China’s commercial vehicle axle is changing shape, not just spec. On 10 October Dongfeng Commercial Vehicle launched its D600 platform in Wuhan; on 11 October analysts confirmed that underslung batteries plus integrated e-axles are now the default architecture for new-energy heavy trucks. The driveshaft is going, and the center of gravity drops by up to 900 mm.
No driveshaft: 300–500 kg comes back
An integrated e-axle deletes the propeller shaft and frees the space where the battery now goes. Per Fangde.com (11 October), an underslung pack cuts weight by 300–500 kg and lowers the center of gravity about half a meter; C&C Trucks quotes 900 mm for its Dianfenghuang. DeepWay’s first mass-produced e-axle truck drops the driveshaft entirely. Transmission efficiency runs 92–95 percent, trimming energy use 5–8 percent — over 10,000 yuan a year at 200,000 km.
Roughly 35 percent of the market by December
Supply follows architecture. Fangde.com expects heavy e-axles to reach about 35 percent of China’s new-energy commercial vehicle mix by end-2026, with Bosch, HanDe, Fast Gear, Great Wall Zhika and Wanliyang shipping new units. Demand is real: 193,300 new-energy heavy trucks sold in January–August, up 70 percent year on year (CPCA).
Dongfeng’s D600 sets the template
D600 covers diesel, gas, battery, hydrogen and ammonia on one architecture, using 233 common modules for 143 scenarios. Its 1,000 hp-class e-axle claims 98 percent motor and 99 percent transmission efficiency. Dongfeng Dana’s EP35D6 (49 t, 35,000 Nm) and EP40D (65 t, 41,000 Nm, four speeds) show the drive axle is now a platform family, not one part.
The weight ledger still bites
It is not free. China Business Journal reported on 12 October that a 600 kWh electric heavy truck weighs over 10.5 tonnes, at least 2.5 tonnes more than a diesel equivalent, cutting payload from 34.5 t to about 32 t. Trunk-line logistics is still only about 0.9 percent penetrated, so the 300–500 kg recovered by the e-axle matters as much as its efficiency.
What it means for axle suppliers
Zhucheng Yihe Axle Co., Ltd. treats this as a specification problem: the front axle still carries the same load and braking duty, but now shares a platform with a motorised drive axle whose housing, ratios and lubrication are frozen at platform level. Only matched families validated over 2,000,000 km get into the module library.
Conclusion
By the end of 2026 about 35 percent of China’s new-energy commercial vehicles will run a heavy e-axle, and the winners in the commercial vehicle axle business will be the makers that sell back payload kilograms, not just torque.