Industry Experts Predict: Inconspicuous Widget “Belts” Are Accelerating the Decline of Traditional Oil Vehicles

May 31st news, the small part of the cable that bundles the cables inside the car looks so inconspicuous, many people don’t even notice it. However, several auto industry experts predict that,This cheap component could hasten the decline of the diesel locomotive.

The conflict in Ukraine has hampered the supply of belts, as the country is a large producer of belts,The belts produced each year are installed on hundreds of thousands of new cars. Made of wire, plastic, and rubber, these ties are barely tech-savvy, with fairly low profit margins, and, combined with the heavy labor of manual labor required to produce them, have never been as lauded as microchips and motors. Without them, however, the car could not be built.

More than a dozen people in the automotive industry and experts believe that,Tight supply of straps could accelerate transition for some legacy car companies,becauseElectric car harnesses are lighter and easier to produce with machines. “This is just one more reason for the traditional auto industry to accelerate its transition to electric vehicles,” said Sam Fiorani, head of production forecasting firm AutoForecast Solutions.

At present, diesel locomotives still account for the absolute majority of global new car sales.According to data from JATO DynamicElectric car sales doubled to 4 million last year, but still only 6% of total car sales.

Nissan Chief Executive Makoto Uchida said the company has discussed with suppliers abandoning the model of using cheap labor to make belts due to supply chain disruptions due to factors such as the Ukraine crisis. However, in the short term,Automakers and suppliers can only move harness production to other lower-cost countries.

Mercedes-Benz is airlifting straps from Mexico to fill a short supply gap, and many Japanese suppliers are adding capacity in Morocco, while others are looking to build in countries including Tunisia, Poland, Serbia and Romania, according to people familiar with the matter. new production line.

Tesla Mode

The harnesses of diesel locomotives require bundling up to 5 kilometers of cables connecting everything from seat heaters to windows. Belt production is labor-intensive, and nearly every model uses a different specification, making it difficult to change specifications quickly.

Supply disruptions caused by the conflict in Ukraine are a wake-up call for the auto industry. Automakers and suppliers said factories were still operating as usual in the early days of the conflict, thanks to workers there who secured a small supply of straps amid blackouts, air raid warnings and curfews.

British luxury carmaker Bentley’s chief executive, Adrian Hallmark, said the company was initially concerned that a shortage of belts would lead to a shortage of belts.Its 2022 car production could be cut by 30% to 40%.

“The Ukrainian crisis could shut down our factories completely for a few months, much longer than the closure due to pandemic restrictions,” Hormark said. “In addition, because the traditional straps themselves are supplied by more than a dozen different suppliers from Ukraine It is made up of different parts, so finding an alternative production line is quite complicated.”

He added that supply issues have led Bentley to focus more on developing simple belts that could be produced by a central computer and could be used in electric vehicles. Bentley is a sub-brand of the Volkswagen Group.The group plans to produce only electric models by 2030.

“Tesla models have a completely different wiring concept, and we can’t change overnight because it amounts to a fundamental change in the way we design cars,” Hormark explained.

The new generation of straps used in electric vehicles such as Tesla can be produced in sections on automated production lines and are lighter, which is a key factor because reducing the weight of electric vehicles is critical to extending the range.

Europe and China have announced plans to ban gasoline-powered vehicles, and with the deadline looming, traditional automakers and producers may not have time to prove their redesigned belts work better, many industry executives and experts said.

“I’m not going to invest a dime in the development of internal combustion engines right now,” said Sandy Munro, an automotive consultant in Michigan. He estimates,Electric vehicles will account for half of global new car sales by 2028.

Paradigm change

Walter Glück, head of Leoni’s harness business, a global provider of energy data management products, solutions and services to the automotive and other industries, said the company is working with automakers to develop harnesses for electric vehicles New automation solutions.

Leoni specializes in zoned or modular straps that will be divided into six to eight sections that are short enough to automate assembly and reduce complexity. “It’s a paradigm change,” Gluck said. “If you want to reduce the production time of a car, modular straps can help.”

Among automakers, BMW is also considering modular straps, according to people familiar with the matter. Such ties require fewer semiconductors and cables, which will save space and make them lighter. The new straps will also make it easier to upgrade the vehicle wirelessly, an area where Tesla currently dominates.

CelLink, a California-based startup that has developed a fully automated and easy-to-assemble “elastic strap,” raised $250 million earlier this year from companies including BMW, auto supplier Lear Corp and Robert Bosch.

The company’s chief executive, Kevin Coakley, declined to disclose the identities of customers, but said CelLink’s harnesses are already installed in nearly 1 million electric vehicles. From the current point of view,Only Tesla has such a production scale, but the latter declined to comment for comment.

CelLink’s new $125 million factory in Texas will have 25 automated production lines that will be able to switch between different strap designs in about 10 minutes, Kirkley said. Meanwhile, the company is working with several automakers to develop electric vehicles and is considering building another factory in Europe.

While lead times for replacement of traditional straps can be as long as 26 weeks, Kirkley said,His company may ship redesigned products within two weeks.

Dan Ratliff, head of Detroit-based venture capital firm Fontinalis Partners, believes that kind of speed is exactly what traditional automakers are looking for as they move to electric vehicles. Fontinalis Partners, founded by Ford Chairman Bill Ford, has invested in CelLink.

Ratliff added that for decades, the auto industry didn’t need to move quickly to rethink the design of an inconspicuous little part like the belt, but Tesla has changed that.