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Electromagnetic Suspension System
chuckgrosvenor writes "Every automotive suspension has two goals: passenger comfort and vehicle control. Unfortunately, these goals are in conflict. Two much comfort, and the car rolls and pitches a lot, too much control and you feel every bump. BOSE has found the happy medium by using electromagnetic motors, power amplifiers, & computer control algorithms to even out the road, while still feeling connected to it. Check the quicktime movies to see two different cars stay level while they go through cornering exercises." Reader gatekeep writes "Amar Bose, founder of the Bose Corporation and MIT professor and alumnus, has recently unveiled a new electromagnetic car suspension system. It's said to have taken 24 years to develop. There's only minor technical details available so far, but the author of this piece describes seeing the system allow the test vehicle to jump over obstacles in its path!"
hmmmm
Here's a pretty cool video about the brand new suspension systems of 1938:o vies&identifier=OvertheW1938
http://www.archive.org/details-db.php?mediatype=m
I like Bose personally. To bad a system like this would be expensive (at least for a few years untill mass production made it more reasonable). Guess that means that unless I strike it rich and can buy a fancy car that would include this (I assume this would be on BMWs or Mercedes), my car will be bouncing on bumpy roads. I'd love to try driving one though.
Comment forecast: Bits of genius surrounded by a sea of mediocrity.
What is so special about it?
Since they aren't making as much on auto loans they have to make thier profit somewhere. And that someplace is repairs.
Little or no technical details, controlled environments that make their technology appear better than it is, and exaggeration. If you read the last article linked, it's not even a fair comparison. For instance, there's this quote:
There's no reason to assume that the Bose suspension does not in any way affect the existing suspension, so simply switching it off is not a fair comparison.
The idea of active suspension is not new, and Bose is not the only one doing it. GM has had "Magnetic Ride Control" for a few years now, and other manufacturers have similar active technologies. While the Bose articles are light on details, it seems that the Bose technology is not far different from other electronically controlled systems (something about electric motors at all four wheels, yet it apparently still uses standard pneumatic suspension components as well).
Bose's flair for hyperbole and marketing is their only real asset. My ass it took 24 years to develop this technology. Perhaps it's been 24 years since there has been any significant innovation in suspension technology (I'm not buying it, though ...), but there's no way Bose has been working on this one piece of technology for 24 years.
Bose can sell a $20 clock radio for $300, and a $1000 home theater system for $3500, and you can bet they'll sell this technology for quite a bit more than average as well, where similar systems are currently optioned around $1000-$3000 depending on the make (ie, Porsche's system is more expensive than Chevy's, and I would expect Bose to be even more expensive than Porsche)
Besides, do you really trust a second-rate "hi-fi" (haha!) company to build the suspension for your car? I certainly wouldn't! Porsche, Mercedes-Benz, BMW, Chevy, et al have been doing it for far longer, and have a much deeper wealth of automotive knowledge. I'll trust the experts on this one, rather than Bose.
Since it seems all residential streets in America are thoroughly infested with these bumpstops (forcing you to reduce the speed from the legal 25 mph to around 5 mph ), I welcome this new suspension.
...is something similar to this whereby the entire car is quite simply propelled by magnetic repulsion. Think about it: If all the roads had the appropriately polarised magnetic cores implanted in them, surely it would be possible to use the maglev system already implemented in mass-transit systems on a new and unprecedented scale. Is it too much to hope that this might be the first step towards reaching that lofty goal?
In my book, it just figures that a loudspeaker company would be the first to start tinkering with this kind of tech. It's just the sort of thing that you can imagine occuring to some sound engineer after too many hours screwing around with large magnets.
Sign the FSF's Anti-DMCA petit
Actually you only heard about it today, because today was the first day it appeared on the corporate website. A friend of mine at Bose has been talking about this ever since he started working there. It looks pretty cool, but the Boston Globe reported it might cost around $20K US. I also got the impression that high speed (over 60 mph) performance wasn't going to be as perfect.
Still, if it makes down to the cheaper vehicles in five or ten years, it might make everyday driving far more pleasant. Certainly the first major improvement in suspension in several decades.
ChuckyG
i thought electronic steering went nowhere because the DOT would never approve a system that failed if you blew a fuse.
I find myself watching those videos and thinking "My car doesn't appear to yaw and pitch that badly when i drive, and driving in rush hour interstate traffic i make alot of those maneuvers"
Only explanation I can think is that the courses were driven alot faster than they appear, and then the video slowed down so you can see the effects more clearly.
Anyone else perhaps more learned in this area care to comment?
If you can't see the value in jet powered ants you should turn in your nerd card. - Dunbal (464142)
Is caused by design.
My brother-in-law is a young, but very well respected manufacturing engineer that graduated from one of the top 5 engineering schools in the US. He related to me that when he had to take the automotive engineering block, his design guidlines were to make it: modular, unrepairable, limited lifetime, and requiring an expensive machine tool infrastructure to build.
This was to prevent shade-tree and small shop mechanics from repairing/replacing/rebuilding parts, and force them to purchase replacement parts. I ran into this in the electronics industry also - you sell the device once, but only you can repair it for the next 20 years.
This sounds like one more unnecessary gimmick, like heated rearview mirrors, temp controlled seats, self-actuating shoulder belts, etc...
When it works right, it will be very nice. When it doesn't, it will be very expensive. And let's not forget that Bose will have this entire system patented, and the control modules probably potted and rigged to wipe themselves if tampered with ("I'm sorry, your module is damaged, that will take 2 weeks and $700 to get a new one").
Thank god that there isn't a software equivalent to electronics potting compound!
When you want something built, come see me. If you want correct grammar and spelling, get a F*ing liberal arts student.
According to TFA, the system uses about one third of the power that a typical car's air conditioner would.
Considering that an automotive AC compressor consumes between 3 and 5 horsepower. Doing the math, that equates to something around an extra 1 to 1.6 horsepower being required to operate this system.
Which doesn't sound like much, until you do the rest of the math:
1.6 horsepower = 82.84 amps at 14.4 volts. 82.84 amps is a fuckload of current to move around in a car for anything, let alone just to keep the car on the road.
Wake me up when the thing doesn't require fatter cabling than the starter motor, and ceases to present a real safety hazard in the event of (increasingly likely) alternator failure.
Kid-proof tablet..
http://www.autoserviceworld.com/article.asp?id=31
http://www.rfsafe.com/ss/index.php/
I BRING WELCOME NEWS FROM THE land of great beer and limitless autobahn. There are signs that automakers are finally hearing consumer complaints about overcomplicated, bug-ridden electronics in cars. This matters a lot, given that the value of the electronics in the average car recently surpassed the value of the steel in same.
One bearer of glad tidings works as an engineer at DaimlerChrysler. Stephan Wolfsried, vice president for chassis electrical/electronics systems, is an Austrian-born 45-year-old who joined the former Daimler-Benz in 1983, and has seen a lifetime's worth of well-intentioned but glitchy systems and software "bugs" that turn out to be "features." Now he's in a position to do something about it.
"During the last year alone we have removed more than 600 functions from our vehicles. Nobody missed them. These were functions nobody needed, nobody wanted and nobody knew how to use," Wolfsried proclaimed at a recent Innovations Symposium hosted by DaimlerChrysler at its Stuttgart HQ. To its credit, the gathered press suppressed the urge to stand during the ensuing applause.
So what kind of "unwanted" features have been eliminated so far? Wolfsried pointed to an "anti-thrum" position in the sunroof of some Mercedes-Benz cars. With the sunroof completely open at highway speed, the inrushing air can cause an unpleasant drumming noise inside. Rather than reshape the opening or design more effective wind-blocking devices as Mercedes did in the past, engineers devised an electronic solution: When the driver bumps the switch to close the sunroof, it doesn't close. Instead, it motors to the anti-thrum position, partially closed, to reduce or eliminate the noise.
Unless the owner has spent lots of time with the owners manual or has an extra-sharp service technician, the customer may not understand. He may, instead, complain that the sunroof doesn't close the first time the button is pushed. And some technicians will waste everyone's time trying to "fix" such a problem.
Ditto the two-key-fob feature that customizes the seat and mirror settings for each driver--memory 1 on one fob, memory 2 on the other. But if the owner misplaces one fob, or tries to use the two keys interchangeably as he's done all his life, he misses his own memory positions, or his chosen radio stations. Then he files a complaint that registers as "customer dissatisfaction" in surveys.
"My conviction is that it must be possible to sit in a car and operate all the major systems intuitively, without an owners manual," said Wolfsried. He declared seven "categorical imperatives" for electronics.
Among them: The auto industry can no longer accept the software industry credo that "all software has bugs." The claim that this is the case, he says, is "an outstanding PR success by programmers. As if shoddy workmanship were preordained."
From the summary: Two much comfort, and the car rolls and pitches a lot
I don't know what's more disturbing: The obvious spelling error in the article summary or that fact that, six hours later, not a single nerd has thought it important enough to mention...
Is it possible that I am the only one who cringed when reading "two much"????
I would have to say that explosives are the most abused technology in all of history.