Electronic APU???

Electric APU , or EPU. Yes, they are nice to have. Quiet and functional.

Warning: The A/C doesn't really stand up in hot climates, like Texas in the summer. Plan to idle then. And make sure there is some type of low voltage monitoring system.

However, the bunk heater will cook you out in 20 below winters. So that's good.

 

I have an EPU in my 20 cascadia it works great so far. Not sure about the A/C haven't had it in the summer yet. I have 8 batteries and haven't had a low voltage yet.

 

Way,way,way better than a diesel powered APU.
Should be standard equipment on all OTR trucks.
Nowhere near the maintenance cost.
Nowhere near the down time.
I'm 3 1/2 years on the one I have now.
They haven't done anything but change the filters on it.

The heat will cook your ### out of the truck.
Air conditioner good to about 85 degrees.
Then you'll have to idle the truck.

They have a completely separate set of batteries
For it underneath the truck. Mine has 4 of them.
Turn it on, set the temperature and forget about it.

When the batteries for the APU get low,
The truck starts on its own and idles until they are fully charged,Then it shuts off.
And your APU kicks back on.

You don't have to do anything but keep on sleeping.
I've sat in the summer heat for 2 days.
The truck started once and ran for about 2 hours
Recharging those batteries. That was it.

I've had both kinds.
I wouldn't touch another diesel powered one.

 

My 2020 Cascadia has the Freightliner 8 battery setup. It has and electric a/c for the sleeper and really thick curtains. It worked good last half of summer. It really only cools the sleeper. When the batteries get down to 12.1 volts the engine will start and recharge the batteries when your sleeping. I get about 6 hours before a recharge. During a 34 hour restart it not perfect because it's more for cooling the sleeper. It has Interior Comfort Mode. It will run the engine more to try and cool entire cab, but the thermostat is in the sleeper. So the sleeper can be cool and front seat hot in sunlight. You just have to turn the temperature for the sleeper down more, so it will start the engine more if sitting in the direct sunlight.

 

Thermo King has a diesel APU and an EAPU. Just so you know their system is only battery power so when the batteries get low the system cut off. The automatic start is a Freightliner thing. I'm not sure how good the Thermo King EAPU is. It don't see many of them on the road. It been out a couple years is was never a real popular system

 

My carrier diesel apu has treated me nice. Problem is drivers aren’t sending them for maintenance until they’re giving problems. Manual says every 2k hours I demand my company to pm it every 1k hours and a belt check every 2k-3k hours. Hasn’t given me any problems ever since it’s at 7k so far. Only downside is this SOB is loud definitely turn her off when I’m home.

 

What my company found was the 1st year they were great. The 2nd year pretty good. Then the 3rd year they went to crud - batteries failing, corrosion, and an inability to keep up with the humidity or breaks longer than 11 hours.

We switched to diesel apus or just idle.