*This article is reproduced from the autocarweekly WeChat account.
Author: Ling Huchong
For people who are accustomed to watching movies, movie box office rankings are not unfamiliar at all. The top-grossing movies such as “Avatar”, “Avengers 4: Endgame”, and the former box office champion “Titanic” are all large-scale productions with big budgets, but there are also medium and even small-budget works such as “Wolf Warrior”, “The Wandering Earth”, and “NETA: Birth of the Demon Child” on the list.
The biggest dark horse of 2021 is naturally “Hi, Mom”, a low-budget film that skyrocketed to second place in the box office history. But regardless of how much investment is made, the explosively popular films that make it onto the list are all conscience works that put the budget into practical use.
Of course, as professionals in the automotive industry, we are more concerned about the automotive sales ranking. Speaking of which, the Chinese SUV sales ranking is somewhat “boring”, because if you look back through the list year after year, basically every year’s champion is the Haval H6, and it is also referred to as the “divine car” by the industry due to its stable performance.
In 2011, the first-generation Haval H6 was the only compact SUV in the 150,000 yuan price range, and it quickly became a hot commodity in the market. Its positioning met consumers’ traditional perceptions – reliable and durable, and its product strength was not inferior to that of joint venture counterparts. After the brand officially became independent in 2013, it listened to feedback from consumers, and in line with the progress of Great Wall Motors’ overall vehicle manufacturing technology, the upgraded version of Haval H6 with the new HAVAL badge optimized the smoothness of the body seams, paint saturation, and gap tolerances, and improved its hard strength in details.
Becoming a popular car in the automotive industry also requires careful attention and treating a popular car like the first car, maintaining the divine car for more than ten years.
The increase in sales has prompted OEM manufacturers to invest more in R&D to improve quality, maintain reputation, and fermentation of reputation can further drive sales growth. The divine car Haval H6 has paved a road that could be a textbook example.
The former Haval H6 was an efficient and comfortable means of transportation from point A to point B, a good companion for family travel, and the third-generation Haval H6, after the test of time, continues to uphold the original consumer definition of “reliable and durable” as a starting point and continues to break through.
Yes, compared with cost-effectiveness, I prefer to define it as an SUV with the goal of being the “safest SUV”. For filmmakers, nothing is better than finely honing the characters, so for car enthusiasts, creating a safer ride that allows drivers to drive with peace of mind is more important than anything.
In fact, with the economic development and the improvement of consumers’ understanding of cars, the industry has higher evaluation standards for active/passive safety. This is also the place where Haval H6 excels on its previous foundation. Its active/passive safety system not only surpasses those of Chinese domestic brands but also those of joint venture competitors.
The third generation Haval H6 has dubbed its passive safety as “Fortress” level which is quite vivid. When hearing this name, people immediately think that it is an absolutely “hard” product.
First of all, it has a very strong “skeleton” which adopts the Boron steel frame and laser welding technology. The proportion of high-strength steel used is as high as 71.61%, and the strength of hot-formed steel is up to 2000Mpa. Through repeated verification, the best deformation energy-absorbing area and ultra-high-strength passenger protection area are designed. In the event of a collision, the multi-channel force transmission strategy of the front/side/rear ensures that the passenger protection area is unbreakable. In addition, the whole series is equipped with 6 airbags as standard.
At the same time, when facing low-speed collision accidents, such as car-pedestrian, car-electric bicycle/bicycle accidents, the pedestrian protection and collapsible energy absorption systems are applied to minimize the damage to both parties.
The “wisdom” in the positioning of the third generation Haval H6 is also reflected in the field of active safety. Many trendy technologies have been applied to realize its determination to “build China’s safest SUV”.It has a total of 20 high-tech eyes, including 14 radars and 6 cameras, maintaining 360° surround detection, bringing convenience and safety to consumers from a “God’s eye view”. It is also equipped with an extremely “intelligent” brain – eyeq4 chip, which can meet the ultra-high intensity requirement of over trillions of TOPS floating-point operations per second, and collects information from 12 ultrasonic radars, 1 ADAS camera, 1 driving recorder camera, 4 surround-view cameras and 2 millimeter-wave radars, and quickly processes and feeds it back to the screen, coordinating the attitude of the driving and control systems, covering most of the travel scene applications.
The low-speed emergency braking assistance system and the front radar automatic warning function can avoid the risk of low-speed collisions. The only full-scenario AEB automatic emergency braking of the same level can monitor the status of front vehicles, pedestrians, bicycles and intersections. ACC adaptive cruise control (full-speed segment) is a boon for drivers who frequently travel at high speeds. Various functions work together to provide a more comprehensive level of safety protection for the third-generation Haval H6.
For users living in urban areas, they will often face “devil’s parking lots” or narrow roads. In order to provide convenience and reduce the possibility of scratching, the Haval H6’s high-definition 360° surround system can intuitively display the surrounding conditions on the screen through four 1280×960 million-pixel high-definition surround cameras, while for areas that are difficult to park, the APA system uses ultrasonic sensors and panoramic surround fusion to detect obstacles and search for line parking spaces, and completes the horizontal, vertical and oblique parking process with the fully automatic parking system, which is very practical for novice drivers.
In addition, there is a function that even experienced drivers can benefit from – 50-meter trace-back. It can record the last 50 meters of forward route in D gear, and when activated, it will automatically control the steering wheel, brake and accelerator to return along the previously recorded route, which is truly a super welfare.
I think there is nothing more frustrating than driving along narrow, winding alleys, except perhaps when you have to back up in such an alley after turning the steering wheel for half a day and finding that the road ahead is a dead end. With this function, simply activate the Haval H6’s 50-meter trace-back function to return to the starting point up to 50 meters away, benefiting both novice and experienced drivers.
The Haval H6 of its third generation, as a popular car, continues its tradition of being rugged and durable, while adding more technological features to make this ride even better. Other functions also work well, such as the Bosch 9.3-generation ESP to prevent slip, improve driving stability; the RMI anti-rollover system to enhance driving safety in emergency turns; the BA brake assist to shorten the braking distance in emergency situations; and the exclusive smart evasion function, which automatically drives the car closer to the farther lane when overtaking a truck and returns to the original trajectory after overtaking is completed.
When looking at the configuration table, you will feel that it has achieved physical safety, and especially with leading technology, the exclusive smart evasion function, it can prevent and avoid danger in advance, give drivers more confidence, and achieve psychological safety.
In this day and age, what is most needed is heart, just like making a movie and polishing an SUV.
A rich and complete set of active and passive safety functions have made the third-generation Haval H6 the safety benchmark of today and will continue to lead the development and evolution of national brand safety standards. I remember at the Haval Million Celebration in 2017, Haval pledged to invest CNY 30 billion in 2020 to build a global R&D system and form a leading advantage in active/passive safety.
This time, Haval still keeps its promise.
This article is a translation by ChatGPT of a Chinese report from 42HOW. If you have any questions about it, please email bd@42how.com.