MAN delivers electric truck eTGM to nine customers
The utility vehicle manufacturer has completed production and handed over the first nine electric trucks of the eTGM line to member companies of the Austrian council for sustainable logistics (CNL) In the coming months, the XXL BEVs will be trialed in daily use.
Originally, the handover was supposed to take place at the end of 2017. Yet the selected companies Gebrüder Weiss, Hofer, Magna Steyr, Metro, Quehenberger Logistics, Rewe, Schachinger Logistik, Spar and the Stiegl brewery just now received their electric trucks for trial.
Specifically, the order includes four cooled vehicles, a beverage truck, three vehicles for interchangeable flatbeds and a semi-trailer truck. According to MAN, “the vehicles form a representative cross-section of the most common distribution transport tasks in urban logistics”.
The basis for the truck is provided by the MAN TGM truck model. The motor has a 264 kW capacity, with a maximum torque of 3,100 Nm and powered by lithium-ion batteries. In the 26 tonne variant, twelve battery packs are mounted, allowing for a 200 km range. The two-axle variant has up to eight batteries, allowing for a 130 km range. Charging can be completed via AC charging with 22 or 44 kW, as well as DC current with 150 kW.
Real world testing is part of the Megawatt project, funded with 3 million euros from a national programme to fund e-mobility in Austria. Ahead of the field testing, MAN has stated that they are looking to gain insights about charging strategies and optimised tour planning. Based on the lessons learned, MAN then plans to manufacture a small series of 50 to 100 vehicles, before launching into larger serial production by 2022. The small series will begin production this year, however the launch delay will likely see a similar delay with production as testing needs to be completed first.
The manufacturing of the test vehicles was done in the Austrian MAN factory near Steyr. There the production of the regular TGM series as well as TGL vehicles takes place next to the Truck Modification Center, which is a unit to manufacture small series and individual vehicles. In order to prepare the factory for a large-scale electrified production, MAN has invested a double-digit sum in the millions.
Furthermore, the electrification strategy will also include the development of an e-bus prototype by the end of the year, named Lion’s City E. This will be launched on the market in 2020, after a delay for an original plan to launch in 2019.
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