As the industry continues down the path of increased electrification, fleets soon will be able to order heavy duty electric vehicles in quantity. These electric vehicles will also impact a heavy duty truck’s braking system components. With electric trucks comes the likelihood that electronic braking systems (EBS) will emerge as the base brake control system. Fleet Maintenance talked with experts at Bendix Commercial Vehicle Systems about the next generation of commercial truck braking technologies.
Transcription of interview:
Erica Schueller, Fleet Maintenance: Welcome to VSP News: Uptime Update. I am your host Erica Schueller, editorial director of Fleet Maintenance magazine, covering all maintenance, all vehicle classes, all management, all the time.
As the industry continues down the path of increased electrification, fleets will be able to order heavy duty electric vehicles in quantity, in the not-to-distant future. These electric vehicles will also impact a heavy duty truck’s braking system components.
With electric trucks comes the likelihood that electronic braking systems, known as EBS for short, will emerge as the base brake control system. Electronically controlled brake valves might otherwise be added to the current anti-lock braking systems on commercial vehicles as an added safety measure.
I sat down with the TJ Thomas and Mike Tober at Bendix Commercial Vehicle Systems to talk about the next generation of commercial truck braking technologies, especially as it relates to EBS.
Michael Tober, COC director, Bendix Commercial Vehicle Systems: Electrification will impact most of the systems (and components) in the braking systems that Bendix provides.
Specifically, with brake control systems, as vehicles become electrified, we need to move to a higher level of electronic control to enable the regenerative braking systems to recapture as much energy as possible.
Schueller, Fleet Maintenance: Tober shares more about the similarities and differences between EBS and ABS.
Tober, Bendix Commercial Vehicle Systems: An EBS system, or electropneumatic braking system, differs from a conventional ABS system in that the primary means of controlling the brake system is electronic in an EBS system.
That means, when the driver steps on the brake pedal, he delivers an electronic signal to the actuators, which then deliver air to the wheel ends to apply the brakes.
With this method of control, it enables us to control the brakes in different ways than we can today. Specifically, with electrification of the vehicle, it allows us to hold off the brakes on the axles that have an electric machine, which then enables that electric machine to recapture more of the energy during regenerative braking.
Schueller, Fleet Maintenance: Experts say the traditional pneumatic air brake system will not go away. On an electric vehicle, the backup pneumatic system may not be used often, but when needed it has to be there. This is why proper air brake system maintenance will remain critically important.
Diagnostic tools for calibration and reprogramming might also be necessary for EBS. Thomas talks more about the current tools available, and what technicians may expect in the future.
TJ Thomas, director of marketing and customer solutions, controls group, Bendix Commercial Vehicle Systems: Currently with ABS our diagnostic tool is ACom. We just released a new version called ACom PRO that will have expanded capabilities.
Whatever functions and features that technicians are used to using with ACom, our current ABS system would be very consistent with what they would do with the EBS system as well.
So, if they performed calibrations or configurations on ABS, likely that would be very similar with EBS.
As far as reprogramming, typically that is not done on a brake system. If something needs to be reprogrammed, you would simply just replace the component and we (Bendix) would do the reprogramming for that component.
Schueller, Fleet Maintenance: Thomas discusses what trends we might expect in the future, as it relates to commercial vehicle braking systems.
Thomas, Bendix Commercial Vehicle Systems: There are two big trends that will affect the industry. One is emobility, and one is highly automated driving. Both of those have requirements for EBS, which is probably the biggest driver of EBS – that redundancy that’s needed when you take into account a highly automated system where a single point failure is not acceptable.
If something happens, for example, to the primary brake system you really need a redundancy in there to at least bring the vehicle to a safe stop. We have much more capabilities with regards to EBS systems than we do with ABS.
Schueller, Fleet Maintenance: If you’re interested in reading more information about how electric trucks will impact commercial vehicle braking systems, visit the link below.
That’s it for this week’s episode. Thank you for tuning in to VSP News Uptime Update, I’m your host Erica Schueller.
Until our next broadcast, keep up with this, and other industry topics, by visiting us online at VehicleServicePros.com.
