There are electric/hybrid cars and small trucks, so why not electric/hybrid semi trucks? You may be thinking I am talking about the Tesla semi; however, there is another company making trucks, Edison Motors. Unlike the complete disaster that the Tesla semi has been, Edison has shown true promise to make an economical hybrid semi that doesn’t take away from the looks of a classic 18-wheeler that we all love. All the while, also making their own designs of what they believe a hybrid semi truck should look like.
Edison Motors started making their trucks after they got tired of waiting for the Tesla semi that they pre-ordered as soon as it was announced in 2017. They started in 2021, and by 2022 the first hybrid logging truck was born. In November of 2024, the first customer trucks started production. Meanwhile, there is still no word of Teslas semi coming to the commercial market yet.
The first truck they made started its life out as a 1962 Kenworth LW 924 that they nicknamed Carl, after the truck driver who believed in the idea for this truck. Unfortunately, he passed away at the start of the build. The team behind Edison Motors immediately tore it down to the frame rails and added a new air ride suspension and a CAT 3306 generator to power the electric drive motor. For the motor, they used a Tesla model S electric motor.
They welded up the differential and spider gears on and adapted a drive shaft to it. From there, it goes into a 4 speed Spicer Aux transmission to reduce the gearing, and into a set of 4.33 rear ends. The generator in this truck charges the batteries in about 20 minutes while the truck is driving, and it can drive for 2-3 hours off the batteries alone. This semi can drive 1000 km on 120L of fuel, which works out to 12L/100km (21mpg).
Their second truck, L500, that they nicknamed Topsy is a fully custom made semi from the ground up. This 
truck has 280 kwh batteries paired with 500 kw powered E axles, running a C9 CAT diesel engine as the generator for the batteries. This truck by itself has hauled a combined weight of 100,700 pounds.
Now, the company is working on five new trucks, one undisclosed along with two tri-drive winch tractors, a tri-drive quad wagon logger and finally a snow plow for a company in Canada. All of this has been accomplished by a team of Canadians, most of them being truck drivers who saw how useful the Tesla semi could be but wanted to improve it. They accomplished all of this inside a tent with a dirt floor.
