If you are familiar with the saying, “do not judge a book by its cover”, I’m sure you’ll remember it when you get to know the 2008 Chevrolet Tahoe Hybrid better.
Although this car may look similar to a V-8-powered Tahoe, it is not the same as this particular model is a hybrid in the true sense of the word. This automobile boasts of space and utility along with fuel economy that is much better than any other gas-powered model. In a nutshell, this is a great green car to own.
However, there are always questions that arise about new technology and the Tahoe Hybrid is no different. This article aims at answering some of the commonly asked questions about the 2008 Chevrolet Tahoe Hybrid; this would give you a better idea about the car and the various facilities it offers.

How is the Tahoe styled?
Although the Hybrid retains the general shape of the gas-only siblings, it consists of “Hybrid” graphics on the sides of the doors and smaller versions on the rear window and windshield. It comes with low-rolling-resistance tires, a lower air dam, an aluminum hood and lift gate and D-pillars that have been accordingly shaped to provide better aerodynamics. As a result of these changes, you get style and environmental benefits from the Tahoe Hybrid.
How is the handling?
Of course, without a doubt, this automobile is pretty huge and if you are not accustomed to driving a car this big, it could take some time to get used to it. It is very important that you align your mirrors properly to avoid blind spots. The independent front suspension and solid rear axle design provide a stiff driving experience. But despite this, the Tahoe is very much stable when driving on the highway at 70 mph. also the car even comes with a direct steering response that allows the car to change directions promptly.

How is the engine performance?
Gas mileage for the two-wheel drive is 21/22 mpg city/highway and for the four-wheel drive, it would be 20/20. The car provides with smooth acceleration at highway speeds. A big strong point of the 2008 Chevrolet Tahoe Hybrid is the brake pedal feel; in fact, the pedal feel is much better than the other Tahoe regulars.
What about the interiors?
Three color schemes are offered for the interior, including a two-tone design that offers black and tan materials. Overall finish is good and the navigation system is easy to operate and handle. The leather front bucket seats offer average comfort and thigh support. The second-row bench seat provides with adequate legroom but a reclining back seat would have been really appreciated. The third row is somewhat small in size and can turn out to be a little disappointing.
What safety features does it offer?
It comes with all the standard safety features; it also has brackets attached to the front to help it better engage with a smaller car in the case of a crash. Also for the first year, you get the services of GM’s OnStar communication system for no additional costs.
What additional features does it provide?
The Tahoe Hybrid has maximum capacity of 6,000 pounds for a four-wheel drive and 6,200 for the two-wheel version. The car is also equipped with nine-speaker Bose audio system, remote start, a back-up camera, power folding and heated side mirrors
Is it worth the price?
This car is definitely a great green car that has some amazing capabilities but the price is a little steep even when you consider the long list of features it offers. However if the price fits into your budget, the car might be a good choice.
I leave the decision to you, take a test drive, and decide for yourself if the 2008 Chevrolet Tahoe Hybrid is worth your money.

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Finding Hybrid Dealers For Your Hybrid Car Needs

As more people are becoming open to the technology of hybrid and as more consumers actually buy such kind of cars, the more people are also being curious on how they can buy these cars . Although it may seem to b a new technology, finding cars like these isn’t really that hard to do. In fact, unknown to many, a lot of hybrid dealers are out there, just waiting to be asked for whatever car they have to offer.

How The Deal Works

In reality, finding hybrid car dealers and buying these kind of vehicles is just the same as buying a regular car. Hence, there’s really no problem on where you should go or find deals; simply because theyíre everywhere! Considering the popularity of hybrids nowadays, you wouldn’t have problems in spotting such kind of deals. So, here are some tips on where and how you could find different dealers that can suffice your hybrid car needs.

It’s A New Thing

One thing that you should realize when hunting for a good environmental friendly car is that such kinds of models are relatively new. Hence, they could only be bought from stores that sell them first hand. It would be quite impossible or rather extremely rare for you to find them in stores that sell second hand vehicles. It would also be rare to find someone selling his/her second hand hybrid.

Nevertheless, the good thing is that new dealers are starting to stock them even more each day. This is especially true, since more people are now getting more curious about hybrid vehicles and hybrid car dealers.

Starting With A Brand

Before heading out to look for dealers, it is recommended that you have a car brand in mind . In this way it would be easier to spot deals that are relevant to what you are looking for.

If you’re starting with a brand, thereís really not much to worry about since almost all manufacturers, such as, Toyota , Chevrolet , Nissan, BMW and Ford are all in this kind of industry already. In fact, such companies are getting more pressured each day to produce the best hybrid cars they can create due to the incessant need for alternatives to expensive fuel.

Going For Online Deals

For starters, the Internet would be a pretty good place to start your search for various car deals. This would be highly recommended if you think you’re not up to getting sales talked yet by a car salesman. Additionally, this method would also be helpful in letting you know more first about the features that the vehicle you are eyeing for has.

Nowadays, car deals are very rampant in cyberspace. It is possible for you to find different Web sites on the Internet that has various offers for hybrid cars. In fact, you could even get different quotations for various dealers. However, you should understand that the key to getting a good deal online is by having good research skills.

Try your best to get to know more info on the car that you want. You could also compare and contrast vehicles that different manufacturers offer. It would also be helpful if you read reviews online, both by experts and consumers to get more realistic feedback with your research. Once you feel that you are well-informed and ready to face a salesman , all you have to do is contact the Web site that you are interested on inquiring with.

Explore Your Newspapers Classified Ads

One classic way of looking for car deals would be your local paper’s classified ads. There are companies that advertise on papers and if theyíre on your locality, then it would really be easy to drop by for a visit. However, you should be wary that you shouldnít look on the second hand section of the ads, since as said earlier, most hybrids are not yet available in that kind of market.

Try Your Local Stores

If youíre looking for first hand experience, then you should try to observe your locality and see where you could find stores that sell cars. You could go directly to the manufacturer’s shop, if there’s any in your place or buy from hybrid dealers. Don’t hesitate to ask them if they have any promos or special offers , especially for hybrid vehicles .

NOTE: Looking for used hybrid cars ?

Hybrid cars are increasingly popular, as the price of gasoline has gone up and seems unlikely to drop below $2.00 per gallon in the foreseeable future. All hybrid cars have both an electric motor and a gasoline powered engine (hence the name); when the car brakes, the battery is recharged, and when the car idles, the gasoline engine may be shut down.

The appeal of a hybrid car is increased fuel economy , which both saves you money and reduces your environmental impact. As part of an incentive program to switch over to hybrid cars and electric vehicles, there are Federal programs that provide a tax rebate for their purchase; these tax rebates go away after a certain number of qualifying vehicles are sold. Most of the Toyota hybrid vehicles , including the Prius, have sold enough cars that these no longer apply.

With all that said, let’s cover the models that are out there, and what needs they fill.

The Toyota Prius is the dominant hybrid car on the market, it’s the model with the greatest mind share. With mileage in real world situations approaching 45 miles to the gallon, the Prius is the leader in terms of raw fuel economy. (It’s fuel economy is high enough that it still makes economic sense compared to the closest non hybrid vehicle in its weight range, the Volkswagon Golf). It boasts a comfortable front and rear seat arrangement (though the rear has some legroom issues), and remarkable driver visibility. Its drawback is that it is not, in any way, shape or form, sporty. It’s a perfectly functional box with wheels with excellent gas mileage .

If you’re looking for something that won’t set you apart as a greenie, something that has a sense of style that’s a bit more conventional, then the primary choice is the Honda Civic Hybrid . It gains a respectable 5 mpg over its non-Hybrid counterpart, but still costs almost $6,000 more at MSRP. However, it’s still eligible for the tax rebates mentioned above, which helps remove much of the sting. Aside from looks ant styling (it still looks like a midsized car, for example.) it boasts better legroom and its gasoline engine is more powerful than that of the Prius, meaning that it wins on the ‘fun to drive’ standard.

For people who love their SUVs, but can’t abide the gas bill, there are two models of hybrid SUVs on the market; both are good for people who want to haul serious cargo, and get over 16 mpg. (In terms of percentage of increase, most SUVs gain more from a hybrid engine than any other vehicle class, in part because SUVs start with horrible gas mileage, and because they have more space to store batteries.)

The leading hybrid truck in the country is the Toyota Highlander Hybrid , which is really more of an overgrown station wagon than a heavy SUV; even so, the hybrid mechanism adds nearly 10 mpg to the mileage compared to the non-Hybrid version, and it doesn’t lose much in the way of performance.

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For a full sized SUV, the Ford Escape Hybrid is the only one on the market, and its sales have been dismal, though it gets good reviews as a car. It gains 7 miles per gallon over its non-hybrid counterpart, and has a full SUV-sized carrying capacity. What it also has is a huge sticker shock. More recent models have had plug in ports to let you charge the battery overnight from a wall socket.

The Chevy Volt may be the future of hybrid drive train vehicles. Designed as a plug in hybrid from the get go, the Volt has four electric motors powering the wheels directly, powered by the hybrid batteries , backed up by the small, very efficient gasoline engine powers a generator that refills the battery on the car. Because they could replace the drive shaft and transmission with more battery capacity, the Volt has a cruising range of 30 to 40 miles before it even starts up the gasoline engine. GM is talking about scaling this drive train up to a full sixed truck body vehicle if the Volt does well in the market place.

This article is about the Chevrolet Volt. First, I discuss the development of the Chevy Volt. Second, I talk about hybrid vehicles in general then I focus on the Volt specifically. Third, I discuss the technology of the Volt. Lastly, I talk about availability of this car.

Since the fuel prices have continued to rise in the last few years, people all across the world have began to do something about it. Top auto manufactures have come up with hybrid vehicles as well as electrical cars .

The Chevrolet Company has developed the Chevrolet Volt as its plug in hybrid car of the future. It was first introduced as a concept car; however, with the demand for gasoline-free, or an automobile that uses less gas, it will be on the market by 2010. The Volt’s extended range gasoline engine is expected to range approximately from 50 miles per gallon to as much as 150 miles per gallon

Many people may wonder what is meant by hybrid vehicles . Hybrid vehicles are vehicles that have at least two, but usually more types of energy sources, which provide propulsion, either shared or individually. Chevrolet Company intentionally avoids using the term “hybrid” on the “Volt”. They prefer to use the term “Electric Vehicle” , which is equipped with a range extending gasoline-powered motor with a 1.4 L, 4-cylinder engine, which is used for powering the 53-kilowatt generator. However, it is more commonly referred to as a “Series Hybrid”.

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GM plans to call the Volt an “E-REV” , (extended range electric vehicle ). However, the 4-cylinder engine will not have any mechanical linkage to the wheels, like the regular hybrid vehicles. It will be run at necessary speeds that will optimize fuel consumption, and charge rate efficiency, and it will reduce emissions. The only emissions that the Volt might produce from its tailpipes, may be a small amount of Carbon Dioxide, and that is in a very safe amount, if it emits any at all, and that is not expected to happen.

The “Volt “ is designed to run entirely on electric power (read: hybrid car batteries ), with a plug in located just in front of the left side mirror, by the fender well. The average commute for many people is usually around 33 miles (53 km). With the Lithium Ion batteries at full charge the car will travel for 40 miles before the gasoline engine even turns on, using the 111 kilowatt, 150 horse power motor, long enough to recharge the batteries, via a 53 kilowatt generator. This can increase the range of the Volt from 40 miles to as much as 640 miles (1,030 km). If you have access to a regular 120/240 volt AC residential outlet, you can also recharge the batteries with an extension cord, which also comes with the new vehicle. A full charge will take 8 hours, which is a normal workday. Therefore, there is no need for an external charging station.

Chevrolet wanted to change the drive train, in order to make it easier to standardize the new electrical components for the Volt and its future electrically propelled vehicles. So a new drive train called the “E-Flex” will be introduced at the showroom, in 2010.

If the EPA tests were run for the Volt the same way they are for other hybrid vehicles , the Volt’s ability to use stored energy from the batteries would result in the first vehicle to reach a fuel economy rating of over 100 mpg . This would make it the very first vehicle to be mass-produced that acquired such a high rating.

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This article is about hybrid car batteries. First, some definitions are provided. Second, hybrid battery costs are discussed. Third, charge capacity and hybrid battery life are explained. Lastly, battery cost is discussed.

Any kind of rechargeable battery stores electricity through chemical means, and batteries have a number of important constraints on them, especially for hybrid cars and pure electric vehicles . To make this discussion make sense, we’re going to have to define some terms.

The first term is energy density . One reason why gasoline is such a useful fuel is that it’s very dense in terms of the energy carried per unit mass and unit volume. For example, gasoline has nearly 20x the energy density of liquid hydrogen per unit of volume, and is nearly 60% greater in terms of its energy density than ethanol or methanol.

Most electrical batteries can’t come close to the energy density of a good alcohol based engine. The handful that can (generally zinc oxide/silver batteries) are prohibitively expensive. This is one reason why, if you look at a Prius, almost a third of the weight of the vehicle is the batteries .

Hybrid battery costs drive a lot of the price premium for a hybrid vehicle (especially hybrid trucks ) . There are three broad categories of batteries suitable for use in a high energy application. Nickel-Metal Hydride (an evolved form of the Nickel Cadmium rechargeable battery), Lithium Ion, and Zinc/Silver.

Nickel-Metal/NiCad batteries are the cheapest to install, and have the lowest energy density of the set; they are also fairly heavy, and carry heavy metals (nickel and cadmium) making their disposal problematic and expensive.

Lithium Ion batteries have roughly 50% greater energy density compared to Nickel Metal Hydride, and nearly 40% greater than straight NiCad. They are also roughly 3 to 4x as expensive per watt/hour stored, because of the high price of Lithium. Unlike NiMH batteries, they also run into problems with waste heat when discharging. (One of the great technical challenges for an all-electric vehicle is getting enough energy stored in the batteries – and safely out again – without the batteries overheating.)

Zinc/Silver batteries have nearly 30% greater energy density than Lithium Ion batteries, but are prohibitively expensive, and use two resources (Zinc and Silver) that are in short supply. The primary use for Zinc/Silver batteries is in the military where they’re used to power guidance systems for torpedoes and missiles.

Most hybrids use NiCad or NiMH batteries ; a very few are making the transition to Lithium Ion batteries, and most aftermarket conversion kits use Lithium Ion batteries – the theory being that anyone who’ll void the warranty on their car will pay the premium for the higher energy density. The Tesla Roadster , the only pure plug-in car on the market, uses banks of Lithium Ion batteries; these contribute nearly $70,000 towards the car’s $110,000 asking price. The Chevy Volt uses NiMH batteries to keep costs down, but uses a lot of them – the Volt’s batteries replace a lot of the weight and volume used for the transmission in the car.

When will the pure plug in vehicle become affordable? It may not happen any time soon. The constraints of battery cost, waste heat dissipation and weight mean that a car that acts like a car, with passenger space and cargo space, would, as a pure electric vehicle, have a cruising range of 40 to 60 miles between charges, and while that’s useful for most American drivers, it’s not quite enough to replace a gasoline car that can get over 300 miles on one tank full of gas.

This article will help you understand the fuel economy, pricing, general availability and quality of the Chevrolet hybrid vehicles on the market today.

There are many Chevrolet hybrids available that can provide fuel efficient performance and remain environmentally friendly. This car company has taken to hear the challenge to produce a clean fuel vehicle that also offers performance.

These hybrid electric vehicles include the hybrid Silverado pickup truck , the Tahoe SUV hybrid , and also the Malibu sedan hybrid . All these American hybrid cars and hybrid trucks use two motors. One of these is a standard gasoline motor and the other is an electric motor. The gasoline and electric motors are designed to work together or alone to provide the best fuel economy and lowest hybrid car cost for the owner

At the present time, no other company offers such a wide variety of American hybrid cars and trucks. This enables the Chevrolet group to have an advantage over other car manufacturers like Ford and Dodge . All these Chevy hybrids are new offerings for the 2009 model year. More and more auto companies are attempting to come up with their clean fuel vehicle to sell on the open market, but Chevy may have the edge in development on many of them.

Fuel Economy/Engine

The Chevy hybrid Silverado achieves its superb gas mileage by just using the vehicle’s electric motor at lower speeds under 30 mph . When the truck is traveling at up to 30 mph, this hybrid electric vehicle uses electric power to operate the vehicle. When speeds exceed 30 mph, the truck’s powerful 6.0 liter V8 gasoline engine does the work to provide the customer the power that he needs for demanding situations.

The gasoline engine manages to get an impressive horsepower rating of 332 and a torque rating that comes in at 367. Regardless of the motor that the Chevy hybrid is using, the uniquely designed transmission will try to operate in the gear that will deliver the best mileage.

The fuel economy on the highway is rated to be around 20 mpg and in city traffic these hybrid vehicles can still manage close to 22mpg and up. The in town or city mileage is higher than highway mileage because the electric motor does almost all of the work in the confines of city traffic. With a full tank of gas the truck has a total driving range of over 500 miles. A good estimate for the driving range on a full tank will be between 500 and 550 miles.

The Chevy Tahoe hybrid has the same 6.0 liter V8 gasoline engine capable of producing up to 332 hp and 367 psi torque. The electric motor used in the Chevy Tahoe hybrid is also the same as in the Chevy Silverado Hybrid . The fuel rating on the Chevy Tahoe hybrid SUV is 20 mpg in the highway and 21 mpg in the city.

The Chevy Malibu hybrid car has a 2.4 liter four-cylinder gasoline engine and a smaller electric motor. The horse power rating of the 2.4 liter is around 180. The Malibu hybrid achieves an awesome mpg highway rating of 34 and a city rating of 35, depending on your driving style and situation. These are very impressive mileage ratings.

Price/Availability

The price for the Chevy Hybrid Silverado is going to be somewhere in the mid forty thousand dollar range depending on the exact model chosen and the options included. Availability for this is limited because of the demand for a hybrid truck that provides great fuel mileage and performance .

The Chevy Tahoe hybrid sells for fifty-one thousand , but the price can vary depending on options and model. Again, the availability is very limited on this hybrid vehicle because it is a full and complete SUV but it is offered with a hybrid power train. The Chevy Malibu hybrid is the least expensive in the Chevy hybrid line up with a MSRP of twenty-four thousand. However, based on equipment chosen and options, the price can vary. The availability of this Chevy hybrid car is also very limited because of consumer demand and reserves already placed on the units being produced.

Quality

All three hybrid vehicles that Chevy offers have the same excellent quality in construction and design as seen in their gasoline counterparts. Therefore, consumers are not missing any of the luxuries or standards that Chevy offers in its regular autos. All three hybrids have the option to be equipped with any up grades such as leather seats and dynamic sound systems.

The only aspect of the Chevy hybrids that is different compared to the gasoline models is the unique drive train . The comfort and handling of all of the hybrids equals or surpasses that found in other Chevy models. There is great care and good workmanship shown in the entire construction of all of the Chevy hybrids that are presently being produced for the public.

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Chevy Hybrid Overview

The entire Chevy hybrid line offers comfort, reliability and roomy interiors and this is sure to please many car buyers. These cars are proof that you can have power, performance and a clean fuel vehicle all in one neat little package. Consumers should be pleased with the mileage and handling of any of the newest Chevy family members.