Tyre pressure monitoring to improve autonomous vehicles safety

10th December 2019

Lanna Deamer

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Falken’s parent company, Sumitomo Rubber Industries (SRI), has developed a solution to remotely monitor the tyre pressure of an unoccupied vehicle. In a crucial step towards ensuring the safety of autonomous vehicles Level 4 and above, SRI has successfully established links between its Tyre Pressure Monitoring System (TPMS) and an Autonomous Driving Control Centre.

The new technology has the potential to support predictive maintenance to prevent flat tyres or other tyre condition concerns that may pose a risk to the safe operation of autonomous vehicles.

It has been developed in collaboration with the Center for Research on Adoption of NextGen Transportation Systems (GRANTS), which is based at Gunma University in Japan. Having worked together on joint research since May 2019, links have now been established for communicating tyre data between an autonomous vehicle and the Driving Control Centre at GRANTS.

The system works with an indirect TPMS mounted inside the tyre rim. This transmits pressure data to the onboard computer system via Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE), which in turn sends the data to the GRANTS control centre. The pressure of each individual tyre can be monitored from the control centre via a Data Management Display.

This development is one of a number of technologies SRI is developing to achieve greater safety and performance while reducing environmental impact.

Earlier this year it unveiled its Smart Tyre Concept, a suite of tyre technologies that provide greater fuel efficiency, increased tyre durability and improved safety while also being more environmentally friendly. SRI will continue to develop systems and services that anticipate and pre-empt issues that can result from inappropriate tyre pressure, wear or damage.