At the Polish MAN plant in Starachowice, series production for battery-electric city buses started successfully at the beginning of October. The Lion’s City E in the 12-metre solo version starts, the first customer vehicles are now rolling off the production line for the hamburg Holstein (VHH) transport companies. The all-electric Lion’s City E as an articulated bus will follow about six months later and is scheduled to go into series production in the first half of 2021.
- Series production of Lion’s City 12 E successfully started, all-electric articulated bus to follow in the first half of 2021
- Lion’s City E will be fully integrated into existing city bus production at the Polish plant in Starachowice
- Extensive test and testing cycle mastered: MAN electric bus is ready for series production
Electrify Europe: This is what the MAN Lion’s City E. achieves every day, the all-electric city bus shows what it contains and inspires bus operators, bus drivers and experts alike. Since the handover of the first two vehicles for everyday use in Hamburg at the end of 2019, the MAN eBus Demoflotte has been rolling over Europe’s roads – with intensive field trials in liner operation and numerous stops at customers, including in Germany, Spain, Belgium, the Netherlands and France. With the successful start of series production at the beginning of October, the electric buses are now also off the production line as standard. We produce the Lion’s City E at the Polish MAN plant in Starachowice – in the first series start in the 12-meter solo version, the electric articulated bus Lion’s City 18 E starts about half a year later.
“I am very pleased that we are now able to offer the innovative and multi-award-winning Lion’s City E in series production. The start of series production is an important milestone on the eMobility Roadmap for MAN Truck & Bus and for the Starachowice site. We are thus expanding our production portfolio and consistently taking another step towards sustainable mobility,” says Michael Kobriger, Member of the Board of Management Production & Logistics at MAN Truck & Bus and Board Mentor for the Bus division. In recent years, the company has carefully prepared bus production and its employees for the requirements of electromobility. “I would like to pay tribute to the entire team, which has worked tirelessly and across departments to develop a reliable electric bus and successfully integrate it into production,” says Kobriger.
Flexible bus production: eBus is fully integrated
The all-electric MAN Lion’s City E is flexibly built in the production process with the other models of the new city bus generation on one belt and without bridging. In order for the production to take place fully integrated, a variety of efforts were needed. The shell of the electric bus alone differs by about 30 to 40 percent from its conventional counterpart. In addition, there is the electric powertrain, the batteries and other high-voltage components. In the preparation of production in Starachowice, plants had to be purchased or expanded, processes had to be rethought and around 3,500 employees had to be intensively trained.
All for one overarching goal: The integrated series production of the Lion’s City 12 E should start just in time for the fourth quarter of 2020 – completely on a production line together with the conventional city bus types. With success!
The first all-electric solo vehicles from customer orders are now rolling off the production line in series. By the end of the year, 17 new electric buses are to be handed over to the Hamburg-Holstein Transport Authority (VHH). For MAN, this is the first major customer delivery in the context of a tender. In addition to Hamburg, other cities are relying on Lion’s City E and have ordered electric buses for emission-free use in public transport. Another order comes from Malmö in Sweden, among others: Nobina Sverige AB, Scandinavia’s largest bus operator, has ordered 22 MAN Lion’s City E. The inhabitants in and around Malmö can already look forward to the quiet and clean vehicles from the series production in Starachowice.
Courtesy of MAN Truck & Bus