Great Wall Motor Opens New Laboratory, Ushering in the "Hardcore Era" of Vehicle Testing | Frontline

In the current context where the penetration rate of new energy vehicles continues to climb and the intelligent competition accelerates, vehicle testing is no longer just a performance verification step in the traditional sense. Instead, it has become the "quality lifeline" and "innovation catalyst" throughout the entire life cycle of R & D, production, and application.

As the automotive industry accelerates its transformation from "mechanical manufacturing" to "intelligent mobile space", an "arms race" around automotive test grounds is quietly unfolding among Chinese automakers.

Recently, Great Wall Motor opened its new laboratories for the first time, disclosing a series of automotive testing facilities such as the intelligent interaction laboratory and the environmental wind tunnel laboratory, which were built with heavy investment.

Among them, the intelligent interaction laboratory is one of the highlights of Great Wall's new test system. The laboratory was launched in 2021 and officially put into use in 2022, with a total investment of over 12 million yuan.

Intelligent Interaction Laboratory

It has the full - link verification capabilities such as VR interaction experience, HMI prototype bench experience, real - vehicle simulated driving, and human - factor objective evaluation. It can conduct VR virtual driving experience, in - vehicle infotainment system interface prototype testing, real - vehicle simulation experience, etc., and is mainly used for the pre - testing and optimization of the intelligent interaction experience of vehicles.

Through virtual simulation technology, before actual vehicle manufacturing, Great Wall can use this laboratory to conduct highly realistic tests on functions such as intelligent cockpits, multi - modal interactions, and scenario - based services in advance, reducing the trial - and - error costs of relevant functions at the actual vehicle stage.

The engineer in charge of the laboratory construction told 36Kr that in the laboratory bench, the in - vehicle infotainment system part uses a self - developed H5 framework, and a new function interface can be generated in 3 working days. "After the in - vehicle infotainment system team develops a new page, they can come to the laboratory for testing. According to colleagues' feedback, after adding laboratory testing, the efficiency of actual vehicle testing has been improved to a certain extent."

The laboratory will continue to be optimized. The engineer told 36Kr, "We are considering introducing some chassis moving devices. In the future, we can not only conduct static tests but also some real dynamic tests."

In addition, the environmental wind tunnel laboratory built by Great Wall Motor with an investment of 300 million yuan was also opened to the public for the first time.

This laboratory supports temperature adjustment between - 40°C and 60°C and humidity adjustment between 5% and 95% RH, basically covering the temperature and humidity conditions of various regions around the world. The wind tunnel nozzle adopts a variable - area nozzle design, and the maximum wind speed can reach 250 km/h.

In addition, it also has a solar radiation simulation device, which can conduct extreme environment tests on systems such as battery thermal management, air - conditioning refrigeration, and engine heat dissipation, and is not affected by seasons and regions, improving the efficiency of vehicle development.

Environmental Wind Tunnel Laboratory

Laboratories have now become an important part of vehicle development. Through means such as virtual simulation and extreme environment laboratories, automotive enterprises can significantly reduce the trial - and - error costs of actual vehicles and improve development efficiency.

In today's era when the intelligent wave sweeps across the automotive industry, Great Wall Motor's heavy investment in laboratories such as intelligent interaction and environmental wind tunnel is a vivid footnote to the current industry transformation.