Welcome everyone to the latest edition of our Reimagining Mobility Podcast series. I'm here with Phil Schnell from our technical center in California. Phil, you've been with AVL for a long time. You've led a lot of different projects from a project management coordination build and lots of things. Probably often, oftentimes many times the guy that's in the background but making it happen to get with the engineers. And with your experience that you yourself are bringing.
I want to talk a little bit about with you today about the aviation project, not necessarily about the battery and the controls and the battery software that we put together for this very exciting aerospace program. But I want to talk about what did it actually take right from a we have to manufacture these batteries. We have to come up with new processes, with new testing and validation, with a with a totally new approach in some cases, and how we put things together, how we design it.
And I know you were in the background or in the forefront, depending on what you want to see in all of this. So tell me a little bit, what did it mean to put a battery program to lead a battery program for the aerospace industry versus for what you've done many times for the passenger vehicle or heavy duty truck space? Certainly it was it was definitely a departure from what we normally do.
As you mentioned, to automotive and some even stationary support generation is what AVL is typically known for going into the aviation space was a bit of a bit of a long, a long stretch for all of us. We knew that there were going to be differences.
But even with the anticipation of what we had and the the research that we did and how to get into the industry that were still some things that were that were catch us as we went through the things that we knew that were going to be a bit of a stretch for us. Were the requirements specifically for the the the first the first flight requirement was is higher for an airplane, obviously, than it is for an automotive vehicle.
You can't pull off on the side of the road with an airplane as high as you can with a car. So the the the safety and the redundancies were or that were implemented were much different than what we would normally expect. That was one of the things that we anticipated. The other thing was just the safety requirements to get the thing up into the air.
Automotive vehicles, as you know, have a particular acceptance of if there's a problem or an issue to allow a battery to be energized safely, I guess would be the right way to say it down the road. Airplanes don't have that. You basically have to protect the battery and the rest of the electrified system. If there is a problem with any one of the individual cells. So increasing the safety level and the testing and the dependency of the batteries was was a big deal.
So those two things we really understood a little more of a nebulous item that was the the documentation and the proof that we were doing what we were doing. AVL isn't really a manufacturing company, but for an airplane we did have to produce over 100 of these battery cassettes, which was a big level of work for us. So producing that volume of product in an organization of ourselves that's used to more of a prototyping approach. That was a bit of a learning curve for us as well.
So those two or three things we really knew going in, but it was working very closely with aviation. To achieve all of those goals is really where we ended up growing. As, as I said, we're, we're a prototyping organization at heart here. So we had to expand our capabilities to do the manufacturing. And in that, we did have to add we knew that there were going to be operational description, pages were going to be pad documents to build everything.
But the level of detail that we had to generate to produce all of those was much more than we expected. Just the pure physical labor of building 100, more than 100 of these of these cassettes, even though you know that it's going to be a lot of work when you're sitting there looking at that many parts, remembering these these cassettes are 800 volts. So there's nearly 200 individual battery cells in each cassette times, 100 cassettes. Just the sheer volume was was overwhelming to all of us.
So bringing in people, working with working with new employees, doing the assemblies, do we adding inspections as we went along? And again, because it was it was the first application of a, I should say the first large scale, larger scale application of a prototyping approach. You ended up you ended up learning a lot of things and adding in in intermediate inspections and procedures that you hadn't necessarily anticipated before. So you learn you learn something.
Take a step, three steps forward, one step sideways, and then adapt and then have to readdress. So those things that were anticipated but probably not completely comprehended was really the growth of the and the learnings that we went through during the past the year that it took to go from the original contract to the build and then support aviation for their first plane.
If you if you had to take, let's say your if you had to make your statement about what were the three main items, the three main pillars, we are able could build upon from either existing technologies, tools, knowhow, capabilities, whatever it might be. That really allowed us more so than anybody else to help Eviation get to where they need or help an aerospace company create a battery that they can use for an airplane. What were those three items? The first one would be safety.
Safety of the individual individual cassette, as I mentioned, to hold any thermal event within the cassette so that it didn't propagate into the rest of the system. The controls to allow the if there is a problem on an individual cassette that allows the remainder of the airplane to to operate successfully, that was integral to the cassette design. But that development was was particularly important. And then I would say understanding what the customer really needs as far as their deliverables.
Because again, with, with the aerospace applications they need to supply information to the FAA to allow the airplane to be flight ready. So many of the things that we do, we didn't completely understand the the the downstream impact or the downstream need or on many of the things that we were doing that they would they would require downstream.
So the safety, the the the product, the electronic management and then the documentation process control, those types of things were the three things that were probably the most important. And fundamentally, again, what we're saying is these are two things that even though we haven't done those for the aerospace community, we have done similar things, or at least a smaller or less complex version of it for mobility applications on the ground.
That that allowed us then to get to with obviously lots of simulation capability that we have anyways to then get into the aerospace and ultimately be successful women. You're right. I mean, those are the top three.
But as you mentioned, there are all sorts of the other tools that we had to use to get to the point where we could achieve those three, three particular ones each one of these things did go through mechanical simulation work, make sure they passed a violent vibration and shock, followed on by physical testing of the things to verify the simulations that we had run.
We supported the thermal thermal controls and development of flow analysis of the the supporting cooling plates that that allowed the system or could allow the system to be cooled. And then the other simulation tools that go along with the software to simulate that, the controls in the software that were developing did indeed do what they what they were supposed to do. Those all of those are true. And you're right, I'm not none of these are unique to either automotive or aerospace.
They're used in both. I think I think what we what we learned is that the the the rules aren't different, but they're interpreted in a different way. Perhaps that's a one way to think of it is that, again, if we were if we were making a a production battery, many of the things that we did for this first flight vehicle would be implemented into a manufacturing plant.
But the need for automotive I'm sorry, the need for aerospace level documentation and monitoring isn't needed on an initial prototype for for an an automotive. Right. And I think that's where we really were, where our eyes were opened quite a bit. Is that the level of need for detail or redundancies and all those things are are much higher for obvious reasons in in an airplane than they are in a car.
So learning those things and then understanding how to apply those higher level of monitoring even on a single prototype is, was, was, was quite a learning process for us. So to me, in my experience, in a, in a, in a role that you have, which is sort of the you had a quarterback, you had a playmaker, right? You're making sure everybody is moving at the right speed with the right things. You're juggling a lot of different balls, a lot of different activities, dealing with the customers.
At the end of day, my experience, it always comes down again to communication in this case is really be the culmination of a lot of work, but also the the bringing together two different industries as you as you share. Right. It's not that were totally different but were significant enough different that oh I didn't realize this. Oh we thought we would do it this way and all. You can't do it this way.
So tell me a little bit about again that the consistency of communication is always a challenge in any type of program, but maybe the add on with two industries, maybe two mindsets to ideas of what call and what safety, what documentation is to talk a little bit about that. Yeah, the tools of communication really were the same. You know, it's it's telephone calls, it's conference calls, it's it's monitoring timing.
Using a typical Gantt chart, it is meeting minutes of what's described, carrying on individual task lists or open eye open items or issues list. So those tools are the same whether it became obvious as we got deeper into the process, many of the things that we're used to in the automotive, the example B sample in those particular phases are maintained fundamentally.
They obviously have different acronyms where to learn a new language to to fit those, but they do have some particular I wouldn't call them more important, but they're more obvious milestones and gates as you're run through, they have critical, critical reviews and and specific reviews that are held very, very tightly.
And recognizing as we went through those particular reviews, which we would normally identify as a as a gait review, as you would move towards and a sample release or some sort of a milestone review that is in preparation for a validation review or a validation event.
These were, again, the the seed of the documentation that was going to be rolled forward, that was going to be necessary much later in the program as they went towards their their documentation package, as it goes to the FAA and felt to many of the things that we again coming from a a more prototyping environment rather than a manufacturing environment we would work with. And it would be more of a development and and and perhaps much more of a fuzzy milestone rather than a solid milestone.
We learned that there are particular criteria that you have to hit as you go through their process that are very, very important, very document or very important to be documented properly in the proper formats, in the proper way. And those were those were items that we had to adapt to be this two items for us, you know, first time in the aerospace and then the first time with aviation as a customer.
So it was them teaching us their environment, their industry, so that we could support them for the needs that they had, those those were those were not not not difficult, but they were definitely learning and learning steps for us that that we again, we comprehended that they were going to start there, but we didn't perhaps fully understand the depth of the detail that was necessary. Right now, I think we see similar things, right? You guys work on our we work on military type application.
We work with marine applications. Now on the electrification space, you mentioned very early on stationary power, which one way or the other has a battery as well. So every single industry though connected one way or the other to the mobility space or directly mobility space has a little bit of its in its uniqueness, which certainly for you probably makes it exciting, but it's different and always the same at the same time.
Probably also challenging because it's then your responsibility to teach our team, our part of the overall project team, that things may not always go as far as they've been done for the last ten years. So what's what may be thinking along that line? What has been the most surprising to you on on how fast our team the the team has has adapted to, I don't know, new requirements, the new milestones. You just share new safety consciousness or additional safety consciousness. I don't know.
I'm I'm sure I'm missing something, but to you, one or two examples that that actually surprised you how well we adjusted to it or. Yeah, yeah. I it's it is interesting. I everyone here has as that came to evolve through automotive backgrounds some built in transportation or passenger vehicles even medium and heavy duties. So most everyone here has that kind of a history. So you use that as a baseline for whatever project you you go into.
And so everything is a an add on or I should say an amendment to what we already know. We use our baseline knowledge and then we move forward identifying the exceptions so the the documentation, the milestones, etc. for the aerospace are a good example of you. You start with what you know and then you learn what you don't. So a couple examples of that.
You know, the the learnings for the documentation for the aerospace, that's an easy example because we just we we worked through that over the past year. Everyone, the the engineering function tends to take learning as a good challenge. I mean, that's that's kind of what we are. We like to learn stuff and do new things. So that was never a problem. To to learn something new was never a problem. The problem is always you don't know what you don't know. So we can learn something new.
But as you imagine, if you if you're getting into the automotive industry for the first time, you pull out the the versus book and try and look at all the requirements for what a car is. But that doesn't teach you how to design a car so you can look at all the recommendations and requirements and rules for airplane approvals. But that doesn't teach you how to design an airplane, right.
So you have to it's somewhat of a trial by fire, working with the customer to understand what they need so that you can interpret that based upon your existing knowledge and then put it into their terms. That's that's always a give and take. And Eviation knew that we weren't an aerospace company, so they were more than willing to work with us to do that. So that was never any sort of stress or any sort of any sort of problems with that.
But that didn't mean that through osmosis they could just give us all of their knowledge. So it was it was, you know, we couldn't understand where we were falling short until we stumbled across the problem and then we had to adapt and learn to it. So in this particular example, I think it was pretty clear that we we had a comprehension of where we were needing, needing to learn new areas.
And so once we stumbled across something, the guys, the team very, very quickly were able to say, okay, I know, I know, I know what I need to learn now. I understand what I need to change or alter or expand, and I can go into it. So that was that was satisfying for all of us that we were able to take our existing knowledge and adapt and learn into a new area. Another example is, is the stationary power, which is yes, it's a battery. Yes, it's some sort of a power generation unit.
But the rules for implementing such a thing become very different when you're either in the car or now you have to actually tie it to the to the ground, which seems easier. But then you need to understand the grid tie implications, the transformers, the other requirements to get it onto the grid, not just to create energy and drive itself down the road independently. And then you have the additional steps of is there a some sort of a third party inspection, very safety requirement.
What are the rules, the fire codes, what are the rules for perhaps in the individual city or the community that you're installing the part on so that now you have to know you're in the building, building requirements, now you're getting permits, all of those things that you never think of or you perhaps never want to think of when you're building an initial prototype or initial proof of concept, but to allow the customer to truly implement what you have, those are the items that that can make
you stumble when you didn't even think there was going to be a problem. Right. Right. So pretty much to summarize to summarize our our discussion here, it required a lot of flexibility, not only on your part, but also on the part of technology to customers. And just as a team. Right. We needed to be flexible. We needed to be willing to to really work together as a team and and take a challenge as they as they came.
And again, as you just mentioned, and the stationary power very much now suddenly we're not dependent on maybe an FAA regulation and or or a mid-summer regulation or wherever it might be. Now, we're suddenly based on different cities, have different requirements for different types of stationary powers, etc.. So and that and that industry is new to everyone who's being involved in it.
So it's not as if there's a standard that can be written that says, hey, if you're going to put electrical power generation here, here's the standards and the rules that you do. So the same with with aviation. They were learning and working with the FAA to create the regulations that we were trying to comply to even before they were written.
So part of part of what we stumble across in many projects over the years is that we're creating new technologies, new applications of technology that people don't they have no experience with. So we don't know how they don't know how to implement it safely or get it into a state where the rest of the world will recognize it as being a safe product.
And so there is education for us as the product, education to the customer for what they're going to achieve with product performance, etc.. And then there's also education for what happens to that product after or how to even implement it on the road or in a building. Right? Perfect ending. This is exactly what it is when we talk about reimagine mobility, right. And leading through technology leadership.
So perfect summary here to the end, but thank you, Phil, and thanks, everyone, for tuning in. You're welcome. Thanks to both. Thanks for listening to Reimagine Mobility Podcast. If you like this episode, please subscribe and tell a friend.