Whether manual or automatic, we all have a seat adjuster inside our vehicles to ensure a comfortable ride, regardless of our body type. What we may be less aware of are the failures or weaknesses of these systems.
According to General Motors, these adjusters require equipment that increases the cost of vehicles and is based on a sometimes complex system. It even seems that these adjusters do not always go through the time with equal efficiency. Especially since often, residues can accumulate on the seat rails, which ends up making the maneuver difficult for the one trying to slide his seat.
As for automatic seat adjusters, they have the disadvantage of their weight, which consequently increases the weight of the vehicle unnecessarily.
At least that’s what the American car manufacturer would claim in a patent application it filed with the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) in 2022, in order to manufacture a magnetic levitation system that would replace the adjusters we know at the moment.
Two years have passed and the question remains: would GM use this patent and would be manufacturing these new type of adjusters? Only GM knows. But if we rely on the idea of the patent, we can hope so.
An idea from GM
To create its new adjusters, the General Motors firm is banking on a magnetic levitation system that is modeled on the principle of Maglev trains.
With this technology, it would be possible to use opposing magnetic fields to raise, lower, move forward and backward the seats of cars. We are talking here about a process that would have the advantage of doing a little cleaning in the parts used by traditional systems. The new system would therefore be lighter, would get dirty less easily and would be less complex.
With this process, the seats could move thanks to magnets. A series of magnets, in fact, installed in the seat rails, which would respond to a controller whose role would be to adjust their polarity.
With the attraction and repulsion of the magnets, the seat would move by magnetic force, in the same way that Maglev trains work. Once the seat is properly positioned, the driver or passenger would then only have to fix the position with a locking pin, and that would be it. Even in its patent application, GM would have indicated that this locking maneuver could also be done automatically, thanks to an actuator.
The magic of magnets and trains…
It all starts with the famous Maglev trains, whose name comes from the English words magnetic levitation (in French, magnetic levitation).
As its name suggests, this train runs on the rails magnetically. In fact, it doesn’t really run on the rails as we usually see classic trains do, since the train doesn’t even touch the rails. It actually moves forward by a phenomenon of electromagnetic levitation.
But since it doesn’t touch the rails, all rolling resistance is eliminated. Can you guess what happens next? The train can therefore travel at much higher speeds… In April 2015, a record speed of 603 km/h was reached. Still.
The principle of the Maglev train is that electromagnets are placed along the railway track while inside the train, there are superconducting coils.
As the train moves, a current is created in the track, a current strong enough to make the train levitate. All because magic happens between the magnets on the train and those on the rails.
Let’s get back to our seats…
GM’s seat process now seems simpler, let’s say. When you consider that trains can steer while levitating using magnets, it’s not so hard to imagine that car seats could be easily moved by the same process.
At least that’s the bet that General Motors seems to want to make with the filing of its patent application. All that remains is to know whether the car manufacturer will actually manufacture these magnetic levitation seats.
Because we have seen, in the past, patent applications filed by car manufacturers which, ultimately, were never used.
GM, like other car manufacturers, frequently files patent applications. Let’s hope, however, that this idea will make its way to our cars. This new GM product wouldn’t revolutionize anything, of course, but if it could make our daily lives a little easier, why not?