The Crucial Car

clipped from www.nytimes.com TRAVERSE CITY, Mich. — General Motors said Thursday that it had “essentially finished” designing its first plug-in hybrid car, the Chevrolet Volt, and would have production-ready prototypes within 10 days. The automaker still has considerable work to do on the car’s lithium-ion battery and other technology in the two years before the Volt is scheduled to go on sale, but completing the design is a milestone for what is arguably the most crucial car in decades for G.M. The Volt would be able to travel at least 40 miles on battery power alone, G.M. said. The battery is recharged by plugging a cord into a household outlet. As of Thursday afternoon, 35,750 people from all 50 states and 63 countries had signed up on an unofficial waiting list for the car at gm-volt.com, a Web site run by a neurologist in New Jersey who is not affiliated with G.M. The doctor, Lyle Dennis, started the site as a fan when G.M. announced the car.