Battery

Web exclusive

Webasto swappable batteries power Staad electrified excavators

With many European cities now insisting that machinery such as excavators used on construction sites must not produce harmful emissions, the pressure on the industry to electrify them is growing (writes Peter Donaldson). In 2020, Staad, the Dutch importer of Doosan machinery, formed its Electric Construction Equipment (ECE) division to convert excavators and now offers […]

Web exclusive

Meeting the challenges of developing e-VTOL air taxis

AutoFlight’s Prosperity I, a Chinese-designed e-VTOL air taxi sized to accommodate a pilot and three passengers, is intended to meet the rigorous safety standards that apply to transport-category aircraft including the largest airliners, and the company is aiming for certification and service entry in 2025 (writes Peter Donaldson). Invited by electric aviation pioneer and AutoFlight’s […]

Web exclusive

A case of plastic over aluminium

Containing thermal runaway, protecting EV occupants from fire and saving weight are all drivers for the application of new materials to batteries, and the battery case is a prime target for replacing aluminium alloy with plastics (writes Peter Donaldson). Multi-industry plastics specialist SABIC has recently re-engineered existing EV battery cases in two proof-of-concept exercises that […]

Web exclusive

Lithium-metal cell packs a punch

With a specific energy of 400 Wh/kg and an energy density of between 700 and 810 Wh/litre, Sion Power’s Licerion-EV rechargeable lithium-metal cells are attracting great interest from EV developers, and the company is in discussion with multiple OEMs to further the development of the technology (writes Peter Donaldson). The company’s senior applications engineer […]

Web exclusive

Feinmetall launches high-current contacts for battery testing and production

As currents produced by EV batteries get higher, the demands placed on the contacts in the systems used to check cell, module and general battery performance in testing and production are also increasing. High-performance contact probes are therefore growing in importance (writes Peter Donaldson). To that end, contacts manufacturer Feinmetall has launched a family of […]

Web exclusive

New chapter in the story of cork

Finding a material with several applications in state-of-the-art EV powertrains that literally grows on trees might seem unlikely, but that is exactly what Portuguese company Amorim Cork Composites is offering with cork (writes Peter Donaldson). The raw material is the bark of the cork oak tree (Quercus suber), which in addition to its best-known application […]

Digest

Everrati Porsche 911

The consumer EVs sector is welcoming a constant tide of all-new electric cars, often designed from blank sheets. However, this approach neglects not only the many existing IC-engined cars on the road now, but the countless classic car designs that remain some of the automotive world’s proudest and most cherished examples.

New Products

Mercedes-Benz announces long-range EV

Mercedes-Benz has unveiled its Vision EQXX concept EV, which has a range of more than 1000 km on a single battery charge, equating to a consumption of less than 10 kWh of energy per 100 km.

Web exclusive

Cotes cuts carbon footprint of running dry rooms

Drying rooms are critical to lithium-ion battery manufacture to ensure that the electrodes are prevented from absorbing moisture, which can lead to a reduction in lifespan and even catastrophic failure (writes Peter Donaldson). Running these dry rooms typically takes a lot of energy, mostly to provide hot air. However, Danish company Cotes has developed a much more efficient way it calls Exergic Technology to do this that significantly reduces the battery’s overall carbon footprint. Understanding humidity is key to getting rid of unwanted moisture from air, and warm air holds more water than cold air. Absolute humidity is the amount of water vapour in a given mass of air, and is typically expressed in grams per kilo. Relative humidity, meanwhile, is the amount of water in the air expressed as a percentage of the maximum it can hold at a given temperature. When that percentage exceeds 100, the water begins to condense out.

Web exclusive

Ricardo shows Steel E-Motive Level 5 concept EVs

Keen to show off what the latest generation of advanced high-strength steels can do, WorldAutoSteel, the automotive arm of the World Steel Association, has chosen Ricardo to design an EV family that could be offered in the nascent market for mobility as a service from around 2030 (writes Peter Donaldson). The first two designs created under this Steel E-Motive (SEM) initiative were revealed at the recent Battery Show Europe and Electric & Hybrid Vehicle Technology Expo in Stuttgart, where WorldAutoSteel’s technical director George Coates and Ricardo’s chief engineer for vehicle attributes Neil McGregor outlined the progress with them so far.