As Ford ramps up its e-powertrain
activities, E&Htravels to the car maker’s new electric vehicle development
headquarters in Michigan to catch up with its head of electrified powertrain
engineering, Kevin Layden.
Shifting Concerns
Like every company that produces and sells
pure-electric vehicles, Ford continues to be focused on in-use battery life,
charging cycle times and infrastructure.
“I think it [customer concerns about
battery life] was out there at the beginning, and we still get some of the
media asking questions about it, but every new technology gets challenged and
some of it is just showing the proof.”
“I am quite confident that, as we go
forward, we are going to be showing that proof. Two and a half years ago, when
we were launching the Focus Electric, there was a lot of apprehension in the
press, and that – the durability – was the first question that came to mind.
Now the question has shifted from durability, to range, to package space. The
original range number for the Focus Electric was 122km (76 miles), and we are
looking at how we increase that, and how we take advantage of technology to
make the battery smaller and lighter, and give the vehicle more capability. But
the issue of durability is fading.”
The
Focus Electric is rated at 110 miles per gallon equivalent (MPGe) in the city
and 99 MPGe on the highway (105 MPGe combined). Ford is quick to boast that the
Focus Electric’s combined rating is 6 MPGe better than Nissan Leaf.
“For Layden, one of the most important
technologies that went with the development of the Focus Electric was the 6.6kW
220V charger unit for the customer’s home installation. “It charges at the rate
of 32km (20 miles) per hour or 3.3 hours to a full charge. As we go forward and
put bigger batteries in, with more capable cells, we will be able to increase
that further. We need to give the customer a battery system that he/she can
fully utilize in that vehicle.”
EV Democratization
The buzzword most recently entwined with
taking matters to a new level for the EV movement has been the
‘democratization’ of the electric vehicle, or, in short, offering e-powertrain
cars for sale or lease to everyone in every state in the USA, as opposed to the
current policy of selling electrics only where individual state government
regulations require it.
Mounted
in the center console is an eight-inch screen that features MyFord Touch
infotainment system.
But Layden has a different and somewhat
refreshing stance on this issue: “I don’t want to sell an electric car to
everyone. I want to sell an electric car to everyone where it makes sense,
where the customer can be satisfied and enjoy the car, and it’s going to meet
his or her needs. You don’t want to put people in a vehicle that they don’t
need or that doesn’t meet their needs.”
The Ford e-powertrain chief says that the
customer with up to a 48km (30-mile) commute to work represents 40-50% of
commuters across the USA. “But when you drive in hot conditions, when you have
to use the air-conditioning system, when you start using the battery for other
things than just propulsion, new challenges arise, and these are the very
things that we are working on. How do we improve the heating capability? How do
we improve our air-conditioning? For example, the Focus Electric has a great
feature called Go Time. You set your Go Time, and when you get in the vehicle
the battery is pre-conditioned, so if you’re in a cold climate your battery is
kept up to temperature so that you can drive away cold, but the charging system
is used to bring the vehicle’s climate control up to temperature, not the
vehicle’s battery. That technology demonstrates that we are committed to making
the Focus Electric work, not just in Los Angeles, but at altitude and in cold
temperatures.”
Focus
Electric has a great feature called Go Time. You set your Go Time, and when you
get in the vehicle the battery is pre-conditioned
While Layden doesn’t see an immediate
future wherein two fist-sized electric motors will power an electric F-250
pickup truck, he does feel that better motors are coming. “The suppliers that
we have relationships with are some of the best in the business, and they are
bringing new tech to us right up front. We can model the electric motor
designs, and then really guide how we want the magnets to be shaped, how we
want the gaps in the E-steel to be managed, and whether or not a revision to
the E-steel makes sense for us. Our suppliers have similar capabilities, so we
understand what happens before it happens.”
