As sustainability continues to be a major focus for the truck manufacturer, Volvo Trucks focused on making improvements on the traditional internal combustion engine to further improve fuel efficiency and address emissions concerns.
"It's very versatile, it's highly efficient, it can be used for many different types of fuel such as biofuel," said Jessica Sandstrom, senior vice president, global project management at Volvo Trucks, regarding internal combustion engines. "We always aim to be leaders in fuel economy, and that means that we will continue to develop our combustion engines going forward."
In particular, the OE has focused on natural gas and diesel biofuel options as alternatives to traditional diesel fuel.
In many markets, the Volvo FH and Volvo FM are available with the Euro 6 compliant gas-powered liquefied natural gas LNG engine. This option allows for fueling options of biogas or natural gas - both of which help to reduce CO2 emissions compared to Volvo’s equivalent diesel trucks.
Volvo Trucks has also designed this new truck series to allow for compatibility and development into full electric trucks in the future. Application will help to determine which powertrain design would be most suitable for each customer.
Other new services
The truck manufacturer discussed new products and services aimed at improving and assessing total cost of ownership. Introduced last year, Volvo offers the I-SAVE fuel consumption (calculator), which Alm confirmed has helped fleets limit fuel consumption by 7 percent or more.
When it comes to vehicle leasing, the Flexi Gold Service Contract provides flexible leasing options for fleets based on vehicle usage. (usage based service contract).
Volvo Connect provides real-time remote monitoring of vehicle systems and components and the ability to manage software updates at the customer's convenience.
"Real-time monitoring keeps a watchful eye on uptime critical components," said Hillevi Pihlblad Rafidashti, commercial services manager for Volvo Trucks. "Using artificial intelligence, machine learning, and algorithms to analyze data, we can predict potential issues much more accurately and frequently than we could before."
As it relates to service and vehicle uptime, Volvo Trucks will offer oil drain intervals extended by up to 50 percent, said Rafidashti. The oil changes can be optimally scheduled with other planned service for the trucks.
Additionally, improvements have been made to connected body services offering a real-time view of vehicle body and equipment status on the vehicle's in-cab display. This provides drivers with the real time status of the body or equipment in the side display.
"We have a new more advanced body builder module that can decrease the need for body builders to install their own hardwired switches and additional wiring between the cab and the chassis," Rafidashti added.
Volvo Trucks looks to continue innovations globally, that will allow the company to address customer needs in the future. This means a continued investment in research and development of new technologies.
"We are increasing our spending and investments in terms of R&D to keep up our leading position in the industry, and also then be part of the transformation that we are in," Alm said.
Working from a global platform, a variety of technologies first introduced to the European market through Volvo Trucks do eventually make their way into the Volvo Trucks North America (VTNA) product lines, which serve the U.S. and Canadian markets. Examples of these technologies include the recently enhanced Turbo Compound engine for North America, introduced in Europe under the name I-Save. Additionally, the Volvo Dynamic Steering (VDS) product first launched through VTNA in September of 2019 was originally available for European Volvo Trucks in 2013. Another recent example, the integrated driveline used in the VNR Electric model introduced during the Volvo LIGHTS announcement last month uses the same integrated driveline as the European Volvo FL and Volvo FE product range.
