Chinese brand hybrid technology: there is no best technical route, only better products

Hybrid has gradually become “ New energy ” The mainstream of the market

There's a number , I think you should know .

2021 year , The sales volume of generalized hybrid in the domestic market , Plug in hybrid + Ordinary hybrid , Have broken through 120 Thousands of cars , Year on year growth exceeded 140%.

On volume 、 In terms of growth , Although generalized hybrid cannot be compared with pure electric market . But combined with the background analysis of the market , You will find that the tide of mixing is coming to you in an instant ——

The first background is , At present, there are only 98 paragraph , Many of these new models were launched at the end of last year ; By contrast , The models on sale in the pure electric market are 295 paragraph . Work it out , The average sales volume of generalized hybrid bicycles has exceeded 10000 platform , Far more than the pure electricity market .

The second background is , The sales structure of pure electricity market is appropriate “ Dumbbell ”, That is, high-end and low-end sales account for more , but 8-20 Wan, the mainstream market that should have a large user group, only accounts for a minority . In contrast, the hybrid market , It's all measured 10-25 Million products . This seems to prove ： In the relatively mainstream market , Consumers prefer to choose hybrid , Not pure electric .

（ Like Saina 、 GAC motor second generation GS8 These hot models , It was only listed in the fourth quarter of last year , It is already 2022 It happened in 2000 .）

2022 year , Hybrid technology of various Chinese brands has appeared , More hybrid models are coming , The tide of mixing will come even more ferocious , You could even say ：2022 year , Are there any hybrid car companies , May be “ die ” It's very sad .

Hybrid technology , flowers

BYD's super hybrid DM-i、 The lemon of the Great Wall DHT、 Changan blue whale iDD、 Trumpchi's GMC 2.0、 SAIC EDU、 Auspicious Thor hybrid 、 Chery's Kunpeng DHT...... Just one year , So many hybrid technologies have emerged in China , It's dazzling .

Although there are many names , But the mainstream form cannot be separated from these four categories ： Power split 、 In series 、 Parallel and series parallel .

The so-called power split , That is, the power of the engine can be shunted to the drive system and the power generation system at the same time , Not subject to working conditions . The core of this form is a set of planetary gear mechanism —— Both can play a diversion , It can also play the role of stepless speed change , So many people call it “ECVT”.

Because of this “ECVT” It's a Toyota patent , So the power split type is basically the same as Toyota's THS It's on “ Equal sign ”. In the last year or two , Toyota THS Start external authorization , There are other models on the road of power diversion , For example, trumpchi second generation GS8, It looks better than blue .

The series structure is much simpler , The drive depends entirely on the motor , The engine only generates electricity . Maybe it's in series. It sounds a little LOW, So more manufacturers are willing to call it incremental program . This structure is very simple , But there are also some shortcomings ： Under the working condition of medium high speed and lack of electricity , The engine tends to go beyond its efficient working area , Low efficiency .

At present, there are not many manufacturers adopting this structure . A year or two ago , GM pushed it for a while , The representative model is Buick VELITE 5 And Chevrolet's volanda , But then he gave up without insisting for a few years —— The main reason is that the market does not accept , Its price is also relatively expensive .

Nissan is still in use 、 Ideal 、 Haze map 、 Thalys and the sky , The representative technology is Nissan e-POWER, The representative model is ideal ONE, The former has a long history overseas , Mature technology , The latter is currently the best selling incremental model in China .

Although ideal ONE Sales are good , But I always have a hunch ： With the continuous growth of the hybrid market , After consumers have more choices —— Ideal ONE The reason for hot sales is not technology , Lies in product positioning , Series will eventually come to an end .

Ideal ONE In fact, the weakness of series hybrid has been exposed ： Electricity and fuel consumption are as high as 8.8L/100km, By contrast , Second generation trumpchi of the same size GS8 as long as 5.8L/100km. This gap is equivalent to iPhone 13 and iPhone 7 The generation difference of .

The so-called parallel , That is, fuel drive and electric drive are two relatively independent systems , Parallel existence . This structure is not complicated , Just add an electric drive system to the fuel car , The disadvantage is that it relies heavily on external charging , Once the battery is not charged , Then the electric drive system will become a burden , Increase fuel consumption , Increase the cost of use .

This structure was once a Chinese brand PHEV The mainstream line of , Because the research and development cost is not high , And it can also enter the catalogue of new energy , Enjoy subsidies and licensing concessions for new energy vehicles , Therefore, it can be favored by some users with limited license and purchase .

Can only cherish , Because charging is inconvenient , Many car owners just use them as fuel trucks , Bear the high fuel consumption in the state of electricity shortage . Slowly, , In the eyes of many consumers , Parallel operation has been reduced to a product of the policy —— It's just a green card .

at present , There are few car companies that follow this technical route , as far as I am concerned , Still pushing , Probably only Chang'an and SAIC are left .

（WEY P8 It is the most typical example of parallel type , Front wheel fuel drive , Rear wheel electric drive , The two are not related to each other . Its market performance is also poor , Finally, it will stop production .）

The series parallel type to be introduced next is the mainstream of Chinese brand hybrid systems . The Chinese brand hybrid system mentioned above , Besides SAIC and Chang'an , Others are series parallel .

The series parallel type is somewhat similar to the power split type , The engine can be charged , Can also be directly involved in driving . The difference is , When the engine gets involved in driving , Because you can't change speed , So the conditions for intervention are very harsh . Honda technical expert renmuxue once said in an interview ：“（ Honda's iMMD） In urban conditions , The proportion of engine intervention to provide power is 2-3%, Only under high-speed conditions 5-6%.”

Ordinary people may have questions ：“ Why should the engine be involved in driving , Isn't it more fuel-efficient to drive directly by the motor ？” Actually , Under the condition of electricity shortage , The most fuel-efficient state of series parallel type is not electric drive , Instead, the engine drives the wheels directly ——

In the state of electricity , The motor is to work , First of all, we have to rely on the engine to generate electricity .“ The engine → Alternator → motor → wheel ”, This energy transfer path , Than “ The engine → wheel ” Two more links , Even if the efficiency of these two links is as high as 99%, There is also a loss of energy .

therefore , To save fuel in series and parallel , You have to skip these two links , Let the engine in the efficient working range drive the wheels directly .

It's not an easy thing !

1 block 、2 block 、3 block ......“ Block... Block ” Keep going

How to make the engine in the efficient working range drive the vehicle more directly ？ This is the most important problem for car companies taking the series parallel route . For now , There are two solutions ： One is to develop a special hybrid engine with a wider range of efficiency ; The second is to increase the gear of the hybrid system , With the engine speed and torque unchanged , Change the driving force and driving speed of the vehicle .

the latter , It is the most important place to reflect the differentiation of various hybrid systems .

at present , Except Honda i-MMD、 BYD's super hybrid DM-i Outside , Other car companies that take the series parallel route have used hybrid special gearboxes with multiple gears ： Trumpchi and Great Wall adopt double gears DHT, Geely and Chery are in third gear DHT.

More gears allow them to reduce the conditions for the engine to intervene in the drive —— Mainly reflected in speed . for example , The lemon of the Great Wall DHT Can be in 40km/h Let the engine intervene in the drive ; Geely Raytheon hybrid engine can be used in 20km/h Get involved in work when .

Multiple gears in the future DHT It may become a development trend of the industry —— It is said that the next generation of Honda i-MMD It will also add another gear . But there is a problem we need to think about ： For consumers , Is it necessary for us to pursue too many gears DHT？

Personally, I think ： No need at all .

you 're right , More gears DHT It can make the engine in the high-efficiency range intervene in the work earlier , But is it necessary ？

During normal driving , We stay in 20km/h The time at the following speed is very short ,0-20km/h The acceleration of is just a blink of an eye ,0-60km/h It only takes fourorfive seconds . Stay in for a long time 20km/ Following , Or there are special circumstances , Or on very congested roads .

In the face of such road conditions , Instead, I hope the engine doesn't start , Purely driven by electric motor ： in the first place , The engine doesn't start , No noise , Relieve drivers' traffic jam anxiety ; both , This congested road condition will affect the engine heat dissipation , It is not conducive to the service life of engine oil .

in addition , The special hybrid transmission with more gears is not advanced , On the contrary, they will attend to one thing and lose the other , Do a seemingly clever thing which turns out to be a foolish one instead .

It is not difficult to add gears to the special hybrid transmission , But is in “ The engine → wheel ” The gear set is added to the power transmission path , The difficulty lies in the spatial layout . Because the interior of the hybrid special gearbox is very complex , There are motors, electric controls and multiple sets of gears , The space is very limited .

If it is through fine design to insert oneortwo groups of gears and gearshift mechanism , Also quite clever , But more car companies only achieve this goal by compressing the volume of the motor . Compress the volume of the motor , actually , That is, the power and torque of the compression motor .

As you can see , Great Wall lemon with double block structure DHT, Even in mocha DHT PHEV This medium SUV It only uses one 130kW\300Nm Drive motor . By contrast , BYD super hybrid DM-i Qin PLUS, a A Levels of car , The beginning is 132kW\316Nm Drive motor , The top equipped drive motor can reach 145kW\325Nm.

Of course , I don't mean the Great Wall lemon DHT Not as good as BYD's super hybrid DM-i、“ Large motor strategy ” Than “ Multi gear strategy ” Gao Ming . Just say , Automobile research and development is a “ Break off ”, In the space 、 When the cost is limited , There are gains and losses .

in fact , There is no good or bad technical route , Just like the seven speed wet double clutch is not necessarily better than Aisin 6AT Advanced is the same , Believe it 6AT It's not necessarily better than CVT Stepless transmission is easy to use . Important , Or how to perfectly match technology and products .

It's like being scolded “ There is an electric train , A worm without electricity ” In parallel , Chang'an can also solve the problem of electricity and fuel consumption ： According to official information , use P2 Single motor parallel structure UNI-K, Electricity and fuel consumption are as low as 5L/100km, Compared with Tang of the same level DM-i lower .

It's just , At present, the hybrid of Chinese brands has just developed , Many brands have not launched products equipped with hybrid technology , Therefore, it is difficult to compare from the same dimension —— You can also see from the above table , Various products with different technical routes , The performance is similar , It seems premature to rush to the conclusion that who is good and who is bad .

But one thing is certain , Models with hybrid technology , Compared with the fuel version, its fuel economy and acceleration ability have made a qualitative leap , And the price has become more people-friendly .

The price is close to the people , Performance leap ...... I think this is the secret of the outbreak of the hybrid market in the next oneortwo years .

writing | Daxiong