[TusharK]

Gurgaon-based Infraprime Logistics Technologies (IPLT) has unveiled its first all-electric truck called the Rhino 5536. The company is planning to launch it in the mid-haul logistics segment by 2020.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WXg3_7f7IUc

The Rhino 5536 is a 60-tonne electric truck. It uses an electric motor that has an output of 483 BHP and has a 276 kWh battery that is claimed to offer a range of 200-300 km. The top speed of the truck is claimed to be 90 km/h. The vehicle comes with an automatic transmission.

According to IPLT, the Rhino 5536 can be used for transporting construction materials. Production of the electric truck is scheduled to commence at the company's Faridabad plant from January 2020. IPLT aims to deploy 1,000 electric trucks on the road by end-2020 and about 10,000 trucks by 2021.

Source: Economic Times

Link to Team-BHP News

[aveoman19]

This is indeed amazing Just the idea of it is simply brilliant. Is there any IP rating for the battery system mentioned anywhere? I might have missed it. There is a problem of the trucks being not noticeable due to considerably less noise from the powertrain though. Hope they have thought through it

[COMMUTER]

Congratulations on bringing this great idea to fruition.

The first player in this EV field to bring about battery packs that can be swapped in minutes will be the ultimate winner in this arena. This will enable an operator to maintain a fleet of many trucks with a few additional packs.

[raystriker]

Originally Posted by COMMUTER

The first player in this EV field to bring about battery packs that can be swapped in minutes will be the ultimate winner in this arena. This will enable an operator to maintain a fleet of many trucks with a few additional packs.

This will probably never be a thing. It'd require an insane amount of infrastructure and will most certainly be skill prohibitive.
Here's an article that has more points why this will not be a thing, atleast with current tech.
https://www.greencarreports.com/news...ppen-heres-why

[GTO]

Nice effort , but ahead of its time. 200-300 km range means 150 - 200 km if you bring in traffic, overloading etc. That kind of range isn't even acceptable to most city commuters, leave aside highway workhorses. These big batteries will also take an enormous amount of time to charge via a portable charger, and there are no public charging stations yet.

Electric trucks will make a lot of sense once battery tech evolves (which it is rapidly) and there's a network of highway chargers (which is also poised to happen but will take years).

[KL01toKA03]

If the Indian Railways can provide charging on RO-RO rakes, then it might be feasible to use this truck for many routes.

I didn't see the price mentioned. Are they pricing it competitively compared to the existing trucks?

[SRT_Dwarka]

Originally Posted by GTO

Nice effort , but ahead of its time.

Beg to differ, this couldn't have come sooner, its a brilliant idea.

Originally Posted by GTO

200-300 km range means 150 - 200 km if you bring in traffic, overloading etc.

Overloading will affect range, traffic, not so much, you see the benefits of regen, batteries being able to deliver more current and efficiency at low discharge rates, and overall power consumption being lower at lower speeds all accumulate. I'm not saying traffic will increase range, but because of these side benefits, range wont deteriorate so much.

Originally Posted by GTO

That kind of range isn't even acceptable to most city commuters, leave aside highway workhorses.

So what they are actually targeting is the short haul market for transport of aggregate, sand, limestone etc. which is why a dump truck, and not a box truck.

So think about is this way, a truck leaves from a quarry, reaches its destination, dumps it load and returns empty. Returning empty is what most trucks in these situations do. From what I understand diesel trucks wouldn't be able to save any meaningful fuel here because of diesel efficiency at part load, but it is not so with motors. So lets take the average of 200 & 400 that is 300 km. Usually each trip is maximum of 100 kilometres one way. This will take a minimum of 6 hours per round trip. So even in the worst case scenario just charge it every two trips along with driver shift changes. Best case scenario would be utilising waiting times at source/destination.

Originally Posted by GTO

These big batteries will also take an enormous amount of time to charge via a portable charger, and there are no public charging stations yet.

Partially answered above. In all likelihood this should happened with custom chargers at the owners end.

Originally Posted by GTO

Electric trucks will make a lot of sense once battery tech evolves (which it is rapidly) and there's a network of highway chargers (which is also poised to happen but will take years).

Agree, apart from the will take years part, because the way I see it, once there is sufficient scale, a few charging points every 50 kilometres or so shouldn't be an issue. When this happens, consider that truck drivers need to mandatorily take a break of about an hour, hour an half every, 4 hours of drive, I bet they would thank Gods for bringing that relief in their life.

P.S. Although, they might not like it so much if they aren't able to skim anything on diesel expenses.

[shashanka]

Originally Posted by TusharK

Gurgaon-based Infraprime Logistics Technologies (IPLT) has unveiled its first all-electric truck called the Rhino 5536. The company is planning to launch it in the mid-haul logistics segment by 2020.

The Rhino 5536 is a 60-tonne electric truck. It uses an electric motor that has an output of 483 BHP and has a 276 kWh battery that is claimed to offer a range of 200-300 km. The top speed of the truck is claimed to be 90 km/h. The vehicle comes with an automatic transmission.

According to IPLT, the Rhino 5536 can be used for transporting construction materials. Production of the electric truck is scheduled to commence at the company's Faridabad plant from January 2020. IPLT aims to deploy 1,000 electric trucks on the road by end-2020 and about 10,000 trucks by 2021.....

A great idea and one whose time maybe just over the horizon! From the way the emphasis has shifted in our country to alternate/renewable/electric energy, this was something just waiting in the wings. I know that from e-scooters, which are catching on fast in the urban milieu, to e-highway trucks seems too big a jump to chew on right now, but with the necessary push from the centre (Gadkariji's infra ministry) it should be feasible sooner rather than later.

But hearing the rumblings about the limited supply of Lithium in nature (assuming LI-ion batteries are being used), large scale applications may have to wait for other power sources.