Swedish automobile manufacturer Volvo Cars has developed a new on-board charger for its upgraded C30 electric vehicle (EV) in collaboration with Siemens, which is claimed to be capable of fully charging the car in about 1.5 hours.
Operating on a three-phase supply, the charger can be mounted on an EV and offer a total range of about 164km on a single full charge.
Being developed as part of collaboration between Volvo and Siemens for the development of electrified cars in August 2011, the new C30 will be powered by a new electric motor from Siemens that generates a peak output of 120hp and 250Nm of torque.
The new motor would also allow the EV to sprint from 0-70km/h in 5.9 seconds.
Volvo Car Group Electric Propulsion Systems vice president Lennart Stegland said the addition of the fast charging solution will improve the time and mileage for the daily usage of the car.
"This will drastically improve the cost of ownership since the customer will now be able to drive many low cost kilometres per day," Stegland said.
"A quick 10-minute plug-in adds power for another 20 kilometres of driving."
Volvo will lease about 100 new C30 EVs for European users in summer 2013 for evaluating the upgraded demo fleet.
