In the process of electrification, two battery technology routes have been formed in the current automotive industry, namely the "power exchange scheme" used by Weilai as the representative and the "CTC scheme" used by Tesla as the representative. The former intends to improve the convenience of power exchange through independent battery packs, while the latter focuses on highly integrating the battery cells with the body and loading more cells more efficiently. Due to the essential differences in structure, there is an antagonistic relationship between the two. Not long ago, zero-run cars made their own choices for this and firmly pursued the CTC technology solution represented by Tesla.
On April 25, Zero Run Auto released its self-developed "Zero Run Intelligent Power CTC Technology" and announced that it will share the technology for free and open. According to official information, the technology realizes the integration of the battery module and the car body, optimizes the space utilization rate and body rigidity of the vehicle, and helps to improve the comprehensive performance of the vehicle in many aspects.
Before the main text, let's first sort out the core information of this zero-run technology release:
1. Zero Run released smart power CTC technology and shared the technology for free
2. CTC technology is the integrated design of the battery, chassis and car body
3. CTC technology helps to improve space, endurance, body rigidity, and reduce manufacturing costs, but it will also increase the difficulty and cost of high maintenance in the later stage
4. Zero-run C01 will adopt this technology to achieve an endurance level of more than 700km
What is CTC: eliminate the battery pack, highly integrated
To understand CTC technology, we may wish to start with the design of the battery pack. From the stage point of view, we can divide the design scheme of the battery pack into three stages, namely "traditional scheme", "CTP scheme" and "CTC scheme".
In the initial traditional solution phase, engineers would package the cell into modules and pack them into battery packs. This structural design has a low degree of integration, which can provide more generous arrangement conditions for the thermal management system, protective layer and other parts. But at the same time, the low degree of integration also makes it difficult to load more batteries in a limited space, and the energy density is limited.
In order to solve this problem, some companies have developed larger modules, and some companies have chosen square batteries, all of which want to improve the energy density of the battery pack by "squeezing a squeeze", thereby improving the endurance level of the vehicle on the basis of limited space.
With the development of battery pack structure technology, engineers gradually found that it seems that removing the module can also achieve the layout of the accessory system, and the space saved can also be loaded with more cells. Thus, the "CTP scheme" came into being.
As the name suggests, CTP, or "Cell to Pack", is a technical solution that skips the module and integrates the battery cell directly into the battery pack. At present, the mid-to-high-end pure electric models on the market have applied this technology on a large scale.
As for the latest CTC scheme in the industry, it is also based on this idea that the battery pack link is cancelled and the battery cell is directly integrated into the chassis structure of the vehicle, thereby further improving the utilization efficiency of space in the perspective of the layout of the vehicle structure.
However, it should be pointed out that the CTC solution released by Zero Run this time is not the most radical "battery cell-chassis" in the industry, but "battery-module-chassis". Compared with the former, the difference between the zero-run CTC solution is that there is more intermediate link in the module, and the same is that it also omits the battery pack. Of course, from the results, despite the addition of the intermediate link of the module, the zero-run CTC solution can still be regarded as a positive innovation, effectively improving the overall performance of the vehicle.
Advantages of CTC: space, endurance, handling, cost
Understanding the meaning of CTP technology itself, let's take a look at the practical significance of CTP technology released by Zero Run. In terms of directly influencing the consumer car experience, the positive significance of CTC can be seen as three gains in two directions.
First of all, the biggest significance of CTP technology is the improvement of space utilization efficiency, which directly brings two benefits, namely, the improvement of battery life performance and the improvement of interior space.
Focusing on the former, due to the spatial advantages of CTC, in the latest zero-run product C01, its battery capacity space has increased by 14.5% compared with the traditional solution, which in turn has increased the endurance level by 10%, reaching the level of 700km+.
Also due to the spatial layout advantages of CTC, compared with the traditional battery layout scheme, the zero-run C01 has increased the vertical space of the body by 10mm, which optimizes the riding experience of the occupants in the car to a certain extent.
Focusing on the latter, due to the CTC layout, the battery pack is integrated with the chassis, forming a CTC double skeleton ring beam structure, and the torsional stiffness of the vehicle body can also be improved by 25%. For users, the core significance of this indicator is the improvement of control feelings and NVH.
In addition, because CTC technology simplifies the battery pack structure, it can also help car companies reduce the pressure of parts management, simplify the installation and manufacturing process, and help car companies improve efficiency in the production and manufacturing process. According to the official information of zero running, CTC technology has reduced the number of parts by 20% and the cost of structural parts by 15% compared with the traditional power battery layout scheme.
In addition, in terms of safety, based on the double skeleton ring beam structure, the physical collision safety of the battery pack can be effectively guaranteed. In the battery management system, Zero Run has developed the "AI BMS Big Data Intelligent Battery Management System", which combines and analyzes the BMS and cloud platforms, adding intelligent prediction capabilities in addition to traditional real-time monitoring. It can provide medium- and long-term early warning of battery status life according to the actual use of users, and more flexibly allocate energy.
The shortcomings of CTC: non-exchangeable, high maintenance costs Of course, a technology must have two sides, with advantages there will be drawbacks, CTC technology is the same. To focus on its negative effects, we must first consider the energy replenishment scenario. Due to the highly integrated relationship between the battery pack and the chassis, it will be difficult for vehicles applying the CTC solution to adapt to the power exchange and energy replenishment. After all, the power exchange mode is more in pursuit of the convenience of power exchange operation, which puts forward higher requirements for the independence of the battery pack, and the battery pack can be regarded as an indispensable part of the power exchange mode. The core advantage of the model using the CTC scheme is the cancellation of the battery pack structure, and the power exchange operation is almost impossible to achieve.
From the perspective of collision accidents, due to the integrated design of the battery pack and the chassis, when the chassis area of the vehicle is deformed by the collision, the maintenance plan will involve more overall structural parts, and the cost will also increase. Although for the former, Zero Run hopes to solve the problem of replenishment by introducing super fast charging through compatibility with future 800V high-voltage platforms. For the latter, the module that affects the space utilization in the structure also provides maintenance convenience to a certain extent, but the above negative impact is still not negligible for users.
CTC to Zero Run: Complete the Intelligent Power Puzzle
In the period of change in the industry, technology-driven is becoming the mainstream of the development of car companies. At last year's Guangzhou Auto Show, zero-run cars proposed the concept of "intelligent car complete body". Zero run believes that in order to achieve intelligent control of the whole vehicle, intelligent cockpit, intelligent driving and intelligent power are indispensable.
Previously, Zero Run has released the "Pangu Oil-cooled Electric Drive Assembly" intelligent electric drive technology, and the "CTC Battery Chassis Integration Technology" released this time belongs to intelligent battery technology, which together with the former supports the "smart power" technology sector of Zero Run. It can be said that the release of CTC technology is indeed a landmark step in the process of zero-run layout intelligent car self-development system.
Based on the above technology, zero-run's new electric medium- and large-sized sedan Zero-Run C01 built on the C platform will also be officially released soon. As the brand's new flagship, the Zero-Run C01 will achieve a 3-second acceleration capability, a 700-kilometer endurance and a 5-meter body length.
Although in terms of overall R&D investment, there is still a significant gap between the R&D expenses of zero run and "Wei Xiaoli", and the overall sales level of zero run is also a certain distance from "Wei Xiaoli", but looking at the development layout of zero run in the past year, we can still expect optimistic expectations for its medium-term development.
Relying on the zero-run T03 in the entry-level market and the zero-run C11 positioned for mid-size SUVs, the cumulative delivery volume of zero-run cars in the whole year of 2021 reached 43,121 units. Moreover, the monthly delivery of zero-run cars continued to achieve a relatively large month-on-month increase, and achieved deliveries of more than 10,000 in March this year, showing a positive development trend. We also have reason to believe that with the arrival of the new car C01, the overall sales of zero-run cars will be more strongly supported.