Recently, there seems to be an increase in the number of "square box" off-road vehicles.
Off-road SUVs have become popular again with the east wind of new energy. This is another segment that has been relatively niche in the past that has been unearthed after market diversification.
At first glance, off-road and new energy seem to be inherently not a pair of words that can be put together, but it has indeed been combined in the past two years. From 100,000 to 1 million, we can find new energy off-road vehicles of various levels and positioning. But there are also many people who say that this is a false proposition, just to further tap the market potential in order to have a product.
What does adding electricity to off-road bring?
As the name suggests, it is to add the attributes of new energy to the off-road vehicle. The new energy attribute is added, and the off-road SUV is changed in product characteristics through the attribute of electric drive.
If classified, the new energy off-road vehicle can be simply divided into pure electric and hybrid, and the hybrid can be divided into plug-in hybrid and extended range, which is not much different from ordinary new energy vehicles. However, in hybrid off-road vehicles, we can also roughly divide into those that mainly use oil, such as the tank Hi4-T, and those that mainly use electricity, such as the Leopard Leopard 5, according to oil + electricity.
Needless to say, pure electric can use the characteristics of the motor to have more power, and can put aside the traditional mechanical differential lock, through different motors to form a point four-wheel drive system, with a more flexible form of power output. In addition to the fact that the range extender can generate electricity from the engine, the electric four-wheel drive system composed of the front and rear motors is also similar.
In the plug-in hybrid structure, the Great Wall Hi4-T with P2 architecture is a typical traditional mechanical structure, based on non-decoupled mechanical four-wheel drive and front and rear differential locks, and through the P2 motor integrated in the 9AT gearbox, it is mainly oil-based and supplemented by electricity, which plays a role in strengthening power and pure electric commuting for the whole car. Moreover, even if the motor fails, it will still not cause qualitative damage to the system, avoid safety problems caused by motor failure outdoors, and greatly improve reliability.
The electric attributes of the equation leopard leopard 5 are stronger, the front axle 1.5T engine + motor and the motor of the rear axle are not connected by a hard mechanical transmission shaft, the front and rear axles are simulated by the electronic control system "energy lock", and the front differential lock is integrated in the front axle gearbox, and the rear differential lock is integrated in the rear axle motor, thus forming an electric four-wheel drive system that can independently control the wheels, and the power output and flexibility of the four-wheel drive system are realized by the electric drive structure.
To put it simply, on the one hand, new energy off-road can increase the off-road ability of the vehicle.
First of all, the biggest advantage of electric drive is power, more torque and faster response, which can allow us to have a better experience and passability in more difficult scenes or high-altitude areas, which is similar to adding turbo to self-priming. The second is a more flexible and fast drive form, which makes it easier to switch between the front and rear axles and the distribution of power to the four wheels, without having to match complex mechanical structures. Models like the ones we mentioned above have been significantly enhanced in these areas.
On the other hand, it can increase the convenience of commuting.
In the past, hard off-road vehicles are not common in the city, because of its demand for off-road, non-load-bearing body, non-independent suspension, AT tires, high fuel consumption, etc., all make it very painful to drive in the city, we can see a few special models in the city, such as Prado, Wrangler, Mercedes-Benz G, etc., which basically have their "status symbol" factors.
However, with new energy, electric drive makes it possible for hardcore off-road vehicles to commute daily.
This brings us to the concept of "light off-road" that began to emerge in the past two years. For ordinary consumers, although they do not have the time and ability to often go to a specific place to engage in hardcore off-road or crossing, it does not prevent them from having a heart that yearns for off-road, so it has also given birth to a series of so-called "light off-road" models that are tough above the shape, have certain or even slight off-road ability, can take into account daily use at the same time, and have a more friendly threshold.
In a way, this is a further extension of the role of urban SUVs in the past, which overtook sedans to become the biggest flashpoint in the market, precisely because people felt that their better passability and spatial performance could be used for urban commuting, but also allowed everyone to go out for a car occasionally. But in fact, in actual use, the ability of urban SUVs is not extreme enough, and the current light off-road SUV is to further meet this part of the demand, making commuting more convenient and off-road easier through new energy attributes.
Now, when you use pure electric mode to commute in the city, not only does it not have the high noise and high fuel consumption of the past, but also accelerates faster, turns more quickly, and the cost of using the car also plummets because of the electricity you can use. On this basis, a hard-core eye-catching square box trend shape, coupled with a certain off-road ability, has become an all-rounder that takes into account both urban commuting and outdoor off-road.
Of course, because of electricity, new energy off-road vehicles can also provide more convenient small functions in the field. For example, the large battery can make the vehicle no longer on for a long time, and can use lights, music, air conditioning and other functions, and the external discharge function can support various outdoor electrical appliances in addition to the function of the vehicle itself, so that it is no longer necessary to use electricity as in the past, only with a generator;
It can be said that the new energy attribute further improves the off-road performance of the off-road category, and at the same time greatly strengthens the shortcomings in the past daily urban use scenarios.
Traditional fuel is not satisfied
In this way, new energy has really evolved a lot of off-road vehicles. However, there are also many people who scoff at it, thinking that this is just a market segment that has been made up for policy reasons.
Since it is a new energy off-road vehicle, rather than any other new energy vehicle, it is natural to meet the needs of off-road first. And for off-roading, reliability comes first in the eyes of many, not those bells and whistles. Since the off-road scenario is definitely more intense than the daily commute, the failure rate of more electronic components on electric vehicles is relatively higher than that of traditional mechanical structures under some extreme working conditions.
For example, under the high-intensity power demand, the motor will overheat, and the problem of heat dissipation needs to be considered, especially in the high temperature weather in the desert, and various unexpected situations often encountered in the field are not completely covered by the pre-test no matter how perfect it is. Another example is the indispensable battery on new energy vehicles, although there are various ways to protect and improve battery safety technology, it is inevitable that there will be failures or collisions, which will lead to battery fire and affect safety. Moreover, major components such as motors and batteries, once there is a failure or collision during off-road, it is difficult to repair them directly on site like fuel vehicles, leaving little chance of accidents.
Not only that, the expensive battery will also bring greater weight, the weight of the new energy off-road vehicle is generally more than 2.5 tons, like the most powerful U8, the weight of the car has even reached 3.5 tons. The weight of the vehicle will naturally obviously affect the passability and safety of the vehicle, especially in climbing, crossing, and desert, and the power is far from enough to make up for the disadvantages caused by the weight.
Another major criticism is the endurance of new energy off-road vehicles, which of course mainly refers to pure electric off-road vehicles. Due to the high off-road intensity, the energy consumption is naturally much higher than that of driving a car, just like the mobile phone has been playing games than just sending WeChat to make calls. Therefore, the battery life level will naturally shrink significantly, not to mention that the current pure electric off-road vehicles are generally only about 500km of the range level. But we can't expect to be able to find charging piles in ravines, jungles, and deserts at any time in outdoor scenes.
Even if it is a fuel vehicle, it is often due to long-distance crossing or high intensity and increase the auxiliary fuel tank, so that the driving distance can reach 1500km or even 2000km, and even the car is not enough to pull more oil with oil drums, which is obviously not possible for pure electric vehicles.
Obviously, there are still many technical limitations of new energy electric vehicles, such as reliability and energy replenishment problems there is no good solution at present, new energy off-road vehicles are certainly not able to replace traditional fuel off-road vehicles, traditional fuel off-road vehicles still have its place. Therefore, although it seems that there is no heat without new energy now, we can still see a lot of new fuel off-road cars launched on the market, from the Jet Traveler to the Ford Liema, and the Toyota Prado in the form of traditional hybrid HEVs.
Che Yun summary
The demand for new energy off-road vehicles definitely exists, and it is also inevitable for the current development of new energy. Perhaps with the development of technology, many problems will be solved in the future. Of course, with more diversified forms of power, we at least have more products that are more suitable for our needs than in the past. It is undeniable that with the wind of new energy blowing into the off-road field, today's off-road vehicle market has long been different from the past.
As for whether you recognize new energy vehicles, what do you think?