EU-LIVE – “Efficient Urban Light Vehical” was a European R&D project (Horizon2020) with the participation of Spirit Design with a total budget of 6.7 million euros, bringing together the know-how of 12 renowned partners, including Virtual Vehicle Research Center, Groupe PSA, Peugeot Scooters, Continental Automotive GmbH, Frauenhofer-Gesellschaft and Samsung SDI. At the end of the three-year research project, 2 real demonstrators of an electric motorcycle (L3e) and a plug-in hybrid tricycle (L5e) and a virtual prototype of a four-wheeled vehicle (L6e) were presented. EU-LIVE focused on the development of common parts (including powertrain, components, battery) to demonstrate that the scooter and automotive industries can offer more efficient and cost-effective e light vehicles to end users in the future.
The L5e demonstrator was a highlight at TRA in Vienna and at the Paris Motor Show in 2018.
Branding and Website
Identity creates team spirit and ensures clear communication
Spirit Design already created a uniform project identity at the beginning of the project. Not only externally to the different steakholders, but especially the communication within the project partners was made easy with the uniform project branding.
In addition to creating common templates, such as Word, Excel and PPT, Spirit Design also made the project identity visible on the website with its clear design. During the project, project communication also came from Spirit Design’s pen. Newsletters, PR releases, brochures and the maintenance of the website as well as the LinkedIn channel kept the public up to date.
User Needs
Understanding future users: The basis of any product development
Together with fka (Forschungsgesellschaft Kraftfahrwesen mbH Aachen), Spirit Design laid the groundwork for product development. Several focus groups were conducted in 3 different European countries, whereby the needs of future users were queried on the basis of common scenarios in road traffic. Functions were derived from the results and flowed into further product development. For a more detailed recap, you can find the public report of this milestone here: user needs study
Open Design Concept and Virtual Prototype
Trendsetting design: The L6e vehicle
With Spirit Design, EU-LIVE had the perfect partner to organize the Open Design Contest. The contest was aimed at industrial and transportation designers as well as engineers, whether they are still in training or already established in their profession. The challenge of the contest was to create an appealing design that meets the requirements of an L6e vehicle. Robert Hahn convinced the top-class jury (representatives from the partners Peugeot Scooter, Groupe PSA and Spirit Design) with his design “Cityflex”.
The futuristic design was further developed by Spirit Design and fka into a virtual prototype, which was subsequently subjected to a feasibility study. The results of the study show that the integration of a modular powertrain can be the solution to cost-effective and efficient L-category vehicles.
Prototype Presentation
The modular platform in the form of L3e and L5e prototypes
At the largest European conference for transport (TRA), the real prototypes L3e and L5e were presented to the public for the first time in Vienna. The L5e vehicle was indeed an eye-catcher at the conference and was also selected by Mrs. Violeta Bulc (EU Commissioner for Transport) from several research projects to learn more about. In the L3e vehicle, the common parts such as battery and in-wheel motor of the modular platform of EU-LIVE were shown.
