At this Beijing Auto Show, it is obvious that the joint venture car companies are making efforts towards the mid-to-high-end market of more than 200,000 yuan. Chinese brands, on the other hand, have chosen to be quite down-to-earth and continue to put pressure on the 150,000-yuan market. For a long time, we have talked about the rise of Chinese brands, which is to overtake by virtue of new energy. However, since the Beijing Auto Show, in the field of ordinary economic cars, domestic cars and joint ventures no longer need to rely on the advantages of electrification.
Copying homework, staring at Volkswagen Toyota?
Among the three major parts of the traditional car, the gearbox is dying, the engine is fighting, and the importance of the chassis has been inherited in its entirety, and even increased. Since new energy vehicles often mean larger models, heavier bodies, and stronger performance, the carrying capacity, strength and flexibility of the chassis also have higher requirements. For example, the BYD Qin L released at the Beijing Auto Show, its body width has reached 1.9 meters, and the axle-to-length ratio has also been significantly improved, which is extremely rare in the traditional 150,000 yuan class car.
So what have been the changes in the chassis structure of the BYD Qin L? Judging from the pictures on the spot, the new car adopts a very standard three-horizontal and one-longitudinal four-link structure. When this structure is advertised, it is often called a multi-link, and some brands will even directly call it a rear double wishbone structure. In fact, broadly speaking, the four-link and the standard five-link can be regarded as the targeted design of the rear axle of the double wishbone (by extension, the three-link is actually a MacPherson variant of the rear axle). Specifically, the four-link extremely thick lower control arm plays a good supporting role. The stability of the tires when bouncing is enhanced. The crux of the problem lies in the trailing arm, as the only longitudinal control arm in the four-link structure, its displacement performance and torsional resistance determine the vehicle's handling limit, comfort and even NVH performance.
In general, the majority of models in this class with four-link suspension are prioritized for comfort tuning. In a way, this sacrifices the vehicle's handling in cornering conditions. For example, when cornering on bumpy roads, the swing of the rear wheels outwards will be relatively obvious. Even so, the handling limit of the four-link suspension is already crushing at the 150,000 yuan level. The best examples happen to be the excellent players of the platform-based car manufacturing concept, Toyota TNGA and Volkswagen MQB. The latter can maintain the reputation of classic IPs such as Golf and Sutar at this price point. The former is to change the traditional chassis impression of Corolla and other models, and raise the handling and comfort of Toyota's models within 200,000 yuan to another dimension.
It is worth mentioning that Toyota's TNGA architecture is a four-link rear axle structure that is widely used on the C platform (Corolla) and K platform (Camry). The platform's low center of gravity is also evident. This is a rare and valuable vehicle in a transverse platform fuel vehicle. However, the BYD Qin L, which has caught up with Toyota and Volkswagen in terms of chassis structure, also has an innate advantage brought by new energy. That is, the lower center of gravity brought by the power battery, as well as the elimination of the gearbox, after reducing the engine displacement, there is more freedom in the vehicle counterweight.
The above highlights are visibly helpful to the naked eye in terms of vehicle space and handling limits. You know, one of the biggest disadvantages of the four-link rear suspension is the squeezing of the space in the car by the trailing arm. This is also the core reason why after the Toyota Corolla changed to the TNGA architecture, the driving quality has been significantly improved, but the rear space has "grown in reverse". In terms of technical framework, BYD Qin L has the potential to optimize this disadvantage. Of course, this also needs the power battery of the chassis part, which is another topic.
The chassis of domestic cars exceeds that of joint ventures?
In fact, the operation of BYD Qin L is also the trend of the times. From BYD's point of view, whether it is a more high-end BYD seal, the standard rear five-link suspension structure is directly adopted. Or the more entry-level BYD Dolphin, switching from torsion beam suspension to rear four-link independent suspension. Its products with a price of 10-200,000 yuan are all replaced with a more high-end chassis structure. From this point alone, there is no doubt that it is ahead of the joint venture products in the same price range.
Taking the opportunity of the Beijing Auto Show, let's also take a look at the chassis operation of other Chinese brands at similar price points. Chery Automobile, which made a reputation on Chery A3 with a set of independent rear suspension ten years ago, has shown off its operation in the new energy era. The Chery iCAR 03, which has been on the market before, plays with the H-arm multi-link rear suspension and the operation of the "girder-like" design given by the battery pack. This is almost a masterpiece of chassis rigidity that can be seen in the category of passenger cars, except for non-native girders and monolithic axle structures. And its price is even within 150,000 yuan. In fact, the chassis of Chery iCAR 03 has already laid the foundation for the later iCAR V23 series, which only needs to continue to emphasize its off-road attributes.
Also using H-arm multi-link are Deep Blue Automobile and Changan Qiyuan. Extending it here, H-arm multi-link suspension is not widely used in the era of fuel vehicles. It's an option that balances support, handling, and plenty of room for a high-horsepower motor on the rear axle. That is to say, at most the fuel vehicles with four-wheel drive structure need to be arranged on the rear axle, and in most cases, H-arm multi-link is not used. Moreover, the H-arm itself must be cast in aluminum alloy, which means that it is impractical to save costs at the manufacturing end. For joint venture products covering the price of 150,000 yuan, the adjustment skills are their advantage, and the material used for the roll is not so cost-effective.
At this Beijing Auto Show, Mazda, which is known for its handling, is also interested in this set of H-arm multi-link. The rear suspension of the Mazda EZ-6 is obviously similar to the aforementioned Changan series players, and belongs to the replica level. Although it is reported that the tuning part will be done by Mazda itself. But the ability of Chinese brands to stack materials on chassis at the same price range may have made it difficult for joint venture brands to parry. You must know that Mazda models at this price are still using a large number of torsion beam structures.
Unlike Chery, Changan and other old Chinese car companies that are keen on making a fuss about control, Geely's painting style is more comfortable, which is most thoroughly reflected in Geely Galaxy. The previously released Galaxy E8 features a direct front MacPherson and rear standard five-link comfort package. On the Geely Galaxy L6 and L7 models, which do not emphasize the rear axle motor, they directly adopt the same rear E-type multi-link structure as BYD. This tendency towards comfort also laid the foundation for the next pure electric new car, the Galaxy E5.
Write at the end:
Full-frame subframe, multi-link independent suspension, aluminum alloy material. These chassis designs and materials, which used to mean high-end on joint venture brand models and rarely devolved to the price of 150,000 yuan, are no longer rare in today's Chinese brand models. On the contrary, under the design concept of electrification, a better chassis has become a necessity. This trend is rapidly sinking from new energy vehicles of more than 200,000 yuan to 100,000 yuan. Because the demands of electrification are the same, the marginal effect of car manufacturing is also the same. The latter happens to be something that the joint venture giant teaches Chinese brands, and electrified cornering overtaking is also being staged in another form in the chassis part.