LPG Vans and Hybrid Vehicles

Leading hybrid commercial vehicle manufacturer Ashwoods Automotive has clinched another award.

The Exeter-based company won the prestigious Manufacturing Innovation Award at the Insider Made in the South West Awards, held in Bristol.

Neil Tague, Editor at South West Business Insider which organises the Awards said: “The South West has some really smart businesses providing next-generation solutions in their chosen fields, and Ashwoods is one of the best.

“It has identified a market requirement for a more efficient and environmentally-friendly way to run commercial fleets and is meeting that demand superbly.”

Ashwoods Automotive is the UK’s largest supplier of hybrid commercial vehicles. The company is the sole hybrid vehicle supplier to the Department for Transport’s Low Carbon Vehicle Procurement Programme (LCVPP), which provides subsidies to public sector bodies purchasing hybrid vans and minibuses.

Ashwoods is also fast-growing player in the fields of driver behaviour technology and the design of low carbon vehicle components. The company recently started manufacturing its innovative Ashwoods electric motor in the South West – significantly improving its bottom line.

Ashwoods is rapidly gaining recognition as one of the leading players in HEV and EV core drive train components including electric motors, gearboxes, batteries, battery management systems and eco-driving technologies. This includes the award winning Lightfoot in-cab driver efficiency system.

Martin Kadhim, Business Development Manager at Ashwoods Automotive, said: “Ashwoods entered the awards because we wanted to be recognised for our local efforts. We try to keep our supplier base as south-west based as possible, for example 75 per cent of the hybrid components are sourced from within 25 miles of the Exeter office – and despite the opportunity to manufacture overseas, Ashwoods Hybrid Drive system is manufactured in Weston-Super-Mare.”

He added: “Winning the award means so much to the team here at Ashwoods as it gives the team further recognition for their focus on developing great technologies that help reduce carbon and play a pivotal role in the fast developing low emission manufacturing industry in the UK.”

A total of six other category winners were announced at the ceremony at Marriott Hotel on November 8th.

These include:

Aerospace/Defence – Aero Stanrew (Barnstaple),

Exporter of the Year – Avon Metals (Gloucester)

Sustainable Manufacturer – Green Fuels (Stonehouse, Gloucestershire)

Food and Drink – Thatchers Cider (Sandford, Somerset)

Advanced Manufacturer – GKN Aerospace (Filton)

Manufacturer of the Year – Burts Chips (Roborough)

The Made in the South West Awards were sponsored by Barclays, Foot Anstey, Grant Thornton, GoIndustry, G4S, TasteTech and University of Bristol.

UK Company set to export to European and US customers

 

One of the UK’s leading hybrid van developers, Ashwoods Automotives of Exeter has launched its own range of battery management systems and electric motors for hybrid and electric vehicles.

 

The new components are designed to offer optimum performance, quality and price. The company has launched a modular based Axial Flux Permanent Magnet motor which can be assembled within one hour (expected to be the lowest $ per kW motor on the market); an integrated Lithium Battery Pack Module which provides a simple, scalable plug and play power cell; and a Battery Management System that can support the full range of Lithium-ion chemistries.

 

Ashwoods is already renowned as the UK’s largest supplier of hybrid vehicles and developed this range of components as an integral part of its continued development of its Hybrid Drive Technology. The new products were developed as part of a consortium with Citroen, Life Batt and Sevcon with grant funding support from the government-backed Technology Strategy Board.

 

The company believes the new range of components offers a unique combination of durability, performance and value for money – a combination that Ashwoods Global Applications Manager; Bob Beckwith explained was a market challenge that needed a solution.

 

 ‘Battery Management is probably the single biggest challenge facing the Electric Vehicle (EV) and Hybrid Electric Vehicle (HEV) market as it affects all aspects of vehicle performance,’ he said.

 

‘One of the greatest challenges that our engineers faced when developing the Hybrid Drive technology was the lack of effective battery management. There are no Battery Management Systems (BMS’s) available on the market that can effectively manage Lithium batteries on a demanding hybrid drive cycle.’

 

He added that access to the company’s own vehicle data had been critical to this development project – particularly in terms of showing its true functional capability.

 

‘We were able to work with data from 150 Ashwoods Hybrid vehicles with proprietary BMS that have covered over two million miles.  No other BMS supplier has access to this level of detailed real world data and this was crucial for the development process.  This has been an application led development project driven with the outcome of delivering a functional product that has not only been proven in day to day transport settings but has real market potential. Moving forwards all our hybrid and electric applications will be made up of our own component parts.’

 

Ashwoods is now supplying its BMS in volume to a number of UK and European customers in the military, automotive and stationary power markets. It hopes that in the next two years that export numbers will grow by over 400 per cent and this year is predicting a turnover of over £10m.

 

The company is now targeting the US market where Bob believes that Ashwoods Energy can break into a market that is currently dominated by larger companies.

 

He said: ‘As a smaller company entering this market we have the advantage that we can be truly flexible and innovative in response to customers – however we can combine that with a data source that many larger companies would envy thanks to our growing fleet of hybrid drive vans.

 

‘In addition our new component range offers versatility and simplicity – and is competitive on pricing – all key issues for customers in this sector.’