VEHICLE REPORT

Testing the future of transportation
DaimlerChrysler’s fuel-cell vehicle fleet

by Dieter Wanke

Since the first NECAR (New Electric Car) was presented in 1994, DaimlerChrysler has produced around 20 fuel cell concept vehicles. Now the focus has changed to testing and the world’s first commercially operating fleet of fuel cell vehicles is running. Thirty buses for public transport are on duty and 60 A-Class-based “F-Cell” passenger cars are already delivered or currently under construction.

Starting with the first handover to the city of Madrid in May last year, all fuel-cell buses are working daily line service in 10 cities including Amsterdam, Barcelona, Hamburg, London, Luxembourg, Madrid, Porto, Reykjavik, Stockholm and Stuttgart. Three additional Mercedes-Benz Citaro fuel cell buses are currently manufactured under series-production conditions at the DaimlerChrysler bus plant in Mannheim, Germany and will be shipped to the Australian city of Perth this summer. The bus develops 200 kW and has an operating range of about 200 kilometres (125 miles) running on compressed hydrogen.

Delivery vans are a smaller test fleet. Since March 2004 the parcel service UPS has been operating a fuel cell driven Dodge Sprinter in Ann Arbor, MI. The vehicles technology is nearly identical to the first Mercedes-Benz Sprinter, which recently retired. It was operated by the German parcel-delivery company Hermes Versand, beginning in January 2001. The 55 kW electric motor allows a top speed of 120 km/h (74 mph). The operating range is 150 kilometres (93 miles).

DaimlerChrysler fuel cell Sprinter to be field-tested by UPS.

Another Sprinter based on improved components is currently under construction and will be delivered to UPS in fall this year together with a fuel cell driven "F-Cell" A-Class passenger car. Base for the passenger car fleet is the Mercedes-Benz "F-Cell" A-Class vehicle, which was first presented in October 2002. It runs on compressed hydrogen (350 bar) and has an operating radius of about 150 kilometres (93 miles). The electric motor develops 65 kW with a torque of 210 Nm and accelerates the car from 0 to 100 km/h (62.1 mph) in approximately 16 seconds. It holds up to four passengers and reaches a top speed of around 140 km/h (87 mph). A total number of 60 cars will be produced in a small series and will be delivered to companies and/or organizations (partners) in Germany, the US, Singapore and Japan by the end of this year.

The tests are taking place under everyday operating conditions. With over 30 cars the majority will drive in Michigan and California. A small fleet of up to three vehicles is already running in the US within the California Fuel Cell Partnership. Another five “F-Cell” cars will go to Singapore in the fall. They are operated by the Singapore National Environment Agency as well as private partners like British Petroleum (BP) Singapore Pte Ltd, Conrad Centennial Singapore, Michelin Asia-Pacific and Lufthansa German Airlines. Two cars were shipped to Japan earlier last year. One is operated by Bridgestone and one by Tokyo Gas, participating in the "Japan Hydrogen & Fuel Cell Demonstration Project" (JHFC). The other “F-Cell” vehicles remain in Germany with DaimlerChrysler or other partners.

The primary reason for the investment in the fleet is to gain long term experience under road conditions in the engineering and reliability of components and the assembly and maintenance processes as well as the necessary infrastructure. Recently good progress has been made towards better cold start capability of the fuel cell units, which can now be started in temperatures as low as minus 20 degrees Celsius (minus 2 degrees Fahrenheit). Most unit failures are currently caused by the software, which controls and operates the components. One reason is very sensitive settings on the software and sensors to avoid any damage on the units. The electrical and mechanical components are fairly reliable and rarely the cause of serious problems.

By the end of 2004 DaimlerChrysler is confident it will have more then 100 fuel cell vehicles on the road. The testing period with the first fleet will continue for two years, being succeeded by a new generation of cars reflecting the experiences with today’s vehicles. Within five years the fleet will be extended to several hundred cars. Targets for the technical development of fuel cell technology in the coming years are the reduction of cost, optimisation and standardisation of production methods and improvements in operating time and reliability. DaimlerChrysler expects that by 2012 the first series production fuel cell cars will be commercialised to fleet markets.

Read more about DaimlerChrysler's delivery of F-Cell vehicles in Berlin.