Dongfeng EV45

For a commercial vehicle, the Dongfeng EV45's cabin feels decently modern and feature-laden. It has an all-grey theme with contrast blue accents highlighting its all-electric nature. The dashboard here has a linear design with an asymmetric centre console.

The driver’s cockpit of the Dongfeng EV45 has a conventional tilt-adjustable steering wheel audio, and Bluetooth controls on its spokes. This steering wheel has a very modern-looking, fully digital colour LCD instrument console with funky-looking graphics for the data on display.

The instrument console is part of a horizontally-laid cluster that has a couple of vacant spaces for storing small items and a 1-DIN audio system, which also consists of the upper centre console of the dashboard. Meanwhile, the lower centre console has slim AC vents in the middle and a trapezoidal housing for the manual AC knobs at the bottom. There is a thin blue strip running across the dashboard, signifying that it is an electric vehicle. 

The Dongfeng EV45 also gets three seats, with a drive controller knob between the driver’s seat and the middle passenger seat. The seats have textured fabric upholstery, with adjustable headrests for the driver and co-passenger. 

Like most of the other conventional trucks, the Dongfeng EV45 also has a squared profile for its exterior design. However, it is the clean and minimalist design language at the front that makes the EV45 attract eyeballs.

The upper half of the front profile of the Dongfeng EV45 is the rectangular windscreen, which has a trapezoidal gloss black panel for the mounts of the windscreen wipers. Coming to the lower half of the front profile of the EV, the upper part has a U-shaped design with a large Dongfeng logo with blue highlights in the middle. 

The lower part of the Dongfeng EV45, which primarily is covered by the front bumper, has unique-looking headlamp housings on the corners. The headlamps here have split designs, with the lower part having boomerang-shaped housings with projector bulbs for the main headlight and daytime running LED strips. Meanwhile, the upper parts, which serve as LED turn indicators, are shaped like eyebrows for the main headlamps. The Dongfeng EV45 also gets a slim trapezoidal air dam in the lower middle part of the front bumper and large dual rearview mirrors mounted on its A-pillars. 

While the Dongfeng EV45's powertrain uses new-age electric technology, the suspension setup is old-school. The truck has steel leaf springs with telescopic shock absorbers at both front and rear. The EV45 has 16-inch steel wheels with 7.00R16 tyres all around and drum brakes for all corners. 

The Dongfeng EV45 truck comes standard with a single electric motor, which is paired with a single-speed transmission. This electric motor produces 161 bhp of maximum power and 320 Nm of maximum torque output while giving the Ev45 a top speed of 100 kmph. The 81.14kWh LFP battery of the Dongfeng EV45 gives it an NEDC-certified range of 350 km and takes 12 hours for 20-80% charge using a slow AC charger and 3 hours for 20-80% charge using a fast DC charger. 

For a commercial vehicle, the Dongfeng EV45 has an impressive set of modern safety features like dual front airbags, ABS with EBD, electronic stability control, front collision warning, tyre pressure monitoring system, electronic parking brake, lane departure warning and electronic stability control.

The Dongfeng EV45 has the proven expertise of Dongfeng in making commercial vehicles, for this light-duty truck has good performance and load-carrying capacity. It also has a modern design and new-age features that put it a level above the conventional trucks of its size.