Mercedes-Benz’s striking EV concept, the Vision EQXX, has just covered one of the longest distances an electric vehicle has ever traveled on a single charge – a 1,008km journey that started at 7am in Sindelfingen, Germany. Germany, and ended almost exactly 12 hours later in Cassis near Marseille in southern France.

According to Mercedes, the EQXX had 15% charge left – a range of 140 km – when it arrived in Cassis, and its average consumption was a record 8.7 kWh/100 km.

The journey began in cold and rainy conditions, and the company claims it was undertaken at “regular road speeds, including extended fast-track cruising at up to 140 km/h on the German Autobahn and near the speed limit elsewhere”, with an average speed of 87.4 km/h for the trip in support.

The long-distance journey was made with the charging socket sealed and accompanied by an independent expert from the German certification body TÜV Süd. In an example of brutal German efficiency, the journey took 12 hours and 2 minutes, with exactly 11 hours and 32 minutes of “travel time”, meaning the drivers were given a 30-minute break .

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Mercedes-Benz planned the route to be a “real-world” challenge, and says the highways, mountain passes, roadworks and weather presented the EQXX with a wide variety of challenges.

Starting from the company’s R&D center in Sindelfingen, near Stuttgart, in cold weather, temperatures from start to finish ranged from 3 to 18 degrees Celsius. North of the Alps there was light rain and further south a light headwind was blowing in the sun.

Of course, the EQXX is a concept, so much of its technology and efficiency has yet to filter down to road cars. The EQXX has a remarkable drag coefficient of just 0.17 (the average figure for a modern car is between 0.25 and 0.3), while its low rolling resistance tires have been specially developed by Bridgestone for the EQXX and feature a rolling resistance rating of 4.7, where the rating for a tire to achieve the highest ‘Class A’ rating in the EU is 6.5, and Mercedes’ own EQS- Benz runs on 5.9 rated tires.

The EQXX is also extremely light for a large luxury car, weighing in at 1755kg, thanks to the extensive use of lightweight materials, such as the durable carbon fiber and sugar composite material used for the top of the battery, which is also used in Formula 1, and the unique rear floor which is made using an aluminum casting process.

The lightweight metal structural component replaces a much heavier assembly of several interconnected parts. It has gaps where structural strength is not required, saving material. According to Mercedes, this innovative design approach saves up to 20% weight compared to a conventionally manufactured component.

Much of the weight efficiency is also due to the dedicated electric chassis with a lightweight F1 subframe and aluminum brake discs, while another is the battery – at 100kWh the battery has been developed specifically for the EQXX, and has nearly the same amount of power as the EQS battery, but has 50% less volume and is 30% lighter.

The result is that the battery is only 2000mm long, 1260mm wide and 110mm thick, and is also relatively light at 495 kilograms. The electric drive was developed in cooperation with the Mercedes-AMG Petronas F1 team.