Deepal E07 Multitruck: A hard charger

What is it?

If it was a Citroen, they’d call it the “Multibogies” but it’s a Chinese-built Deepal and is named the Multitruck — the E07 Multituck to be exact.

We say Citroen because Deepal seems to have adopted the quirky mantle in the world of EVs. It dares to be different.

The road is well paved with utes that have been converted to SUVs in recent years, but never a SUV that can be transformed into a ute and back again — at the touch of a button.

And yet, that’s what the Deepal E07 Multrick is capable of doing.

Why? Perhaps a better question is why not, after the car attracted admiring comments from not one — but three fellow travellers.

Deepal says the E07 embodies its progressive spirit: pushing boundaries to create experiences that feel more personal, more versatile, and more human. Uh-huh.

What’s it cost?

Unlike the Deepal S07 that we drove recently, there’s two grades from which to choose this time.

There’s E07 RWD, priced from $64,900 and the E07 AWD Performance, priced from $73,900 — both plus on-road costs.

Our test vehicle, the Performance model, was finished in optional Matte Hematite Grey at $1800 with Orange Nappa leather trim for another $500 (black is standard).

RWD has a single motor that drives the rear wheels, while the Performance model adds a second motor and a tonne of extra performance.

Try 0-100km/h in just 3.96 seconds. That’s Ferrari quick!

This, and both variants offer more than 500km of range from a single charge.

Apart from the quirky luggage compartment, which by the way is completely sealed behind a glass partition, the Multitruck offers a long list of luxury appointments.

There’s 21-inch wheels, high-priced Michelin Pilot Sports, variable air suspension, Nappa leather seat trim, driver and front passenger eight-way power-adjust seats, four-way lumbar and two-way leg adjustment, driver seat with heating, cooling, two memory settings, with a front passenger seat that adds a third memory, plus massage and zero gravity functions.

Rear seat passengers are not neglected with heating, ventilation, massage, and powered backrest adjustment.

There’s also heating and power-adjustment for the steering wheel.

Dual-zone climate air has rear air vents and an air purification system (with PM2.5 filter).

The front windows have double insulated glass, with rear privacy glass and a panoramic sunroof with electric shade, plus 256-colour ambient background lighting.

Get the picture. There’s just one caveat. You have to work out how to activate many of these features because the Multitruck is a little light-on in the instruction department.

After a week behind the wheel we were still trying to figure out how to open the front boot or frunk as it is known, along with how to operate the sunroof shade and how to adjust the steering wheel — we’ve been doing this job for 25 years.

Infotainment consists of a 15.4-inch touchscreen that automatically tilts towards the driver (or passenger if required), with a premium 18-speaker audio system that sees speakers scattered throughout the cabin.

Pretty much everything is controlled from the screen, but it’s not always intuitive and it takes your eyes away from the road.

Multitruck has been awarded a full five stars for safety by ANACP, with enough active and passive safety features to fill a book.

Seven airbags and a 360-degree camera are standard including a centre airbag which provides added protection to front seat occupants in side impact crashes.

Autonomous emergency braking supports Car-to-Car, Vulnerable Road User, Junction & Crossing, Backover and Head-On situations.

The lane support system includes lane keep assist (LKA), lane departure warning (LDW) and emergency lane keeping (ELK), and an advanced speed assistance system (SAS) with a speed sign recognition system.

There’s also three tethers and two ISOFix anchors in the rear for child seats.

Multitruck comes with a 7-year/160,000km warranty and 8-year/240,000km battery warranty.

Service intervals are a relatively brief 10,000km or 12 months, after an initial complimentary 5000km or 6 months service.

There’s also fixed price servicing for 7.5 years or 75,000km.

What’s it go like?

Entry is via pop-out door handles, with button release to get back out again and walk-away lock/unlocking.

Yesterday we spotted a headline that claimed China had now banned pop-out handles because of safety concerns. We’ll investigate.

There’s no need to start the motor either. Just apply the brakes, select Drive and you’re good to go.

The interior is expansive, replete with orange-coloured, part-Nappa leather, a flat floor and oodles of front and rear legroom.

The seats are large, comfortable and recline, with massage and extendable leg support.

But the concealed air conditioning failed to impress, at once freezing the driver and cooking the front seat passenger.

A minimalist approach to design sees the user left to figure out what does what most of the time.

It’s not ideal because your attention should be focused on the road ahead, rather than playing with the touchscreen.

A roller button on the right side of the steering wheel offers volume control. The left roller remains something of a mystery.

The gear selector on the right of the steering column doubles as cruise control, but there appears to be no easy way to adjust distance to the car in front.

The same goes for figuring out what button does what when it comes to opening or closing the tailgate which is a case of suck it and see.

It has three sections: the glass roof slides up and forward, the glass tailgate section drops down and the tailgate itself also drops down — all in one go if you get it right and vice-versa. We rarely got it right.

A set of four buttons just inside on the left control proceedings, with two more buttons on the right that make the transformation complete, dropping the rear seats and centre glass partition.

In hatch mode Multitruck offers 524 litres of storage space or a whopping 1654 litres with the seats folded as a pickup.

Deepal reportedly conducted local testing and calibration before launch, fast-tracking over-the-air updates to improve driver monitoring, adaptive cruise control, energy management and interface responsiveness.

They say it resulted in a smarter, smoother, and more intuitive drive that is better aligned to local needs.

The RWD is powered by a single electric motor, delivering 252kW of power and 365Nm of torque, with 0-100km/h taking 6.7 seconds.

It has a comforting driving range of up to 550km (WLTP).

AWD Performance has two electric motors and is engineered for those who want uncompromising performance, producing 440kW of power and 645Nm of torque.

The result is blistering acceleration, sprinting to 100km/h in just 3.96 seconds.

For this performance you sacrifice 40km of range, with a total range of up to 510km (WLTP).

In a straight line Performance is akin to an Exocet missile, but it is large and heavy and lacks the composure to tackle corners at high velocity.

Deepal makes no claims in the specs about what to expect when it comes to energy consumption.

However, the trip computer showed a long term average of 17.5 kWh/100km over a distance of more than 9000km.

For our part we were getting 19.9 kWh after almost 1000km and two top-ups.

Both models feature the same ternary lithium 90kWh battery and can be charged from 30 to 80 per cent capacity in just 15 minutes using a 240kW DC charger.

For overnight charging, a 7kW AC unit can restore full capacity in 13-16 hours.

In reality, experience has shown these claims to be pie in the sky and don’t forget 30-80 per cent is only 50 per cent of the battery’s capacity.

The other 50 per cent however is likely to take much longer.

Nevertheless, we boldly set off from Sydney to Canberra behind the wheel of our head-turning Multitruck, confident we had sorted out any charging issues on our previous trip there in the Ioniq 5.

But, once again, charging became an issue when it shouldn’t have been, threatening to ruin our weekend away.

Our first moment of doubt arrived just a few kilometres down the road where we planned to top up the Multitruck before heading off.

A good 30 minutes later we were still trying to get the car to accept a charge from a bank of 300kW Tesla Superchargers, or had Tesla decided to lock us out (it had happened before)?

Leapmotor C10: One too many bells and whistles

We tried three different stalls all with the same result, chatting with Tesla owners as we tried to troubleshoot the problem.

The car started to charge, but disconnected almost immediately, citing an unknown error.

Frustrated and out of time we decided to charge the car somewhere along the motorway, or indeed when we got to Canberra where we had previously used a bank of Superchargers at Tuggeranong.

But as our range dropped it became clear we wouldn’t make it without a top-up, so we pulled into an Ampol service centre and tried again — unfortunately with the same result. It kept disconnecting.

A couple of phone calls later it turned out the Deepal with its state-of-the-art 800 watt architecture had an issue with Tesla chargers and, it appeared, with Ampol too — good to know (now).

By this time, with patience wearing thin, we decided to give it one last shot before pulling the plug on Canberra and our longtime friends.

Backtracking about 15km to Wilton we found a 150kW Chargefox charger with two stalls tucked into a corner of the tiny shopping centre.

One stall was occupied by a diesel-powered Mitsubishi ute (but that’s another story).

Plugging in we were elated to see the charger fire up straight away and 40 minutes, 54kWh and some lunch later we were finally on our way.

Welcome to the Wonderful World of EVs where you never know quite what to expect.

The infrastructure has some catching up to do and it is one, if not the main reason that many Aussies are giving electric vehicles a wide berth.

Note too that our three different charge attempts required three different apps and three different accounts, along with the need to hand over credit card details to three different vendors.

Long story short. As much as we enjoy exploring and driving EVs — and the Multitruck is right up there with the best of them — we’re happy to hand them back at the end of the week.

What we like?

Wow factor
Luxury amenities
Ferrari-like performance

What we don’t like?

Lack of information
DC charging difficulties
Uses too much energy

The bottom line?

The Deepal E07 Multitruck is an impressive vehicle.

Three people, one of them a Tesla owner, volunteered that it was a good-looking beast.

But as bold and as beautiful as it might be, the E07 or Multitruck (there’s no Multitruck badge) is only as good as its next charge which as we demonstrated can be elusive.

And without the power to push on, whether it’s to Canberra or further afield, it’s not really fit for purpose, becoming little more than an ornament — don’t you think?