The future of off-highway equipment

Alastair Hayfield attended this years iVT Expo, here are his key takeaways…

• It’s all about system and component efficiency for the next generation of electric machines. Motors, inverters and hydraulics need to be optimally designed, packaged and controlled to maximise the benefits of going electric.
• The most successful suppliers and OEMs will be those that capture and use duty cycle data to design their machines and optimise. Companies need to develop the data science skills to collect telematics data and bring it into the design phase of new machines.
• Battery and component thermal management is often an ‘after though’ or ‘overlooked’, but can represent the second most expensive part of an electrified powertrain. Development and integration of effective cooling strategies must be a priority for every OEM.
• Hydraulic efficiency was possibly the biggest highlight of the show. Multiple companies were demonstrating new hydraulic technologies and approaches with the aim to improve fuel economy or support the move to electrification.
• Automation and autonomy is a big priority now, particularly with advances in electrification and hydraulic control. It was great to see specific use cases, see the need to quantify levels of automation for machinery, and how it will tackle some of the challenges the construction industry faces.
• Finally, it was great to see an update on the development of CAN for off-highway machinery. Really interesting debate about the future and whether ethernet will be used as a backbone for distributed/zonal CAN networks, particularly in autonomous machines.

Thanks to Turntide Technologies, Bosch Rexroth, Danfoss, Bucher Hydraulics, Ymer Technologies, Saft Batteries, Moog Construction, Epec Technologies and the many others who took the time to give us their insight.

The off-highway equipment market is at a pivotal moment. Electrification, automation and connectivity are redefining how machines are designed, built, purchased and used. The machines of today will look very different from the machines of 2030 or 2040. What are the key technologies? Who are the key OEMs and suppliers? What will the machines of the future look like and how can we as an industry prepare?

Our Senior Research Director, Alastair Hayfield, answered some of these questions at iVT Expo on Wednesday 29th June 2022. Download the presentation below.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UkJb9IFZ0I0