Volta Trucks has kicked of production of its first road-going electric truck.
Specifcally, work has begun on a ‘Design Verification’ (DV) prototype Volta Zero at a bespoke facility in Coventry, UK.
In other words, 25 vehicles will be produced at the facility between now and January 2022.
Then, the fleet will embark on a rigorous testing regime.
For example, engineers will replicate a wide range of customer usage and delivery cycles.
In addition, the first road-going Zeros will g to extremes of cold and hot weather environments.
Therefore, trips to the Arctic and regions with equatorial conditions, will be visited.
Meanwhile, results of the comprehensive DV testing programme will be fed into the final prototype stage (PV).
As a result, these PV prototype vehicles will be built at the company’s plant in Steyr, Austria, in mid-2022.
Many of the prototypes will be lent to selected customers for extended periods to be tested in their real-world logistics conditions.
As a result, fleet drivers will undertake millions of delivery kilometres, alongside Volta Trucks’ own engineers.
Ian Collins, chief product officer of Volta Trucks welcomed the new first road-going trucks.
“In August, the first Volta Zero rolling chassis started testing,” he said.
“And, we’ve already extracted huge amounts of data from that vehicle.
“We have integrated that feedback into the Design Verification prototypes that start production today.
“Therefore, we now move into a rapid test – learn – iterate – develop phase.
“This stage is going to be far more condensed and intensive than a normal vehicle testing programme.
“For example, we have an ambitious timeline to start series production in a year’s time.
In conclusion, Collins said that the test programme was essential to ensure the product was right.
He said Volta wanted to “deliver the highest possible quality standards and exceed our customers’ expectations”.
