The Real MOTOR City
By Tony Posawatz
Chevrolet Volt Vehicle Line Director
Detroit has long been known as the epicenter of the global auto industry, hence the nickname Motor City. However, Motor City isn’t an entirely accurate nickname since most of the vehicles produced here have been powered by internal combustion engines.
But with vehicles like the Chevrolet Volt going into production at the Detroit Hamtramck Assembly Plant next year, GM is helping put the motor with electric motors and electrified propulsion back into the Motor City.
Beginning this evening, all the major players in the electric vehicle, infrastructure and policy arena will gather at the sold-out Business of Plugging In conference to discuss what it will take to bring electric vehicles to market. We’ll discuss items such as how to assure consumers have easy access to charging and what extra benefits are possible for being an early EV purchaser among many other topics. For Detroit, the conference is significant as it strives to retain and create jobs at the forefront of a developing industry.
The Chevy Volt team has played a key role in shaping the discussion surrounding electric vehicles. And GM as a founding sponsor of the conference has played a key role in shaping its direction. This evening, our vice chairman of Global Product Development Tom Stephens will welcome the conference attendees to Detroit. The conference opens tomorrow when our vice president of Global Product Planning Jon Lauckner joins Pacific Gas and Electric CEO Peter Darbee and former New York Governor George Pataki in a keynote discussion on creating a national strategy for electric vehicles.
Several Volt team members will also participate in panel discussions throughout the two-day conference. On Tuesday, Britta Gross, director of global energy systems, infrastructure and commercialization, is moderating a panel on plug-in ready cities while Denise Gray, director of hybrid energy storage systems, will moderate a battery technology panel. On Wednesday, Volt planning manager John Ferris will be part of a supplier development panel addressing the challenges of creating a supply base for EVs.
The conference concludes at midday on Wednesday and is followed by a GM-sponsored public day where more than 300 high school and college students will have the chance to learn about the industry through a “Passport to Knowledge” tour and mentoring opportunities with those working in the industry. I encourage anyone who has the opportunity to attend. The Volt Age is upon us, and Detroit and Michigan are leading the charge.
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Tony -
The term “motor” is correct, but it would have also been equally correct to call Detroit the “engine city.”
An engine is any device that converts stored energy (fuel) into some kind of force. The term “motor” was originally used to distinguish between vehicles powered by steam engines, and the new-fangled cars powered by internal combustion engines. While both types were powered by engines, a car powered by a motor* was by default known to be powered by an ICE and not a steam engine.
In short, all motors are engines, but not all engines are motors. Either term is correct for a car**, truck, train, or airplane powered by an ICE. (Airplanes with turbine engines cannot be said to be powered by turbine motors.)
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* The term “motorcar” is still very common in the UK.
** But good luck trying to get any of the states to change the name “Department of Motor Vehicles” to “Department of Engine Vehicles.”
Don’t forget when go for a drive it’s also called MOTORING around. Even in the song “Born to be wild” the song started, “Get your MOTOR running”. The magazine most famous for automotive news is called MOTOR Trend, Boats are called MOTOR BOATS or MOTOR VESSELS.
The point is Tony AKA Anthony we all know what a motor aka engine is. I for one am ready to Throw up aka puke aka barf aka heave aka blow chow every time one of you experts tell us what all things should be named. Kind of like POP vs Soda. If you care about those two terms you probably should see a shrink.
Tony when you felt the need to explain and define these two generic terms, you lost all credibility and I stopped reading your entry because U R Jest 2 gal dang smart 4 us simpletons! So I’ll just keep driving my General MOTORS car and my neighbor will keep driving his Ford MOTOR company truck and my buddy will keep driving his Toyota MOTORs car ect and we’ll all be happy
From the article below it sounds like GM is a day late and a dollar short………
Here is an article about Nissan.
Electric Transportation Engineering Corp. this week finalized a deal with the U.S. Department of Energy to begin developing and installing a charging network for electric vehicles across five states, including Oregon.
The Phoenix company, a subsidiary of Scottsdale, Ariz.-based ECOtality Inc., is rolling out more than 11,000 charging stations in five states — Oregon, Arizona, Tennessee, Washington and California — using $99.8 million in federal funds.
The project is in partnership with Nissan North America, which will deploy 4,700 of its all-electric Leaf vehicles which are scheduled for release in fall 2010.
As part of the project, Oregon expects to receive just under 1,000 of the Nissan vehicles and around 2,000 charging stations, centered around Portland, Eugene, Salem and Corvallis.
Pacific Business News
What I’d like to know is when Bob Lutz will issue a challenge to Jay Leno to let him take a Volt to Hollywood and run it on that “Green Challenge” course Jay has been having celebrities drive that electric Focus around?
That is a challenge millions of people would want to watch. It would be putting a lot on the line, but if Bob won, it would have enormous payback.
Working on diesel electric locomotives… I ALWAYS knew the distinction of the motor and the engine. Motor is electric, engine is the diesel engine. I couldn’t stand when people called engines motors!!! I tried to explain to people for a while, but gave up. (clearly my self imposed problem, not anyone else’s)
I’m glad the world may soon know the distinction for my sanity.
for the uninitiated, dlesel engines produce mechanical engergy converted to electricity which drives the electric wheel motors.
Hans,
All motors are also engines. Not all engines are motors. (For example, Google uses a search engine.)
But you are right, in the common vernacular, a motor refers to an electric motor. (I guess that’s why GM is called General Motors, huh? Maybe they should become GE for General Engines, except GE is already taken.)
Detroit will always be called the Motor City regardless of what the engine or motor actually does. The name is synonymous with Detroit – period.
If anyone wants to argue to point, ask them why California is the Golden State when in fact it’s just covered with dried out dead brush. Even from an Airplane Window you can tell it’s not golden.
To be fair though, some of those beach girls have nice golden tans.
“Motor City isn’t an entirely accurate nickname since most of the vehicles produced here have been powered by internal combustion engines.”
Mr. Posawatz,
Why then has the company for which you work been called General Motors for so long? Why has your primary competitor always been the Ford Motor Company? Toyota Motor Corporation? American Honda Motor Company? Chrysler Motors, LLC? Hyundai Motor America? Nissan Motor Company? Tata Motors?
For a word that’s not entirely accurate — according to you — why do so many auto companies put “motor” in their name?
Ah, Mr. Posawatz, you have learned the first lesson of the reply feature: reply writers don’t address the main topic of your article, but rather key off on tangiential remark. Here it’s the motor/engine debate. That doesn’t mean that the rest of your article was ignored, but that’s the way these things go. Sorry about that, it happens.
John,
Tony would have done better had he left the first two paragraphs out of his piece. But he did open himself up for comment when he started by implying that all those who have called Detroit “Motor City” over the years were wrong.
It never helps to start a piece by getting off on the wrong foot. Tony — or the staff assistant who wrote this piece for him — thought they had a hook to grab our attention, but stepped into an area where they appear not to have much expertise.
Mr. Posawatz,
You’ll have to have a talk with Mark Reuss. During his Autoline After Hours discussion, he referred to the internal combustion automobile propulsion units Holden makes in Australia as, ‘motors.’
You’ll have to get his mind right now that he is back in North America.
Mr. Posawatz,
Have you had a chance yet to go one-on-one with Mark Reuss to discuss what you think is his incorrect use of the word motor?