Here we have a super cool and super interesting Jincheng JC3500DZD low-speed electric vehicle (LSEV). I met this machine in a parking lot inside a residential area in the south of Beijing in the summer of 2024. It looked brand new and rather brilliant, with a sophisticated headlight design and a two-tone color scheme. But the best thing about the Jincheng JC3500DZD is the 3-wheel layout: one at the rear and two at the front.
The Jincheng JC3500DZD is manufactured by the Jincheng Group, a subsidiary of the Aviation Industry Corporation of China (AVIC). The Jincheng Group is quite old. It was founded in 1949 in the city of Nanjing, Jiangsu Province. It started as an electromechanical and hydraulic supplier for the aviation industry, and, like so many Chinese companies, expanded into all sorts of businesses later on. The company also has a joint venture with Germany’s ZF, making steering pumps for China-made Volkswagens. In the late 2000s, Jincheng began to make LSEVs, a market that was starting to boom at the time.
The Jincheng JC3500DZD has a unique 3-wheel layout, with a single wheel at the rear. That is highly unusual. 3-wheel LSEVs have been around for a long time, but those normally have two wheels at the rear and one at the back. With the JC3500DZD, Jincheng has turned things around.
It has nice JC3500DZD stickers on the doors.
Kleenex alarm! The Jincheng JC3500DZD seats two persons, the driver at the front and one passenger in the back. The dashboard looks quite nice for the segment, with a screen for infotainment and the drive selector at the center stack. The owner added a seat cover and he also put a towel over the handlebar steering wheel, likely to keep it cool. It was like 38 degrees Celsius that day, hot hot, great for checking out hot cars.
Factory photo of the interior, giving us a better look at the layout.
The Jincheng JC3500DZD is a small machine: 2645/1188/1604, with a 1726 wheelbase, a curb weight of 430 kilos, and a max weight of 765 kilos. It is powered by a single electric motor at the rear with an output of 3.5 kW. The top speed is 52 km/h. The motor is sourced from a company called Taizhou Huangyan Minglong Technology, which appears to be one of those unknown heroes of the Chinese EV revolution, making motors for many small electric vehicles. No specs on range, but mostly, this sort of vehicle uses an LFP battery with a range of around 150 kilometers.
Character time! 航空工业金城, Hángkōng Gōngyè Jīnchéng. Hángkōng Gōngyè is short for 中国航空工业集团 (Zhōngguó Hángkōng Gōngyè Jítuán), Aviation Industry Corporation of China. 金城, Jīnchéng, is the brand name.
The Jincheng JC3500DZD appears to be a cool and innovative vehicle, albeit with an unconventional seating situation. It was the first one I had ever seen in Beijing, and I am always on the lookout for the newest and strangest LSEVs. I sure hope Jincheng can sell some more of these machines in the Chinese capital.