Produced by | Tiger sniff car group
Author | Wang Xiaoyu
"Musk, didn't expect that?"
This sentence comes from the famous automobile magazine MotorTrend. On January 4, Beijing time, after the release of the Mercedes-Benz Vision EQXX concept car, they took a provocative title -
“Mercedes-Benz Vision EQXX Concept: Did You See This Coming, Elon?”
Rushing to release the concept car on the eve of the 2022 CES Electronics Show, Mercedes-Benz is really a bit of a "global automotive technology vane". According to Kang Linsong, chairman of the board of directors of Daimler AG, the EQXX is "the most energy-efficient model ever", with a cruising range of more than 1,000 kilometers, a 100-kilometer energy consumption of less than 10 kWh, and a one-shot drive from Beijing to Nanjing.
That's not the point, the focus is on the EQXX's product positioning — its wheelbase is just 3 inches (about 7 centimeters) smaller than the Tesla Model 3, and the wheelbase happens to be between the Mercedes-Benz A-Class and the C-Class. Obviously, the tip of the EQXX's knife is pointed directly at the Tesla Model 3, or the next tesla new car after the Model 3.
But under the appearance of EQXX's ultra-low energy consumption and long endurance, it is Mercedes-Benz's "trade-off" as always - a series of operations such as the tri-fork star logo made of stickers, the power performance of the total output power of only 150kW, the cancellation of the sunroof for solar panels and so on. Of course, there is also its "duck tail" for low wind resistance and long endurance.
Such an operation is not only that Musk did not expect, I believe that everyone here did not expect it.
First, in order to reduce wind resistance, give up high value
In 2006, the film Who Eliminated the Electric Car, starring Tom Hanks, was released. The film tells the story of the rise and fall of an electric vehicle in The history of the United States, and the protagonist in the film is the originator of modern electric vehicles and the famous Universal EV1.
The drag coefficient of the universal EV1 at that time had reached a staggering 0.19Cd. This peculiar and retro look on the EV1 is now used by Mercedes-Benz on the EQXX.
GM EV1
Similarly, it is also to achieve ultra-low wind resistance.
The object with the lowest wind resistance coefficient in nature is the water droplet (0.04Cd), so the supercar pursues a streamlined design to emulate the shape of the water droplet. In order to achieve a drag coefficient of 0.17, EQXX also uses this teardrop appearance curve. You know, an American football has a drag coefficient of about 0.18-0.2.
That is to say, the drag coefficient of the Mercedes-Benz EQXX is even lower than that of American football.
This body form was shown as early as the 540K Streamliner launched by Mercedes-Benz in 1938. By 1978, the sci-fi C 111-III had created a very low drag coefficient value of Cd 0.183. When playing aerodynamics again in the era of electric vehicles, Mercedes-Benz is a bit on the head.
The EQXX's front cover features two exhaust holes for the cooling system, which connect to the narrow active intake grille under the front.
In daily driving, the active intake grille is closed, the transmission system is dissipated by the heat dissipation plate arranged on the chassis, and the active intake grille will be opened at high heat dissipation requirements, using airflow to dissipate heat for the motor.
At the rear, EQXX has an active rear diverter, which will automatically extend downwards and rearwards when the speed reaches 60-70km/h or more, and help the bottom wind speed of the vehicle to be consistent with the side and roof.
In order to reduce the wind resistance on the EQXX Mercedes-Benz also did a lot of details, such as the external LOGO part, including the "most valuable" three-prong star logo on the front of the car, the VISION EQXX at the rear, all of which are stickers - the purpose is to reduce the wind resistance.
Looking at the value alone, Mercedes-Benz has indeed achieved the lowest in the industry. Compared with the 0.189Cd of volkswagen XL1 hypermiler, the drag coefficient of 0.208 of Tesla Model S Plaid and NIO ET7 is now lower. Even lower than mercedes-Benz's own Concept IAA with a drag coefficient of 0.19.
The obsession with the wind resistance coefficient makes the Mercedes look a little misguided, but the big idea is not wrong.
The air is invisible and untouchable, but it is the biggest killer for cars. Studies have shown that when a sedan travels at a speed of 80 kilometers per hour, about 60% of the energy consumption is used to overcome air resistance. Especially for electric vehicles, the impact of wind resistance on energy consumption is more prominent when driving at high speeds, taking BYD Han as an example, for every 0.01 reduction in the wind resistance coefficient, the endurance of the car will increase by 8 kilometers.
Reducing wind resistance is essentially to increase endurance.
But Mercedes-Benz is not for low wind resistance and low wind resistance, for example, you use a traditional rearview mirror like EQXX, and there is no so-called low wind resistance camera electronic rearview mirror like other manufacturers. That's because Mercedes-Benz engineers believe that a camera-electronic rearview mirror system like the one used on the Audi e-tron on the global market consumes too much power.
Theoretically, when Mercedes-Benz built the EQXX, it followed its new "mission" – "The mission is efficiency."
But here, efficiency, you can understand it as efficacy, you can also understand it as efficiency. Take this tail of EQXX, for example, it has done both, both efficiency and efficiency.
Let's start with efficiency.
To make the rear of the EQXX like this, the challenges are all from engineering. Mercedes-Benz in the rear of the body application of bionic engineering structural components, in simple terms, according to the actual structural functional needs, in the actual need to carry the load of the place to use the material, do not need to leave empty, the shape of the part is shaped by the actual needs, not in advance, similar to biological evolution to optimize.
This large casting structure is called BIOQXX by Mercedes-Benz. As you can see, it is formed by an independent, complete casting, due to the lack of solder joints for overall molding, the rigidity of the rear part of the body can be greatly improved, which can fundamentally reduce the use of materials in the case of completing the design goals, to achieve the purpose of weight reduction.
In the traditional body process, cast aluminum is widely used in the top of suspension shock absorber towers. Because the top of the tower is the most direct part of the road stress transmission to the body, it requires extremely high local stiffness, and the shape is very complex. The traditional top of the tower is made of welding multiple components, which in itself is not conducive to weight reduction. Especially for electric vehicles whose weight will directly affect the endurance, weight reduction is a big problem.
Tesla Model 3 and Model Y body comparison
Tesla is a popularizer of this "one-piece die casting" technology. On the domestic Model Y, Tesla made a large part of the entire rear body baseplate, rear wheel arch, and rear cross-stringer into a cast aluminum part. This part of the body requires 70 parts on the Model 3 without "integrated die casting technology".
This one-piece die-casting technology, on the one hand, improves the efficiency of body production because of the reduction of parts, and on the other hand, because the weight reduction can also increase some cruising range - that is, improve efficiency.
Second, for the sake of endurance, castration of power
The Mercedes-Benz VISION EQXX achieves a cruising range of 1000km, which is obviously not only achieved by making the front of the car into a "duck mouth" and the tail as a "duck tail". As mentioned earlier, the mission of mercedes-benz vision EQXX concept car is "efficiency", and the 100 km power consumption of EQXX is controlled below 10kWh/100km. This is well understood, equipped with a 100kWh battery pack EQXX, can easily achieve 1000km endurance.
"The easiest way to achieve more electric mileage is to put a bigger battery in the car. However, size and weight limitations can lead to diminishing marginal returns. The launch of the VISION EQXX Concept shows that we have overcome this challenge and taken energy efficiency to a whole new level. We have found new ways to increase the range of electric vehicles. ”
Yorg Battle, vice president of Mercedes-Benz Vehicle Engineering and Overall Vehicle Function, calls the "new approach" to find an excellent balance between energy density and 100 km of electricity consumption – maximizing battery capacity while minimizing power consumption.
First of all, the battery pack is designed to reduce weight.
EQXX uses technology similar to Cell to Pack, the battery cell is provided by the Ningde era, directly "glue" the battery cell to the battery bottom case, minimize the module, and finally achieve an energy bulk density of 400Wh/L. The nearly 100kWh battery on EQXX is only half the size of the similarly capacity battery on EQS, and it is 30% lighter.
In addition, it is equipped with a higher silicon content and other unique components of the battery anode. The external power electronic components of the entire battery are integrated into a small box on the battery, Mercedes-Benz called onebox, which is designed to facilitate installation and removal, and with this Onebox component, the fully functional battery pack weighs only 495kg.
Secondly, it is to improve the transmission efficiency.
On the EQXX, Mercedes-Benz claims to use "a new self-developed electric drive system", which is actually borrowed from the technology of the racing team. The 150 kW total output powertrain has been developed by the F1 experts of Mercedes-AMG High Performance PowerTrain GmbH to reduce energy consumption and losses through system design, material selection, lubrication and thermal management.
The ultimate EQXX enables efficient use of energy, with its lightweight and efficient electric drivetrain ultimately delivering up to 95% of the battery energy directly to the wheels. In other words, 95% of the energy can be transferred directly from the battery to the wheels.
It's important to note, however, that EQXX may have nothing to do with performance.
In the official information related to EQXX, the strengths of the electric vehicle of 100 km acceleration are not mentioned. After all, it only chose a motor with a power of 150kW, which is not high or low, and it is still a single motor. You know, the domestic Tesla Model 3 single motor version, has a total output power of 202kW, can achieve 6.1 seconds of 100 km acceleration.
Of course, the "trade-off" of power output is also a routine operation of Mercedes-Benz. The 1.5T engine used on the Beijing Benz C260L, like the EQXX, can achieve a total output of 150kW.
Finally, power is generated by the sun.
EQXX installed a 117 solar panel unit on the roof. This solar panel, developed by Mercedes-Benz in cooperation with the Fraunhofer ISE Solar Energy Research Institute in Germany, stores the electricity generated in a lithium phosphate battery and is used to power other low-voltage appliances such as air conditioning fans, lights, central control entertainment systems and on-board 12V appliances.
According to Mercedes-Benz data, in the case of sufficient sunshine, solar panels can increase the endurance of 25 kilometers. And it is precisely in order to be able to increase this 25km, Mercedes-Benz canceled the sunroof.
In fact, after mercedes-Benz such a design and operation, got a 100kWh battery pack, 1000km endurance, 10kWh/100km results, the numbers are almost in accordance with this reference line, step by step derived.
But is this data really subversive enough? Weibo big V hard brother analyzed: "Mercedes-Benz EQXX, 100 degrees of electric running 1000 kilometers, 100 kilometers of electricity consumption of 10 degrees, is easy to achieve. Single motor rear-drive version of the Model 3 does not open the air conditioner with cotton feet open, many car owners should have reached. Therefore, lightweight is better than Model 3, the efficiency of motor electronic control is improved, and 10 degrees of 100 kilometers is very realistic. ”
Third, in order to protect the environment, use plastic bottles as interiors
Although the appearance, power consumption, and battery life are somewhat deliberate, but in terms of creating a sense of interior luxury, Mercedes-Benz does have two brushes. Because of the limited space, here we will only briefly say two points, one is the material and the other is the large screen.
For example, the opening handle of the car door is simplified to a small pull strap, which is made of Biosteel high-strength bionic fabric produced by AMsilk. The interior of the door is lined with a three-dimensional effect of the dot matrix decoration, these small sequins that can change color with different viewing angles, are from recycled PET plastic bottles. Yes, your Mercedes is made of plastic bottles.
Inside the carriage, 38% of the Dinamica-turned-out fur surface is made of recycled PET plastic bottles, the plush carpet is woven with 100% bamboo fiber, and part of the leather is derived from cactus extract, and the material known as Deserttex provides an extremely soft touch.
This concept of sustainability has long been used by Germans in the design concept of new products. For example, in bmw iX cars, the interior and fabric are made of a large number of recycled materials, such as the fabric/microfiber upholstery using 50% recycled polyester material, the carpet floor mat using 100% recycled nylon material, and the olive leaf extract is from the leaves collected after pruning olive groves in Europe every year.
In BMW's words, it is: "No sustainability, no luxury".
Finally, one more word about the big screen.
On the EQXX, Mercedes-Benz directly implanted a curved giant screen with a diagonal size of up to 47.5 inches and an 8K resolution (7680x660 pixels). But unlike the Hyperscreen single-glass plane on EQS, EQXX's large screen is not OLED, but LED screen.
According to mercedes-benz engineers, the current OLED is not as good as LED backlight technology in terms of brightness and screen durability, so it is not used in the car machine. Of course, in addition to the engineer's explanation, there may be another possibility, that is, OLED is cheaper than LED screens.
Write at the end
Although EQXX is only a concept car and has many slots, concept cars often guide car companies to develop in the direction they identify.
In the 1970s, Mercedes-Benz launched a project called the Experimental Safety Vehicle (ESV), in which safety engineers are constantly exploring new ideas in the field of automotive safety by creating concept cars. Unveiled in 1971, the ESF 5 safety concept incorporates a number of safety technologies, including energy-absorbing bodies, ABS, and airbags. Later, the ESF 2009 safety concept car used preventive safety body structure, interactive vehicle information transmission system and other safety technologies.
ESF 05 safety concept car
Today, a production car based on the VISION EQXX concept will be available around 2025. I believe that on that day, we will see a new Mercedes-Benz in the era of electrification.
When the technical energy of the blow is produced, it is not too late to fight back against Tesla.