World’s first battery driven caravan?

German RV manufacturer Dethleffs is working on a caravan with battery-driven axles that will reduce the load on the tow vehicle, and allow smaller tow vehicles to tow much heavier caravans.

Unveiled at the 2018 Caravan Salon supershow in Germany, the E.Home Coco concept incorporates two 40kW lithium batteries, mounted flat in the floor, that send power to the caravan's dual-motor axle.

The result is a caravan that can drive its own wheels, with a  ‘black box’ electronic module that controls the electric motors and can be pre-set with a predefined number to effectively reduce the weight on the tow vehicle.

Each of the motors is capable of producing up to 463Nm of torque, and there's a torque vectoring system that will independently vary the torque delivery at each wheel for improved performance and stability.

As an example, Dethleffs said the effective weight of a 900kg caravan could be reduced to as low as 100 kg using the system, and to demonstrate what’s possible, the display caravan was hitched up to a tiny BMW battery-powered car.

The innovative set-up would also address the issue of ‘range anxiety’ with electric tow vehicles, so that they could be driven further before having to stop to top up the batteries.

Solar panels on the caravan's roof would help keep the extra caravan batteries charged, and the axle motors could also be used to park the caravan when unhitched.

Dethleffs also imagines the caravan being used as another source of domestic electricity, with it parked in the driveway and hooked up to the home grid. The caravan could be used as a backup power supply or an active part of a solar system, and thus extend its use beyond holiday touring.

The e.Home Coco is Dethleffs' latest vision of a fossil fuel-free RV future, following on from the display of the all-electric, solar-backed e.home concept motorhome at last year's show.

The German manufacturer plans on testing the e.Home Coco concept with a working model in 2019.