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GTB-40 First Drive
On August 15, 2008, the prototype GTB-40 PHEV hybrid bus made its first drive at the Autokinetics development center in Rochester Hills, Michigan. The first drive occurred late on a Friday afternoon following an intensive week of final component assembly and vehicle check-outs led by Bruce Emmons, Fisher Coachwork’s co-founder and Chief Technology Officer.
While the event was witnessed by only a handful of team members including co-inventor Leonard Blessing, the first drive marked a significant milestone in the development of this game-changing hybrid and the culmination of more than seven years of analysis and engineering development.
For the first time, thousands of pounds of Nitronic Stainless Steel which had entered the facility as flat lifeless sheet-stock emerged into the late afternoon sunlight, glistening brilliantly from stem to stern. “It was like something right out of the future” recalled Bruce Emmons, “I’d seen the vehicle thousands of times, but never like this; like something from the Jetson’s that had just landed in front of our building.” Bruce’s comment was perhaps prophetic, because if the team at Fisher Coachworks has its way, the GBT-40 will indeed be the future of urban mass-transit buses and the vehicle by which all new hybrids will be measured.
In the remaining hours of sunlight, the team conducted numerous laps around the facility establishing initial benchmarks for acceleration, suspension compliance, handling, braking, regenerative braking, noise and vibration. With the exception of an overly still initial suspension setting, the vehicle performedexceptionally well and displayed the performance parameters expected during the first drive.
If the first drive was any indication, the team can look forward to a robust pre-manufacturing development effort and a successful launch of the production vehicles in 2009.
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