The ET9 will be built on a 900 V high-voltage architecture to support faster charging and will also have an intelligent wire-controlled chassis for continuous upgradability, Nio executives said.
(Image credit: CnEVPost)
Nio (NYSE: NIO) is starting to warm up for the ET9, which will be officially unveiled in three days at Nio Day 2023.
The flagship Nio model will be built on a 900 V high-voltage architecture that will support faster charging, and it will also have a smart chassis by wire for continuous upgradability, two Nio executives said.
More than a dozen Nio executives have recently become active on Weibo, in contrast to the fact that the company previously had little to no official voice on the social media platform.
Previously, the only people who regularly spoke out on Weibo were Shen Fei, Nio's vice president for power business; Harry Wong, head of smart driving products and experience; and Bai Jian, vice president for hardware.
For its upcoming flagship model, the ET9, Nio will utilize a 900 V high-voltage architecture that breaks the industry's upper limit, Bi Lu, the company's assistant vice president of electric drive and high-voltage systems, said in a Weibo post today. This is his first Weibo post and the only one so far.
This means that the vehicle's high-voltage wiring harness will be further reduced in weight and charging will be faster, Bi said, adding that the model will be able to offer the best overall power replenishment experience, supported by Nio's proprietary battery swap system.
On the new smart electric drive platform, Nio has further reduced the weight and size of the motor to achieve higher power density, he said.
In terms of safety, the vehicle is capable of real-time online diagnosis of the health status of the 900 V electric drive system and optimization of control parameters in conjunction with the user's driving habits to ensure efficient, safe and reliable power output, he said.
The current high-voltage system of mainstream electric vehicles typically has a voltage range of 230 - 450 V, which is commonly referred to as a 400 V system.
With a 400 V system, a higher charging current is required if the vehicle's charging power is to be increased. But it also means thicker, heavier wires and more heat generation.
To achieve faster charging, the industry is moving away from the 400 V voltage platform to 800 V. Currently systems with a voltage range of 550 - 900 V are called 800 V high voltage systems.
800 V systems were initially used in high-end sports cars such as the Porsche Taycan and Mercedes-Benz Project One, Bi noted, adding that as high-voltage technology advances, 800 V is starting to be used by more EV makers and in more models.
Nio has built a full-stack design and development capability for motors, electric controls, gearboxes and assembly systems since it formed its design and development team in 2015, Bi said.
Yesterday, Nio's head of vehicle application software, Xiao Baihong, previewed the ET9's smart wire-controlled chassis on Weibo.
"When Nio wants to launch its executive flagship sedan, the development goal of our chassis system is very clear -- to use the most cutting-edge technology to bring the most extreme experience to the user," Xiao said.
One of the core technologies of the ET9 is the wire-controlled intelligent chassis, and at a technical level it can be said that the chassis system is currently the only true fully wire-controlled intelligent chassis in the world that integrates three core hardware systems together, he said.
This improves vehicle driving comfort, handling and safety, Xiao said, adding that it even surpasses the chassis of Porsche's third-generation Panamera.
Nio has been involved in the field of wire-controlled chassis since the first generation of the ES8, a model that uses wire-transmission control for the air suspension and braking system, except for the steering, which remains mechanical, according to Xiao.
Nio has equipped the intelligent chassis controller ICC on the ET7, released in January 2021, which integrates control functions such as redundant parking, air suspension, CDC damper and supports high-level intelligent driving scenarios with cross-domain fusion, he said.
In the soon-to-be-released ET9, the "brain" of the wire-controlled intelligent chassis has evolved into the VMC intelligent computing platform, which is like a symphony conductor that can realize the potential of each wire-controlled hardware, Xiao said.
VMC decouples software and hardware and, combined with SkyOS support for flexible deployment, can be extended with new features and new wire-control hardware, he said.
The platform can connect wire control hardware including AD intelligent driving systems, drive systems, braking systems, steering systems, and active suspensions, enabling a new level of vehicle motion control, according to Xiao.
VMC is also data-driven, and the fully wire-controlled intelligent chassis will have the ability to evolve, iterate and grow, he said.
In the next 3-5 years, Nio's fully wire-controlled intelligent chassis and VMC platform will become a new technology benchmark for high-end smart EVs, he said.
Nio will hold Nio Day 2023 in Xi'an, Shaanxi, Northwest China on December 23, where the ET9 will be unveiled.
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