So today when I was out on my bike I saw, indeed, came close to running into, my third Chery hybrid taxi. I made a point of checking out exactly which model Chery it was. ‘A516’, I’m pretty sure I saw. Well, wikipedia says there’s a Chery A5 series, but it doesn’t do much to satisfy my curiosity:
The Chery A5 is a car produced by Chery Automobile. The Chery A516 has a 1.6L engine, and the Chery A520 has a 2.0L engine. The Chery A5 ISG the first Chinese-designed mass-production hybrid vehicle.
Right. So what was written on the side of the vehicle said clearly that it was a hybrid. I’m pretty sure that the badge on the back said ‘A516’, but I suppose the letters ISG could’ve been elsewhere…. I was cycling in traffic, after all, and didn’t have time to stop and make a very careful note of all the particulars.\
China Car Times has a write-up here.
I guess the logical thing is to go straight to the Chery website. Damn, they really need to hire some competent English editors. The A5 page doesn’t offer much information and does not seem to mention any hybrid edition. Maybe it’s only for internal consumption?
Alright, here I can see A520, 518 and 516 (could the numbers have anything to do with the 2, 1.8 and 1.6 litre engines offered?) but… damn, what’s the Chinese word for hybrid? Oh dear, I’m not sure how much that’ll help.
Nah, I just can’t find anything about an A5 hybrid.
So I’m intrigued. I’ve seen three (or maybe 2, having seen one twice, or maybe only 1 three times) Chery hybrid taxis. There doesn’t seem to be any information on them on the Chery website, although I am sure the one I saw today was an A516, and the previous two looked the same. And if I’m matching memory with pictures rightly, I’ve ridden in an A5, and it was a pretty decent car. Also, the boot (trunk, if you speak American) has a lot more space than you’d think just looking at it from the outside. So if Chery really is producing hybrids and they are showing up in the Beijing taxi fleet, then good on them, let’s see some more.
That’s really interesting. I’ve read reports that the hybrid is especially good for stop-n-go kind of vehicles, which makes it a perfect candidate for garbage trucks, mail delivery, and pretty much delivery trucks of all kind. Of course, as you alluded earlier, how to produce and recycle those batteries is very important to make them environment-friendly. It’s encouraging to see Chinese manufactures are designing and producing them.
I don’t know how hybrid vehicles are called either. I just went to Toyota’s China site, and noticed Toyota calls Prius 油电混合动力车.
That would seem like a logical name for hybrid.
Yeah, hybrids are a long ways from perfect- they still burn stuff, and therefore produce some pollution, and the batteries…. but they are a huge step forward and I want to see more of them. And it is encouraging to see Chinese manufacturers designing and producing them. The more I see of Chery, the more I like that company.
We have an entry for hybrid car as 电力、内燃两用汽车 but that is more of a definition. Someone here says, 混合动力车 which can be abbreviated to 混动车. After reading your post now I need to add a whole pile of new words to the dictionary.
Cheers Dan, I looked but somehow didn’t find that. Now, if you could see the document I’m working on right now (but you won’t be able to, sorry), you’d see you have a shitload more words to add. I have a lot of horrible technical shit to be dealing with at the moment.
That sucks. Technical translations are always the worst; especially when the English words are unfamiliar to you. I had to work with some math concepts recently and had to check all the English words to make sure they existed…and I used to be pretty decent at math.
Yup, and I never ever studied any kind of engineering, which was what I was working on yesterday. Fun and games. Still, I got it done, and that’s the main thing.