Truck & Off-Highway Engineering - December 2021 - 5

TECHNICAL INNOVATIONS
ELECTRIFICATION
ABS ramps up commercial-vehicle
battery-pack assembly
American Business Solutions (ABS) is
preparing for a big uptick in business
with the increasing electrification of
buses, medium- and heavy-duty trucks.
" In order to be ready for the sales pipeline
now through 2026/2027, we needed
more space, more equipment and
more people, " said Subhash Dhar,
founder, chairman and CEO of the energy-storage
solution supplier.
Dhar and other ABS officials spoke
Mahle's active pre-chamber technology proves
to be key to stable hydrogen ignition without
reduced compression ratio.
to do that, but we think that even with a
regular spark plug, it won't be dilute
enough to be able to significantly cool
those temperatures. So, the active prechamber
allows much leaner operation
than that, to the point that combustion
and surface temperatures are cool
enough to significantly reduce the likelihood
of pre-ignition. "
Having reduced the combustion temperatures
so significantly, there are other
benefits. First is that it is possible to raise
the compression ratio, which in turn improves
efficiency. The low dilution levels
also help to reduce the levels of engineout
oxides of nitrogen (NOx). Bunce noted
that the levels are low enough to consider
eliminating NOx aftertreatment.
" You may or may not want to do that,
but at the very least you could take
whatever is the base aftertreatment
solution for NOx and scale it down pretty
significantly, " he said. " We're seeing
extremely low NOx levels, essentially
close to where a NOx analyzer would
not even be able to measure it. "
John Kendall
TRUCK & OFF-HIGHWAY ENGINEERING
December 2021 5
with Truck & Off-Highway Engineering
prior to a ribbon-cutting ceremony for
the firm's expanded innovation center
in Lake Orion, Michigan. Since the acquisition
of assets from Bosch Battery
Systems, ABS has been in growth
mode. At its 2019 founding, ABS employed
a dozen technical specialists.
Today, the number of employees in
Michigan is 120 with an additional 75
engineers and technical specialists being
recruited by the end of 2022.
The innovation center's 115,000-sq.ft.
footprint includes three environmental
chambers, a prototype low-voltage assembly
line for 24- or 48-volt applications,
and a prototype high-voltage
production line with robotic assemblers.
ABS's high-voltage prototype line will
be replicated at its 170,000-sq.ft. manufacturing
facility in Springboro, Ohio,
where Bosch Battery Systems workers
previously assembled lithium-ion battery
packs for the Fiat 500e subcompact
car.
" We're going to convert that line for
the assembly of four different highvoltage
battery packs, " said Dr. John
Warner, ABS's chief customer officer.
The modular and scalable approach to
pack assembly features unique manufacturing
processes and cell interconnects.
" We'll use wire bonding on all the
high-voltage cells, giving us the ability
to use thermal management on the
cells, " Warner said. " We'll be able to
sandwich an aluminum cooling plate
between the two sets of cells. "
High-voltage battery pack production
is slated to start in October 2022
for commercial-vehicle applications.
" Everything that we learn on the prototype
line in Michigan will get transferred
to the production line in Ohio, "
Warner said.
Three environmental chambers
provide in-house testing capability
at ABS's innovation center.
FROM TOP: MAHLE POWERTRAIN; ABS
Truck & Off-Highway Engineering - December 2021

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