TDK InWheelSense™ — A Tire-Mounted Telemetry Solution For Automotive Intelligence
InWheelSense™: A tire-mounted telemetry solution combining self-powering energy harvesting, sensors, edge computing, and Bluetooth connectivity. Designed to collect and process real-time tire-road interaction data, supporting advanced driver assistance and autonomous driving systems.
Problem
Tires & Wheels in vehicles lack real-time smart sensing capabilities such as road condition detection, wheel alignment sensing, tire wear out etc.
There's a need for power generation within the tire/wheel to enable continuous sensing without relying on batteries.
The automotive industry is moving towards digital transformation and electrification, but tires & wheels remain largely undigitized.
Solution
TDK's InWheelSense: An energy harvesting and sensing solution for automotive applications, particularly for ADAS and autonomous vehicles.
Approach
Hardware Development:
- Utilize piezoelectric technology to create a power generation system within the wheel.
- Design a compact module (125 mm length, 19 mm depth) that can be integrated into existing wheels.
- Enable attachment of up to 12 modules per wheel for flexibility and scalability.Power Generation:
- Harvest energy from tire rotation to generate an average of 1 mW of continuous DC power at 65 mph.
- Create a battery-less system to ensure long-term operation without maintenance.Sensing Capabilities:
- Implement real-time sensing for road conditions, treadwear, tire health etc.
- Incorporate AI-driven analytics to process and interpret the collected data, enabling more sophisticated insights and predictive capabilities.
- Leverage AI to identify patterns in the data that could indicate potential safety issues or maintenance needs.Availability:
- Evaluation kits were made available for testing and integration purposes.Industry Alignment:
- Address the digital transformation and electrification trends in the automotive industry.
- Focus on sustainability and long-term product support.
Industry Recognition
CEATEC AWARD 2020 Grand Prix in the "Digital City Planning of the New Normal Age" category
Key details about this award:
It was announced on October 20, 2020.
The CEATEC AWARD recognizes excellent technologies, products, and services exhibited at CEATEC.
The judging committee highly evaluated InWheelSense for several reasons:
Its ability to facilitate the acquisition of new types of data important for autonomous driving
Its contribution to improved safety and comfort
Its economical sensing solution using proven piezoelectric technology
Its potential to contribute to "tire intelligence" and environmentally friendly tire/wheel IoT applications
Other noteworthy mentions:
TDK exhibited InWheelSense at CES 2023 where it was featured in Ubergizmo’s Best of CES2023 list
