Airstream and its parent company Thor Industries reveal more details of its upcoming electric trailer that was unveiled last month. It is expected to essentially go off-grid for a few days and increase the range or mpg of the vehicle to tow. It could also potentially maneuver itself into a spot or a camping spot.
Now the company has revealed more details about the project and the concept vehicle, which CEO Bob Wheeler underscored, in a follow-up Q&A session on the project last week, isn’t just a sustainability exercise. “Ultimately if it doesn’t provide a better customer experience it’s going to be a lot of effort for nought,” said Wheeler, who added that part of the project aims to navigate past some of the traditional pain points for EVs—like charging and trip planning.
Noting that, don’t expect the product to become available this year, or even next. The CEO emphasized that the company is still at the early stages with this idea. “It’s pretty safe to say that this exact concept trailer, this proof of concept, we’ll not see anything like this on the market ever,” he said. However, it is a way of gathering feedback from dealers and customers and figuring out the right feature sets and value standpoint for such a model that it wants to build in the near future, he continued to explain.
Not completely set
Airstream’s starting point wasn’t with a completely new chassis and technical set, though. It picked up with the chassis that its German affiliate Dethleffs developed with ZF in 2018 and 2019—the one that was demonstrated last year with an Audi E-Tron Sportback on an Alps route that involved high altitude and lots of ascent and descent. With essentially this same system as in the eStream, albeit with a lighter trailer, the E-Tron Sportback managed the 2route despite its 218-mile EPA range rating. 40-mile.
Furthermore, Airstream is bringing more to the project. According to product development and engineering VP McKay Featherstone, is the creation of a platform around this. “Our work was really to integrate that into one complete system, not just dropping a house on top of the chassis, but making sure everything works together towards a common goal,” he said, explaining that includes aerodynamics, connectivity, and some of the control units. Featherstone explains that a company’s focus toward sustainability and a lower carbon footprint for its customers was one of the drivers. But he also pointed out that the project goes all the way back to the launch of the Tesla Model X.
Credits- Greencarreports
