- Lightship, the company behind the futuristic AE.1 self-powered RV trailer, has a new product.
- The Powersled is based on the same underpinnings as the luxury camper, but it’s geared toward jobsites and emergency response situations.
- It packs a huge LFP battery that can drive the trailer’s wheels, improving the towing vehicle’s efficiency.
Towable generators are great for job sites where there is no access to electricity. However, they’re noisy, they emit nasty fumes into the air, and they usually take up the whole trailer, which means a second vehicle and a second trailer are needed if the workers have to haul a lot of stuff.
Now, though, Lightship, the company that brought us the self-propelled AE.1 RV trailer, wants to fix all of these problems with a new electric trailer. Dubbed the Powersled, it’s based on the same underpinnings as the futuristic AE.1 travel RV, including the TrekDrive electric motor that aids during towing, but packs a huge battery that can power a jobsite or remote emergency response situation for days.
Photo by: Lightship
Plus, because the batteries are nestled between the chassis rails, the top of the trailer is free for, you know, trailer stuff. The Powersled’s makers said the dual-axle trailer will be available as a stripped chassis for custom upfitters, a flatbed platform, and a cargo configuration for enclosed or climate-sensitive payloads.
The company offers three battery configurations: a base 80-kilowatt-hour model, a mid-spec 160-kWh pack, and a huge 240-kWh option. All versions are powered by lithium iron phosphate (LFP) cells and come with a single electric motor that can provide a maximum power output of 70 kilowatts (94 horsepower) and a peak torque of 121.7 pound-feet. The continuous power output of the TrekDrive motor is rated at 30 kW (40 hp).
Lightship claims that its battery trailer can double the fuel efficiency of the towing vehicle compared to a similarly sized conventional trailer that doesn’t have an electric motor driving the wheels.
A Tesla-style NACS charge port is standard, allowing the 80-kWh Powersled to be recharged from 20-to-80% in as little as 40 minutes, while the 240-kWh model needs 120 minutes. On AC power, the same top-up will take between five and 15 hours, depending on the configuration.
On the power output side, Lightship’s battery generator trailer can deliver up to 19.2 kW at either 120 or 240 volts when fitted with a single on-board charger. With the dual OBC, the trailer can deliver 38.4 kW of continuous power, with a maximum 80-amp current at either 120 or 240 volts.
In other words, the base 80 kWh model fitted with the single on-board charger could sustain a jobsite for roughly four hours at full blast, while the 240 kWh model could keep the tools running for a little over 12 hours. That said, with a lower power consumption, the largest-capacity version could comfortably keep the lights on for at least two days.
The Powersled is 319 inches long, 87 in wide, and its floor is 63 in wide. Unladen, the ride height measures 9 in. The maximum gross vehicle weight rating is 12,000 pounds, and the maximum payload weight is between 6,200 and 8,700 lbs, depending on the configuration. The trailer itself weighs between 3,300 and 5,800 lbs, and its operating temperature range is between 19.4°F (-7°C) and 109.4°F (43°C).
The order books are open, and Lightship says it has already secured an initial customer for the Powersled, with deliveries already underway to agricultural drone manufacturer Exedy Drones, which wants to use the power trailer as a mobile charging and field operations hub for drone-based crop monitoring and spraying applications.