Gaohe HiPhi X, I believe that everyone will be attracted by its appearance at the first sight of this car. If a Danyan Orange HiPhi X stops on the side of the road with its open and winged doors, it's no exaggeration to say that it will attract no less onlookers than a red Ferrari F8.
The first impression of the HiPhi X's appearance is that it is full of technology, and it is not like a car born in the real world on the street, but more like a product of other dimensions, the kind of car that children see and call transformers. And the essence of all this must lie in its six doors.
01
The original intent of the design
The doors of the HiPhi X are different from the gull-wing doors of the Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG, and also different from the eagle wing doors of the Tesla Model X. The hiPhi X's door panels can be opened in the same way as Rolls-Royce, and the rear door frame can be expanded upwards like a gull-wing door. But behind the traditional design, the sacrifice is the rigidity of the body and the challenge of the assembly process. To be honest, I wonder why I spent so much effort designing doors.
This starts 38 months ago when the HiPhi X was developed. Chen Junyou, CTO of Chinese Express High-Tech Co., Ltd., shared with us such a story, as early as 20 years ago, Chen Jun's father bent down and sat in an existing sedan at home due to poor cervical and lumbar spine. At that time, Chen Jun wanted to use his own strength to do something, so he developed a medium-sized SUV, so that his father's problem was solved, but because his mother was old and inconvenient, the last SUV became a very difficult thing.
The time came to a Spring Festival before the development of HiPhi X, when Ding Lei, CEO of Chinese Express Gaohe, took a fancy to the door design of Tesla Model X, and discussed with CTO Chen Jun whether he could get such a design for Gaohe's car. At first, Chen Jun was very resistant, because he felt that such a design could become a thankless challenge, whether it was sealed or safe. Looking back, isn't this design Chen Jun's original intention? This design can also solve the problem of getting on the bus for many people with limited mobility and the inconvenience of getting on and off the bus for women wearing short skirts.
So Chen Jun began to lead the team to plan, sifted through hundreds of design schemes around the world after no results, so he began to create his own patent design, after 38 months HiPhi X was finally launched. For an ordinary car, the 38-month research and development cycle is more than enough, and the time is obviously not enough for Gaohe, so HiPhi X still has a lot of regrets and dissatisfaction for engineers, so the trade-off is very important.
02
Is it safe?
The design and development of the car is inseparable from safety, to know that even the MPV with electric sliding door is designed, and the grooves on the left and right sides must be strengthened accordingly, so not to mention the hiPhi X's wingspan door is lifted on the roof.
First of all, it should be clear that the design of the winggate must have affected the torsional stiffness of the body-in-white. The HiPhi X's body-in-white weight is 370 kg and its torsional stiffness is 28.3 kN·m/deg, which is a gap from the 44.14 kN·m/deg of the NIO ES8, but it still meets the mainstream level of the same level.
This is also the data of Gaohe after making certain trade-offs, taking into account both the accuracy of the assembly and the comfort brought by NVH. Then again, the hiPhi X achieved a five-star evaluation on the C-NCAP at the end of last year, so the structure of the spread wing door still has not compromised to safety, so how does the high head strengthen the body structure?
This brings us to the I-beam design in the middle of the winggate. HiPhi X uses 1,500 MPa of thermoformed steel in this section, and the top door has a double-lock design that allows the spread wings door to be fully connected to the body. Even if a collision occurs, the wingspan door can become a force transmission path of the body to disperse the force load and ensure the integrity of the crew compartment. At the same time, the B-pillar is constructed of thermoformed steel into a large cross-sectional frame to further enhance the body structure.
Of course, as a pure electric product, it is also necessary to balance the weight and rigidity of the body, HiPhi X uses a steel and aluminum hybrid body, aluminum materials account for 37%, high-strength steel accounts for 42%. Most of the car body is aluminum, the rear body is high-pressure cast aluminum, the door cover is aluminum, but in the key positions of the collision, such as the I-beam of the spread wing door and the A and B columns are made of high-strength 1,500 MPa thermoformed steel, and the anti-collision bar in the door uses 7 series aluminum alloy material to optimize the structure through certain trade-offs. The structural security aspects of HiPhi X are trustworthy.
03
Five-star reviews also have shortcomings
In the score distribution chart of the 8-sided shapes in C-NCAP, the most perfect should be that all 8 corners are dipped. Let's look at the score of Gaohe HiPhi X, in addition to the pedestrian head type, the other 7 results are more balanced, but the pedestrian head type took 7.487 points in the case of a full score of 12 points.
However, open the C-NCAP to take a simple look, in fact, the results of the pedestrian head type are generally not too high, all around 7-8 points. Very few models can get a slightly better score in this area, and the highest score in recent times is 9.353 points, and each car company has a certain optimization space in this sector.
Since there is a disadvantage, we must think about where we can make up for it. Therefore, Gaohe made a corresponding compensation on the pedestrian-crossed AEB and avoided collisions through active safety. However, the current auxiliary driving capability of Gaohe HiPhi X still has a certain gap compared with tesla, ideal, Weilai and Xiaopeng in the first echelon.
Speaking of defects, we have to mention its spread door, in fact, the current HiPhi X spread door still has some minor problems to be improved. First of all, the door will actively avoid obstacles when opened to avoid collisions. Due to the fact that the sensing range of the door radar is not wide, it will still cause friction in special cases. For example, after parking on the side, the road teeth are higher, and the lower side of the door is either stuck on the steps or hits the road teeth. Moreover, when the door is closed, the anti-pinch function is not so sensitive, and these small details need to be improved.
04
Five stars alone?
Redundant design
Structural safety is only the foundation of a car, the HiPhi X as an SUV but has a large inclination of the front gear design and not high ground clearance, three rows of 6-seat body structure makes me prefer to treat it as an MPV. And its final attribution is believed to be a fashionable toy in the garage of the big boss, and see where HiPhi X can save the value of the big bosses.
The HiPhi X features a dual-redundant design on critical hardware, much like a civil airliner. HiPhi X has made corresponding redundant designs in power, steering, braking, etc.
Here is mainly to talk about the power supply redundancy, HiPhi X in the front and rear of the vehicle are equipped with 12 V small batteries, even if encountered a rear-end accident can still ensure the normal power supply of the vehicle, after all, the electric door has a certain gap with the traditional mechanical door after encountering an emergency.
So you must ask, what if you encounter a continuous rear-end accident and get sandwiched and the whole vehicle loses power? Gao He said that all four doors in the car have mechanical pull locks, and the doors will be automatically unlocked in case of emergency. But I have a question, when the people in the car are unconscious, how should the rescuers open the door? After all, there is no mechanical handle outside the car, which still needs to be examined.
Battery safe
Since the launch of new energy vehicles, battery safety has received widespread attention from the industry, consumers and even society. Throughout the industry, we generally handed over different answers to the potential safety hazards of batteries. Some puncture tests, some will prevent heat from spreading, but Gaohe does not seem to have made a unique design in related aspects, whether it is ceramic materials, mica plates, pressure relief valves or bottom steel plates are the mainstream means of protection in the industry.
In addition, Gaohe also has a cloud management system. Gao said that from the beginning of the temperature rise can be warned, once the relevant problems are detected, it will be notified to the user through the app, phone and car machine in about a minute. Having said that, the new forces also have different solutions in this field, and this sector expects to have more advanced solutions that have always been ahead of The High Cooperation.
05
future
As one of the new domestic forces, the first product created a new track with a price of 570,000-800,000. This track is something that independent brands have not dared to try in the past, and it is also the least optimistic about people.
Yes, the HiPhi X still has imperfections and small flaws. However, in recent months, Gaohe's sales performance in the market segment it is in is not bad, and even not losing the traditional luxury brand pure electric products at the same price. Allowing consumers to abandon traditional luxury brands to choose Gaohe also shows that this brand does have something. Looking back, it seems that there were no independent brand products that could earn a better return rate on the street than supercars.
The safety of Gaohe HiPhi X is only the basis of the vehicle itself, the C-NCAP five-star evaluation is a compulsory course, and the design of the winggate door, body shape, etc. are electives. Being able to do a good job of elective courses on the basis of compulsory courses and do a successful job is actually a sign of the rapid development of our own brand.
At the Gaohe Technology Safety Workshop on January 12, the CEO of Gaohe Automobile also said: "Gaohe's future products will be more amazing, and they will not be defined by price." At present, the second car, HiPhi Z, has clarified the positioning of its flagship, and Ding Lei has also revealed that future products will explore the more popular market. Therefore, we may also look forward to seeing whether Gaohe's next product can decentralize personality and luxury to gain more market share.
Author: Jiang Xiaohei
Edit: Reinhardt
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