Stellantis EREV platform with 690 mile range

[Kaiju]

If the Ramcharger had been a thing in 2023 I would've been shopping it alongside Rivian and the Lightning. The Ram is a bit too HUEG for my tastes but I still would've run it on battery 90% of the time even if it had trash efficiency. Would've taken that as a win.

I'd wondered if disuse of the engine would be a problem. Would've existed to me as a nagging maintenance thing to remember to run it long enough to burn all the gas every few months. Having to do it largely for no reason other than maintenance. Still needing to do the actual engine maintenance too, even if less frequently.

The kicker for that sort of hybrid though is I don't think it can actually perform like a full BEV. A 'small' battery like the Ramcharger has is still limited in the amount of surge power it can deliver, so it would rely on the engine-generator to spin up and kick in extra juice, meaning it doesn't have the massive instant torque and there would be a delay on demand for maximum power. Probably would still seem powerful compared to regular truck engines, since that's how people feel about EV equivalents of regular consumer cars that aren't being sold on their HP or torque numbers.

Also at least that gas range extender is basically a portable generator that you can do anything with. Power a house, RV, whatever. Unless of course someone made the abominably dumb decision not to include V2H when it's literally the best use case for it.

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[NY_Rob]

I'd wondered if disuse of the engine would be a problem. Would've existed to me as a nagging maintenance thing to remember to run it long enough to burn all the gas every few months. Having to do it largely for no reason other than maintenance. Still needing to do the actual engine maintenance too, even if less frequently.

Not to worry, you won't have to "remember" to run the engine every so often or to burn off some gas or lubricate the engine.
I currently have two PHEV's, a BMW i3 REX, and a Jeep Wrangler 4xe. If you don't use the ICE enough, both vehicles will force you to run a "maintenance" cycle based on how many days since you put new gas in the tank (90 days with old gas in the tank in the case of my 4xe Jeep triggers a gas burn off event called Fuel Oil Refresh Mode 'FOAM'). On the BMW, the fuel tank is only 2 gallons, so burning some off to make room for fresh gas doesn't take much driving. The Jeep has a 17 gal tank, so the trick (if you pretty much always only use the electric motors to power the vehicle like I do) is to drive around on only a quarter tank of gas, that way when you're forced to burn some, at least you're only burning through 4 gallons.

So, in a nutshell.. no worries my friend, HAL 9000 has you covered. He knows what's best for the mission vehicle and will run the engine when it needs to be run, and he will burn some gas when it needs to be burned ?

 

[dleepnw]

With battery tech where it is today, this EREV makes sense as a bridge between ICE and BEV in the US. There's already several Chinese manufacturers doing this as well.

 

[Thedude]

With battery tech where it is today, this EREV makes sense as a bridge between ICE and BEV in the US. There's already several Chinese manufacturers doing this as well.

It’s near perfect for those of us who live where there isn’t charging and do activities that current EV trucks can’t support on a fairly regular basis.

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