Two things you can be sure of about in the Chinese EV world are how fast moving it is and that one company will always try to outdo another. Just yesterday we reported that BYD and Geely both claimed that their latest PHEV systems are capable of 2000 km and can achieve under 3 l/100km. Well currently Chery is trying to one up them with a real world test that they’re currently live streaming.
The challenge involves driving two Chery Fulwin A8 Pro cars fully fueled and charged to see whether they can achieve the feat. Both set off yesterday at 3 pm from Wuhu in Auhui Province, where Chery is headquartered. The route has 12 stages and involved the team driving through the night and is scheduled to finish at 9 pm Beijing time today when the cars will hopefully reach Yancheng, in Jiangsu Province.
To ensure transparency the cars were fully fueled and charged and then sealed so that the cars could not be refueled or charged on route. Furthermore the challenge is being live streamed on Douyin, China’s TikTok. Currently car 1 is doing slightly better having travelled 1214.6 km and averaged 2.6 l/100km versus 1213.8 km for car 2 which has averaged 2.7 l/100km.
The Chery Fulwin A8 Pro uses the Chery Kunpeng super hybrid C-DM system, equipped with the fifth-generation ACTECO 1.5TGDI hybrid engine, the vehicle’s fuel tank is 60L, and the battery capacity is 18.3 kWh. There is an electric motor on the front axle providing 150 kW with 310 Nm of torque. Transmission is a 1-speed hybrid transmission (DHT) unit and the system combined power is 265 kW with torque of 530 Nm.
Currently the Chery Fulwin A8 Pro is not on sale and is due to launch on April 18. It is derived from the Chery Arrizo 8 an ICE car. Fulwin was the name of Chery’s first car and the name has now been resurrected as a sub brand for PHEV versions of Chery models. There is already a Chery Fulwin A8 but the new Pro version looks different with a more enclosed front end.
As yet no car company has tried the 2000 kilometers challenge and we will have to wait a few more hours to see whether Chery succeeds.
Editor’s note:
Chinese car companies are getting very good at doing live-streaming events where their cars undertake feats to gain headlines. William Li did this with a Nio ET7 to achieve over 1000 km distance with the new 150 kWh battery in December last year. And the Chery event is the latest such attempt. However, it is slightly disingenuous as the result is not the same as a CLTC range.
In the early days of EVs in China you would get producers claiming that their car had a range of for example 400 km but when you looked more closely this was at a constant speed of 60 km/h and the NEDC figure, which China then used, was significantly lower. Based on the distance and time for the Chery test route the average speed would seem to be around 70 km/h and so even if the car does achieve the 2000 km distance, which currently it looks like it will, this does not mean the car has a 2000 km CLTC range.
Source: Fast Technology
1200 km using 60 liter tank means 5l/100km……
Where did you get the 1200 km from? The distance of the route is 2000 km.
It seems the car has today been renamed as the Fulwin A8 Voyage and will now launch tomorrow (March 30)!
It seems that the cars failed to achieve 2000 km. One car achieved 1,917.9 km and the other 1,935 km.
Big deal ,how close to the 2000 km target ,wakey wake that knocks spots off anything from the west.