Endmontage des rein elektrischen Zentralantriebs CeTrax lite am ZF-Standort Friedrichshafen. Schon wenige Monate nach Serienstart wurden tausend Einheiten produziert.
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Final assembly of the all-electric CeTrax lite central drive at the ZF Friedrichshafen location. One thousand units were produced just a few months after the start of volume production.
Following the start of series production of the electric drive for light commercial vehicles, CeTrax lite, in April 2023 in Friedrichshafen, ZF can already look back on a thousand units produced. CeTrax lite is a purely electric drive with 150 kW peak power that sits centrally in the vehicle frame – the place occupied by the conventional transmission in “combustion trucks”. The lead customer is the Japanese commercial vehicle manufacturer ISUZU, which has been delivering its CeTrax-equipped ELF EV vehicles to customers worldwide since October 2023. Further series launches are planned for the current year. The electric central drive for light commercial vehicles is thus continuing the success story of its “big brother” CeTrax, which went into series production in 2020. The central drive, which is also manufactured at the ZF site in Friedrichshafen, is primarily used in buses and is ordered by customers from Korea, the USA, Australia and Europe. With its high reliability, the robust central drive “made in Friedrichshafen” has made a name for itself worldwide in tough everyday public transport operations. From this year, the new CeTrax 2 dual electric central drive will also be manufactured in Friedrichshafen.
A special feature of ZF’s CeTrax concept is that purely electric central drives are suitable for electrifying existing commercial vehicle platforms. In this way, manufacturers can expand their portfolio towards purely electric vehicles with a manageable development effort. As the series production of the “big” CeTrax, which has been running in Friedrichshafen since 2020, shows, this concept is particularly interesting for manufacturers of city buses, but also for special vehicles in ports and logistics centers. Electrification with CeTrax lite offers just as much potential for small delivery trucks, city buses or special vehicles, which are mainly on the “last mile” to the consumer and therefore also have to be locally emission-free in inner-city environmental zones.
As demand at ISUZU has developed very positively, production figures in Friedrichshafen are now also increasing. “We are proud to have met the needs and requirements of the market with our CeTrax lite. CeTrax lite is on its way to becoming a globally successful product and is pushing purely electric and locally emission-free delivery traffic,” says Kleber Vinhas, Site Manager of the ZF plant in Friedrichshafen. “At the same time, we are preparing further series start-ups for customers. And with CeTrax 2 dual, the next electric central drive from Friedrichshafen, now for heavy commercial vehicles, is about to go into series production.”
ZF has a high level of vertical integration and added value with the CeTrax lite, as many components are also supplied from other ZF locations, including Schweinfurt and Auerbach, for final assembly in Friedrichshafen. “An electric drive from ZF means that the hardware components and software are perfectly matched,” adds Kleber Vinhas. As a result, CeTrax lite is characterized by particular efficiency in practical use.
