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Volvo delivers 74-tonne electric truck
- TheJoeMan 3y agoThe technological innovation pace in large capacity batteries and motors for EV’s is very inspiring. However, everything has externalities that seem to be ignored or remembered only after the fact. The USA’s roads have a score of D <1>. These electric trucks are tremendously heavy, and road wear is proportional to vehicle weight to the 4th power! <2>. A possible future innovation might be reinventing the highway pavement system, either materials or methodology of resurfacing. <1> https://infrastructurereportcard.org/cat-item/roads-infrastructure/ https://infrastructurereportcard.org/cat-item/roads-infrastr... <2> https://www.insidescience.org/news/how-much-damage-do-heavy-trucks-do-our-roads https://www.insidescience.org/news/how-much-damage-do-heavy-...
- someplaceguy 3y ago[flagged]
- bryanlarsen 3y agoThis vehicle has 10 axles, so it should put less wear on the road than a typical truck&trailer with 5 axles with a capacity of 45-55 tonnes of cargo. Wear is directly proportional to the number of axles.
- SoftTalker 3y agoBut more tires, more tire wear, more micro-plastic pollution from the tire wear, etc.
- bryanlarsen 3y agoNope. Twice the number of tires means half the weight per tire. Half the weight means 1/16 of the wear per tire. Twice the number is 2X, so overall 1/8 the impact.
- TerrifiedMouse 3y agoAny reason why we don’t put as many tires on (existing) trucks as possible? Seem like a good deal reducing tire wear.
- Rebelgecko 3y agoTruck drivers don't have to pay for the negative externalities of tire wear
- paulclinger 3y agoIt will complicate the control of the truck and add more components (increasing the cost).
- rootusrootus 3y agoIt would probably increase wear, not decrease it. When a vehicle with more than one non-steering axle turns, some of the tires must slide. It's mostly not too noticeable unless the corner is fairly tight or the trailer has at least three axles. You don't really want any more wheels on the ground than you need to support the load. Or you need to allow those axles to pivot. Heck, even with my modest two-axle travel trailer I leave tire marks on my driveway where I have to turn sharply to get it onto the road.
- dgacmu 3y agoIncreased friction -> uses more gas/energy. Complicated the mechanical design; more moving parts you have to maintain in a more crowded area.
- mc32 3y agoI think we need to look at it as a throughput question. How do we transport X tonnage from pt A to pt B? What’s more efficient? One truck with more axles or two separate trucks, with fewer, for example; taking into consideration roadwear, tire wear, bridge capacity, etc.
- smolder 3y agoFewer vessels for fewer total trips is the more efficient option as a rule. See: cargo trains and gigantic container ships. Australia has some super long cargo trucks they allow called road-trains, I think, which are justifiable if you can fit them onto roads. The thing that needs to be balanced in the case of # of axles is the cost of outfitting each truck with additional axles and associated suspension/braking hardware versus the savings in tire costs due to reduced wear on the larger number of tires.
- smolder 3y agoI wanted to add that there are a bunch of factors at play in this optimization problem that might not be obvious. For example, there are diminishing returns in reduced wear from distributing load over more tires at some point. More tires & rolling parts also tend to increase rolling resistance, even ignoring extra weight that tends to come with a more complex design. Another potential advantage of having more axles is to reduce the frontal area of the vehicle by arranging tires in the direction of travel instead of putting them side by side on the same axle. Frontal area is a big component of the drag on a vehicle, along with speed and drag coefficient.
- dontlaugh 3y agoProbably a train. Doesn’t even need to carry its own electricity source.
- jillesvangurp 3y agoThey aren't really that much more heavy than normal trucks. We're talking a couple of percent of the useful payload here. They aren't 'tremendously' heavy but just about the same weight give or take a couple of percent. A couple of tonnes of battery goes a long way. And it's not like big diesel engines, assorted plumbing and other systems, and a couple of hundred of gallons of fuel weigh nothing. There's no need for new pavements, or any other solutions for a perceived problem that simply does not exist.
- samwillis 3y ago> reinventing the highway pavement system A number of years ago there was a demo of a technology where they mixed (something like) iron filings in the asphalt. By slowly driving over it with a massive electromagnet they could heat the asphalt from within, helping to fix any small cracks before water ingress could cause a larger problem.
- xethos 3y ago> The idea is that HCT will contribute to [...] reduced road wear [...]. One example is Finland, where it is permitted to drive with 76 tonnes of total weight and 34,5m truck combinations on most roads. Another is Sweden, where it is allowed to drive 74 tonnes... Apparently it can actually reduce road wear, likely due to using fewer trucks (and therefore fewer axles), despite the absolutely massive size of the semi featured in TFA. Considering how close the truck matches the length and weight limits of the road networks listed, I strongly suspect it was explicitely designed around said limits. Possibly coupled with a margin for safety and human inaccuracy at the weigh scale, or simply lowest common denominator for limits in a market not listed.
- stephenitis 3y ago[flagged]
- abenga 3y agoEvery LLM-unrelated story always has a comment saying "I asked GPT this-that-or-the-other and it said x." Why? What do these tangents add to the conversations?
- abenga 3y agoLLM-unrelated stories here always have at least one comment saying "I asked GPT this-that-or-the-other and it said x." Why? What do these tangents add to the conversations?
- bear141 3y agoProbably because people pay for the service and then feel the need to justify its expense at any opportunity no matter how appropriate.
- SAI_Peregrinus 3y agoNo, road wear is proportional to the weight on each axle to the 4th power. More axles (like this tandem-trailer truck) can distribute the weight. Of course that means more wheels needed, so more tires and other components. Tire wear also scales with axle weight (among other factors). Total environmental impact depends on more than just the weight. The added weight isn't good, but may be offset by the other design changes.
- TerrifiedMouse 3y agoSo what's the downside to more tires?
- netsharc 3y agohttps://www.washington.edu/news/2020/12/03/tire-related-chemical-largely-responsible-for-adult-coho-salmon-deaths-in-urban-streams/ https://www.washington.edu/news/2020/12/03/tire-related-chem... EVs' heavier weight also cause more tire wear, creating more fine dust...
- Rebelgecko 3y agoIs that based on the EV's overall weight, or is it proportional to the amount (or maybe contact area) of the tires?
- MagicMoonlight 3y agoThe world is burning and you’re acting like dust matters. I’m so tired of this shit.
- kzrdude 3y agoAnd the strength of guard rail needed to keep the vehicle in its lane is also proportional to .. the square of the weight (kinetic energy) if I could guess?
- throwaway892238 3y agoThe size of the fire from one of these trucks getting into an accident is going to be impressive
- benj111 3y agoYes, it would almost be like the fires you have today, when a truck explodes that's carrying fuel for all the other fuel using vehicles.
- AtlasBarfed 3y agoI've been pretty frustrated with the slow adoption of EV and PHEVs for large trucks. EV drivetrains are so much better suited to heavy trucks for everything but range (thus... the hybrid). The insane torque they can deliver, the energy recovery in braking, simply is a revolution for them. The Tesla demo showed that being barely able to go up a mountain is a thing of the past with an EV drivetrain. I had to drive an RV with a friend over the Appalachans, and then the constant undulating foothills of the eastern midwest. What is especially annoying is the automatic transmission can't handle the climbs without careful metering of torque by the driver, otherwise it does a loud and jerky downshift. EV drivetrains would have none of that. The range? Put a generator onboard. For RVs they already have one in most cases. The stability of the entire system would be enhanced with floor batteries. interior and storage space would improve. You have a huge room for solar cells, and for RVs, the roll-out sunshade could be further solar cell real estate. The weight issue will improve with density. Sulfur, solid state, and semi-solid state are in the wings. But again, a hybrid drivetrain would reduce the amount of batteries needed and improve range. We should have mandated the development of hybrid drivetrains in all wheeled transport two decades ago, which is five years after the Insight and Prius hit the market.
- perilunar 3y ago> The range? Put a generator onboard A small trailer with a genset and extra luggage space would be enough to convert an compact electric car into a touring car. Even better if you could rent one only when you need it.
- benj111 3y ago>A possible future innovation might be reinventing the highway pavement system, either materials or methodology of resurfacing Yes. Perhaps we could replace tarmac and tyres with steel. Obviously there would be grip implications, so we could cut grooves in the road, and add flanges to the wheels.
- beretguy 3y agoHow about electric train or something instead? Something electric, but more efficient? Is there something, anyone knows?
- nisa 3y agoIt's already there - https://www.alstom.com/press-releases-news/2023/8/alstom-and-verkehrsverbund-mittelsachsen-present-new-battery-powered-electric-train-germany https://www.alstom.com/press-releases-news/2023/8/alstom-and... Hydrogen is also already used for trains - https://www.alstom.com/solutions/rolling-stock/alstom-coradia-ilint-worlds-1st-hydrogen-powered-passenger-train https://www.alstom.com/solutions/rolling-stock/alstom-coradi...
- konart 3y agoSeriously? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electric_multiple_unit https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electric_multiple_unit
- nottorp 3y agoHmm in the long run it's probably more efficient to install wires on train tracks. If you meant battery powered trains that is. Guess it would work as a stopgap measure.
- zardo 3y agoWhile every other country comes to that conclusion, somehow in the US we keep deciding that running wires is too expensive and we can save money with hydrogen fuel cells or fast charging batteries. Probably because the cost numbers for systems that have never been demonstrated can get away with magical optimism, while existing technologies are constrained by historical data.
- rootusrootus 3y agoThere should be pretty reliable data on electrification costs for a freight railway and how the operational costs add up. If it were a substantial business advantage over diesel-electric, why aren't the privately owned rail companies doing it already?
- sulam 3y agoThe truck is not 74 tons, it's capable of moving that weight in cargo. Title update would be nice.
- imoverclocked 3y agoThis is how trucks are referred to. A 74 ton truck is not expected to weigh 74 tons.
- sulam 3y agoThat's great. Do we expect the typical HN reader to know this? While I don't think I'm 100% representative, I looked at that title and thought "wow, that's a really big truck! Is it used for mining?"
- postalrat 3y agoWhat do you think the typical HN reader thinks when they hear "1 ton pickup truck"?
- el_benhameen 3y agoI’m all for keeping the original title, but thanks to your comment I’m one of “today’s 10,000” to realize what that term means. And I grew up around trucks!
- talldatethrow 3y agoEven better, when they hear commercials for America's best selling half ton truck, did they really think it weighed 1000 lbs?
- sulam 3y agoTruthfully I didn't think much about it, but yes I assumed that was their weight, in the same way that a heavy-weight boxer fights in a particular weight class.
- kvetching 3y agoDiesel is much more energy efficient than batteries.
- csours 3y agoSure, and dumping mercury from your gold mine is cheap.
- bcrl 3y agoExternalities make everything cheaper than it should be.
- kube-system 3y agoUnfortunately, the best way to turn diesel into motion is an internal combustion engine, and internal combustion engines have very poor efficiency.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- dev_tty01 3y agoBased on all the diesel locomotives out there, the best way to turn diesel into motion is with a diesel engine running at optimal conditions driving an electric generator which in turn runs electric motors for the drive wheels. At least for very large loads, they are much more efficient per ton of goods than a diesel truck.
- SigmundA 3y agoDiesel electric drive are only around 80% efficient while a mechanical transmission is 95%+. It is a misconception that trains use them for efficiency, trains get their efficiency from low rolling resistance from steel wheels on steel tracks and aero efficiency from all the cars drafting together. The electric drive is needed for simplicity of routing power to wheels and for the precise traction control needed to get the train moving without slipping the wheels.
- davideg 3y ago> The truck runs 12 hours a day, with a stop for charging when the driver takes a break I'm curious how much range it gets before needing a charge, and how long it takes to charge during that break. Running 12 hours a day doesn't tell us anything about distance covered.
- SoftTalker 3y agoMy question as well. The next sentence says: "In the long term, the truck will also run between Gothenburg and the city of Borås, 70 km from Gothenburg." So the implication is that it's not being used for that distance yet. 70km is really not very far. Great if you can take some short haul diesels off the road I guess, but that's not even a 1-hr drive on most roads.
- baseline-shift 3y agoDistance isn't the only issue. Nobody needs that kind of power in a truck to get around in. But short haul and heavy duty like in a mine, this would be very handy.
- esel2k 3y agoRecent documentary where those heavy CAT loaders in Sweden mines are electric: https://youtu.be/V5aDnIfBCKA?si=aQevXe13IjjFkgRQ https://youtu.be/V5aDnIfBCKA?si=aQevXe13IjjFkgRQ
- favorited 3y agoGermany is also experimenting with electrified highways, where trucks charge their batteries via a pantograph for stretches of the autobahn. Of course, they're also shuttering nuclear plants and reopening coal plants, so you might call it a step forward and a half-step backward... https://www.dw.com/en/germany-tests-first-ehighway-autobahn/a-48632817 https://www.dw.com/en/germany-tests-first-ehighway-autobahn/...
- imtringued 3y ago
- ChuckMcM 3y agoThat is pretty cool, it has definitely been an interesting electric truck week. I especially like Volvo USA's Electric VNR series (https://www.volvotrucks.us/trucks/vnr-electric/ https://www.volvotrucks.us/trucks/vnr-electric/). As someone who tries to curate a wider notification network of new technologies, I found this 'hole' in my sources on electric truck availability/deployment kind of notable. Now I'm going to need to find some sort of 'Transport News' type publication that summarizes these things monthly or quarterly :-).
- kramerger 3y agoI believe I speak for everyone here when I say this: This calls for a new van Damme commercial. Edit: the old one https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=M7FIvfx5J10 https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=M7FIvfx5J10
- kwhitefoot 3y agoIf someone else does it would it have the same impact? I think part of the reason it worked so well is because Van Damme was well known for exactly that sort of stunt. But Van Damme is 63. Even though I'm sure he is fitter, faster, and more supple than 99% of the population of any age if he could do that again now that would be quite some achievement I think. Even with safety lines.
- avar 3y agoThe original commercial has Van Damme using safety lines.
- js2 3y agoIf Tom Cruise at 61 can ride a motorcycle off a cliff six times, Van Damme at 63 can surely still do a split between two trucks. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-lsFs2615gw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-lsFs2615gw
- slim 3y agoor you can have a stunt man do it, then make a fake making of video where van damme pretends he did it
- raffraffraff 3y agoBasically, Tom Cruise is the world's wealthiest stuntman. I'd love to know the carbon footprint per second of video for that scene. And honestly, would it have looked worse had it been created using CGI?
- js2 3y ago
- btbuildem 3y agoI wonder how good their regenerative braking is -- that's a lot of kinetic energy to both have to stop effectively and to take advantage of as, well, energy. Most diesel trucks use a jake brake / engine brake because the wheel brakes would otherwise wear out relatively fast, or even overheat and fail on longer downhills. Seems like in-wheel motors are just about perfect for this application, and if they can put a reasonable fraction of that energy back into the batteries, even better.
- simondotau 3y agoThere's no theoretical reason why it can't be good. The Tesla Semi is capable of significant regenerative braking capacity over long downhill stretches. Tesla's marketing claim featured a route which included Grapevine Mountain — which has a 4136ft elevation. They assert that it was capable of continuous regenerative braking, though it's not clear how much friction braking was involved. (It's almost certain that some trailer braking was involved for safety and stability.)
- kalleboo 3y agoIn the interview with Jay Leno they said you can do Grapevine "without ever touching the brake" which I interpreted as 100% regenerative
- martin8412 3y agoIt's capable of jack shit until they release it and let independent reviewers without NDAs review it.
- jasonwatkinspdx 3y agoIn wheel are bad unless you really need the compactness. In general on a vehicle you want to minimize the unsprung mass. Also the geometry of the wheel restricts you to mostly axial geometry, where as radial electric motors can be made as long as you want. These trucks can charge at 160kw, so yeah they can put some pretty serious power back into that battery during regenerative braking.
- m463 3y ago
- gumby 3y agoPretty dammning for that Tesla / Pepsi report from yesterday: https://bradmunchen.substack.com/p/scoop-the-tesla-semi-from-an-insiders https://bradmunchen.substack.com/p/scoop-the-tesla-semi-from... https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38297765 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38297765
- kortilla 3y agoI don’t think an article from a blogger with no source really carries much weight.
- martin8412 3y agoIt carries the same weight as press statements from Tesla on a semi never released into the hands of the public without NDAs.
- kortilla 3y agoNo it doesn’t because one of them is actually doing something…
- mdgrech23 3y agoThis is silly. We need to start viewing gas as a precious resource and treating it as such which means creating cities that don't take a car to get around in.
- rootusrootus 3y agoYes, absolutely, but what would you like to do for the next 100 years while we make that happen? Keep on burning dug up fossils?
- tuwtuwtuwtuw 3y agoAre you proposing we should stick with gas vehicles until all cities on earth has been redesigned to not need cars and trucks?
- paravz 3y agoExtra battery in the trailer can make it go so much further. And make battery in the trailer replaceable during a "charge" stop
- andersrs 3y agoGermany is doing something with electrified truck lanes on the highway. The trucks get charged through a pantograph as they're travelling.
- seb1204 3y agoSounds good but it will require long stretches of infrastructure to be electrified or am I wrong?
- askiiart 3y agoIf we base our numbers off the Mercedes truck elsewhere in the thread [1], then that takes 1 hour to charge a 600 kW battery, which can go for about 600 mkles. If we assume a speed of about 60 miles per hour, then that only requires a bit over 10% of the road to be electrified (60 miles out of every 600, I'd recommend splitting it up to 15 miles every 150). And maybe add a bit more to be safe, plus charging at rest stops in case the vehicle is low on battery when it gets get on the highway, and some more depending on the terrain (e.g. more up mountains than down). That being said, the Volvo being discussed only charges at 180 kW/h, and the article doesn't have battery or range information. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38315909 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38315909
- baseline-shift 3y agoI can see EV for next-gen mining equipment, the sort of behemoth that the wheels alone dwarf a man standing next to one - and still needded for mining new climate tech energy likel lithium, copper, silicon - but jeez, just some truck?
- micwag 3y agoNot quite a behemoth but there is already a 120 ton mining EV: https://www.emining.ch/ https://www.emining.ch/
- XorNot 3y agoEV for mining is already a big deal: you don't want to run diesel equipment underground in an enclosed space. The optimisation for mining would be replacing more of the surface diesel generators with solar + batteries as a logistics optimisation.
- kalleboo 3y agoI thought mining equipment like that already was electric? 1978: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bagger_288 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bagger_288 > Gross power: 16.56 megawatts of externally supplied electricity
- pornel 3y agoThere is an electric mining truck: https://electrek.co/2022/11/23/caterpillar-demonstrates-first-battery-electric-792-large-mining-truck/ https://electrek.co/2022/11/23/caterpillar-demonstrates-firs... Already in operation: https://youtu.be/6TxMeHRq1mk?t=178 https://youtu.be/6TxMeHRq1mk?t=178
- baseline-shift 3y agoThe Ports of Los Angeles require decarbonization, and so this is not required to go great distance, but rather to spend a day moving containers around at the port.
- sheepscreek 3y agoCompared to Tesla, it seems Volvo’s gone a different route. While they don’t mention the total range, the trial distance being ~70km one way (with 12 hr/day duty cycle) suggests they might be targeting low distance heavy transport. Semi’s high range means it needs a bigger battery, combined with the non-stop use takes a large toll on them. Someone in the other post speculates the cost of replacing them could be $170k. Volvo’s model likely gets around that with smaller batteries - leading to lower cost of maintenance.
- kalleboo 3y agoThe current trial use of Semi with Pepsi seems to be the same use case as Volvo. They only have day-cabs, and every day Semi returns to the transport hub. The long-range continuous-use stuff is still a future goal.
- laurencerowe 3y agoWhile there would be some efficiency savings from carrying around less weight, I'm not sure one should expect lower maintenance costs with smaller batteries since the wear per cell would be higher in inverse proportion to the size of the battery.
- sheepscreek 3y agoThat’s a fair point. Volvo fitted with smaller batteries but travelling a comparable distance as the Semi will result in more charge-discharge cycles for the Volvo. That can lead to more wear.
- 6stringmerc 3y agoWhere is the video of the Moose test or is that a Finn thing only? Moose bites and, uh, collisions with moose can be very nasti
- tomohawk 3y agoBy way of comparison, a loaded M1 Abrams tank weighs about the same. The wear and tear on roads will be enormous, and the extra particulates from the greatly increased tire wear are also concerning.
- mharig 3y agoPeanuts. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/worlds-largest-dump-truck-and-its-hybrid-180953812/ https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/worlds-largest-dum... As far as I know, there exists a full electric version of this truck, or of a comparable.