Hyundai Wants Your Next Car To Give You A Neck Massage
Hyundai placed a patent at the USPTO, detailing an innovative neck massaging system that can be used on future car headrests.
The driving experience is getting more comfortable every day. After the heated seats and the massaging seats, Hyundai is apparently working on a new innovative system that can potentially turn cars' headrests into massaging devices.
Before you get too excited, it’s obvious that this kind of novel advanced comfort apparatus will be reserved for the higher end of the car offerings spectrum, before gradually becoming standard equipment on more affordable cars.
But how did Hyundai get the idea for a massaging headrest?
Well, we’ve had Massaging seats for a considerable time now; the invention had a significant impact on the driving experience, especially on long trips. We also had travel pillows, helping passengers sleep more comfortably in the seating position. So why not combine the two and create the ultimate comfort mechanism ever implemented in the car industry?
Hyundai Wants Your Next Car To Give You A Neck Massage
But it’s not that easy. The trickiest part is how to fit the heavy and complicated whirring of electric actuators in such a small object as a neck pillow, trying to do that the conventional way results in a heavy, uncomfortable accessory that defeats the very purpose of the invention.
So Hyundai looked for a new way to get rid of all the electric actuators that come with a lot of mechanical noises and extra weight. The solution was to adapt an existing technology to fit in the headrest; Hyundai used the adaptive damping technology to create the desired variable-stiffness shock absorbers.
So basically, what happens is that a variable electrical current runs through the pillow, activating a series of compact electromagnets, each electromagnet will be placed around a sealed fluid-filled cell deep inside the neck pillow. The trick is that the fluid inside the cells reacts to the electromagnets thanks to the ferrous metal particles mixed in it. These particles can change their viscosity whenever the electrical current passes through.
This complex setup will create the desired massaging waves effect without the need for heavy electrical actuators. This effectively reduces the weight of the pillows and makes the creation of a massaging headrest a very viable possibility. [i]
It’s important to note that this new patent is not limited to message pillows. It’s in fact the starting point for further development that could take us to a time when we will have lighter, cheaper, and more functional massaging seats, making them more accessible to a larger portion of car models. And who knows what can happen next?
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