2023 LDV Mifa 9: Mid-trip battery swapping possible for Australia

A three-minute battery change was a pipedream just a decade ago. LDV says it’s now a reality.

The trial has already begun in the Mifa 9 people mover’s China home market. Apparently, there are stations that’ll swiftly remove your Mifa’s depleted battery and replace it with a fully charged freshie in under three minutes.

That’s similar to or even less time than it takes to fill a regular people mover with 70L of viscous diesel. The best bit? Maxus, LDV’s namesake in China, says it’s possible in Australia.

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“To relieve driving range anxiety, Maxus has developed battery-swapping technology for the Mifa 9 which can complete a battery change in just three minutes”, said general manager Maxus product panning division Jiayue Xie.

“In China, Saic Motor Group is building battery swapping stations, we are also planning to apply this technology to Mifa vehicles here in Australia”, added Xie. The $106,000 LDV Mifa 9 people mover has 430km WLTP driving range and with 120kW DC fast-charging can go from 30-80 per cent charge in 36 minutes.

Speaking to local executives LDV Australian distributor from Ateco, we get a clearer idea of timeframes. Australian general manager Dinesh Chinnappa said that battery swapping tech like that being rolled out in China isn’t going publically at scale any time soon.

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There are other implementations beyond a Formula-1 speed pit stop mid-road trip for this technology, though.

For example, an easy-swap battery could revolutionise delivery fleets that rely on electric vans such as the forthcoming LDV eDeliver 7, cutting downtime and allowing off-peak charging.

Instead of using expensive DC charging infrastructure, or wasting precious time sitting on a slow AC power point, businesses could have a stash of batteries at base. Drive in at lunch after the 300km-or-so that LDV claims its forthcoming eDeliver 7 will be capable of and swap the depleted LFP pack for one with 100 per cent – it’s not a bad idea for big fleets such as Ikea, a company that’s already using eDeliver 9 vans in metro areas.

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Although in its infancy, the idea of battery swapping isn’t new. An Israeli company, Better Place, made plenty of noise in Australia before going into liquidation in 2013.

Since 2021, Janus Electric has been trialling the technology with heavy goods vehicles, running trucks and semis from Sydney to Brisbane that are capable of 400-600km of driving range with a battery-changing station in between.