If you ignore the "zero emissions" crap and look at practical applications, I can see some use cases for a truck like this. It also seems simpler than a normal hybrid (maybe I'm wrong, but to me it seems to add to potential mechanical problems to have both an electric motor and a gas engine with a transmission). This is an all electric motor but with two power sources: battery and gas generator.
But why the generator has to be a 6-cyl gas engine I don't know. Do you really need all of that to run about a 40kW generator? (my math on depending on the gas generator when the battery is empty to run it 80mph) I was under the impression that the standby diesel 40kW generators were 4-cyl. And you don't need that much if you start the gas generator long before the battery is dead. Maybe I'm overlooking something.
“Maybe I’m overlooking something.”
I guess I am, also. Yours were exactly my questions.
It’s not a 40kw generator, it’s 130kw!
“Stellantis estimates the range of the Ramcharger to be up to 690 miles, including up to 145 miles powered by a 92 kilowatt-hour battery when fully charged without the extended-range power from the gas engine and 130 kilowatt electric generator.”
“Maybe I’m overlooking something.”
Maybe it’s a matter of how much of your driving uses electricity from the grid, versus electricity from the onboard gas generator.
Perhaps a much smaller battery compensates for the weight of the gas-powered generator.
Stellantis is putting another option for us on the market. That’s a good thing.
Suppose it was simply a normal truck powered by a 6-cylinder piston engine.
Would you consider 3.6 liters displacement to be too much, not enough, or just right?
Cut through all the hype, and that's what it's doing ... it's using a piston engine to drive an electric generator to run electric motors to make the wheels spin. It's a railroad locomotive.