BYD presents batteries for electric construction machinery
According to reports from China, XCMG is the country’s largest construction machinery manufacturer. Although potential unit volumes are not mentioned, this partner gives BYD potentially great leverage in the sale of batteries for electric construction machinery. As is usual with BYD, the packs are based on LFP cells – the lithium iron phosphate chemistry is considered robust and does not require materials such as nickel and cobalt.
There is still no official announcement from BYD regarding the off-highway batteries. The CarNewsChina portal reported a few days ago that BYD would present such a battery at Bauma China. There are now some photos of the presentation on WeChat, on which CarNewsChina has based its current article.
BYD offers three different battery packs aimed at different applications. The ‘super hybrid’ battery is – as the name suggests – optimised for hybrid drives. The ‘super-fast charge’ battery is optimised for applications with short charging times, while the ‘super integration’ battery not only offers the largest packs, but also cell-to-body integration into the vehicles themselves – which brings its own challenges in the off-highway sector. In principle, all three battery packs are designed for use at temperatures between -40 and +65 degrees Celsius and can also be used at an altitude of 5,500 metres. At least that’s what BYD promises in the presentation.
The ‘super hybrid’ battery has an energy content of 17.3 kWh per pack, but several packs can be installed in a vehicle depending on requirements. However, as this only concerns short electric distances and support for the combustion engine, BYD focussed on a high charging rate of 4C. This type of battery should be able to be charged from 20 to 80 per cent in ten minutes. The energy density is 120 Wh/kg.
The ‘super-fast charging’ battery has an energy content of 37.7 kWh per pack and a higher energy density of 160 Wh/kg. The pack is designed for a service life of 7,000 cycles, whereby the battery can be charged and discharged with up to 400 amps. At 2C, the charging rate is not only lower than that of the hybrid battery, but also far from what is considered ‘super-fast charging’ – even if this term is not precisely defined. However, BYD calculates that a charging process of ten minutes should already allow 1.5 hours of working time.
Thanks to an energy density of 320 Wh/kg, the ‘super integration’ battery has an energy content of 97.7 kWh per pack. Here, too, the charging and discharging current is a maximum of 400 amps. As this battery is designed as a ‘cell to body’ concept, it has some special features for construction machinery. That is because vehicle vibrations play an important role in this application. The pack is thus designed to withstand these vibrations.
Mass production of the ‘super-integration’ battery is said to have already started; according to BYD, this is the first CTB battery for the construction machinery sector to be in series production. No specific vehicles with these batteries have yet been presented. However, in view of the partnership with XCMG and the fact that production has already started, this should soon be the case.
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