage of orders will be done that way and it certainly won't be the fastest way to get your hands on one.