Now that battery-electrics seem firmly plugged into the transportation grid, hydrogen fuel-cell electrical automobiles (FCEVs) profit from the shortest odds for large adoption they’ve ever identified. That is nonetheless no assure, nevertheless. Basic Motors constructed the hydrogen-fuel-cell Electrovan in 1966, but at no time within the final 57 years has the commonest component within the universe merited even the notional optimism of “give it 5 years to take maintain.”
However that countdown timer is perhaps counting down, lastly. The Superior Clear Transportation Expo in Anaheim, California, lately gathered all of the bettors among the many alt-fuel ranks. The chorus from everybody we spoke to, on the subject of trucking, was “Hydrogen is right here.”
Hyundai is putting its first wager with the XCIENT, a Class 8 tractor on sale now and getting into fleet obligation on the Port of Oakland this summer time. The XCIENT FCEV adapts the arduous factors of the present, diesel-powered XCIENT semi that has been offered worldwide since 2013. This explains a number of the old-school bits tucked among the many new tech that helped get the XCIENT to market rapidly.
How Hyundai’s Hydrogen Gas-Cell Truck Works
Ten hydrogen tanks are organized two-up in a body behind the cab, rising to just about the 13-foot peak of the tractor’s roof fairing. The tanks maintain a quantity of a bit over 462 gallons of compressed hydrogen at over 10,000 psi, totaling 151 kilos of gasoline. Refilling from empty takes about half-hour. The tanks feed two hydrogen fuel-cell techniques underneath the cab, successfully the identical models discovered within the Hyundai Nexo FCEV crossover. Variations centered on bracing elements for the trials of a Class 8 obligation cycle. Every system accommodates two 121-hp stacks, for a mixed output of 483 horsepower.
As we wrote in our fuel-cell primer, stacks carry out greatest at a gentle energy output. Automakers tackle this through the use of the fuel-cell system to cost a high-voltage, low-capacity battery that powers the electrical motors turning the wheels. Within the XCIENT, the techniques energy a high-voltage, pretty high-capacity battery. The Nexo’s lithium-ion pack has a 40.0-kWh capability, whereas the three 24.0-kWh lithium-ion packs within the XCIENT equal a complete of 72.0 kWh.
The pack’s body bolts to the passenger-side body rail, reverse the cooling equipment hooked up to the driver-side rail. Nestled within the rails between them sits an electrical motor making 469 horsepower and 1650 pound-feet of torque. (By comparability, a diesel XCIENT makes as much as 512 horsepower and 1844 pound-feet.)
The motor hooks as much as an Allison six-speed automated transmission. For the reason that XCIENT’s high pushed velocity is simply 57 mph, the truck solely makes use of the primary 5 cogs within the field. We specify “pushed” as a result of a cruise-control offset characteristic permits the rig to achieve 9 mph over the cruise velocity when going downhill, so the gravity-assisted high velocity is 66 mph. The transmission housing accommodates a mechanical retarder that helps sluggish the truck when the battery is full and regen braking cannot be employed. Future evolutions will ultimately dispose of the standard gearbox and put electrical motors on the axles, eliminating the mechanical retarder and enhancing regen efficiency.
A driveshaft turns each tandem axles in again, creating the 6×4 drivetrain that is the norm for U.S. over-the-road Class 8 vehicles. With full tanks and when loaded to the 82,000-pound gross mixture weight restrict for electrical tractor-trailers, Hyundai claims the XCIENT can go 450 miles. Hyundai and different FCEV business car makers say the profit is not solely that these miles shall be far kinder on the atmosphere in comparison with miles put down through diesel, they’re going to be far kinder to drivers as properly.
Driving the Hyundai XCIENT Hydrogen Gas-Cell Truck
First, drivers should make the unexpectedly excessive ascent into the cab. The U.S. market has most popular typical vehicles, the sort with engines out entrance, which have a decrease cab flooring. In a cab-over just like the XCIENT, the place the physique must clear the entire peak and width of the engine, getting seated is like climbing a ship’s ladder to a bosun’s chair.
A well-known truck structure greets those that attain the summit. Analog gauges within the cluster flank a central display screen displaying car data. A small infotainment show within the middle console is angled towards the driving force. On the steering wheel and sprint, a number of rows of buttons handle features akin to altering airbag stress, activating comfort options akin to hill-hold help, biking via the infotainment, and controlling the HVAC.
Two stalks emerge from the best facet of the steering column. Transfer the higher stalk up and right down to shuffle via the 4 ranges of regenerative braking, and it may also be pushed or pulled to pick the very best gear allowed. (When descending an extended hill, setting third gear as the utmost caps the truck’s velocity with regeneration slightly than the friction brakes.) The decrease stalk is the shift lever; turning the knob on the finish of the stalk modifications gears.
Our six-mile take a look at drive encompassed two rectangular laps round Anaheim’s metropolis streets. The XCIENT’s solely foible made itself obvious earlier than we left the car parking zone: brake-pedal programming. The primary smidgen of journey did not appear to have any impact, adopted by each brake pad latching onto its drum with haste. Cab-overs naturally jiggle much more than the standard rigs we’re used to, being hinged on the entrance bumper and missing the damping impact of six ft of engine forward of the bulkhead. Mixed with the abrupt brake actuation, solely as soon as did we handle to decelerate or come to a cease with out making the XCIENT shimmy.
In each different approach, the take a look at drive presaged vastly extra nice workdays for truckers. Driving a turbodiesel massive rig is to be submerged in pressing noise, vibration, and harshness for the 11 hours a day that federal legislation permits truck drivers to spend behind the wheel. If the truck should run whereas parked, the NVH turns into a lullaby for the day’s remaining 13 hours.
The result’s that every one the soothing benefits credited to electrical vehicles rely exponentially extra for heavy vehicles and their pilots. The XCIENT’s idling, driving, and sturdy acceleration at each velocity are accompanied solely by the occasional muted whine, simply ignored. Conversations could be held at a pure quantity, a marvel in a giant rig. The XCIENT is so carlike and straightforward to drive, in actual fact—simply thoughts your mirrors and the turning circle—that its truck-size steering wheel feels comically giant. We additionally drove the Nikola TRE FCEV Class 8 truck and a BYD battery-electric Class 8 in Anaheim, and one afternoon made it clear that electrical vehicles are excellent as each workplaces and beasts of burden.
These outdoors the truck profit too. Hyundai is focusing first on the drayage market, which affords brief, common routes anchored at industrial places appropriate for hydrogen refilling stations. Drayage vehicles spend loads of time idling in residential areas round ports whereas they wait their flip to seize a load. Hydrogen energy silences the cacophony native residents have been compelled to take heed to and likewise improves the air these of us breathe.
Hyundai hasn’t stated but how a lot the brand new XCIENT prices. It would say that it expects present state and federal clean-vehicle subsidies to place the XCIENT FCEV at value parity with present diesel fashions over a service lifetime of six to eight years. That is excellent news for fleets, for truck drivers, and for residents in areas with a lot of truck site visitors.
