Latest Stories

Technology Report
Materials

JLR Tackles Weight with Structural Electronics

Ashutosh Tomar, electrical research technical manager at Jaguar Land Rover (JLR) said he has absolute confidence in the game-changing potential of structural electronics (SE) now being...

Feature Image

News
Manned Systems

CES 2020: Hyundai Shows Electric VTOL Air-Taxi Concept

Hyundai at CES 2020 revealed a fullsize electric vertical-takeoff-and-landing (eVTOL) “air taxi” concept and confirmed it has joined Uber’s aerial rideshare initiative known as...

Feature Image

News
Automotive

GoMentum Begins Testing Autonomous Shuttles

It was uneventful when an eight-passenger, low-speed driverless shuttle crawled at about 10 mph (16 km/h) toward the intersection at the GoMentum Station AV proving grounds in Concord, Calif. The...

Feature Image

Articles
Software

CES 2020: Toyota to Build a City of the Future

There’s hardly a region on Earth that Toyota doesn’t reach. At the 2020 CES conference, the company announced a visionary project of similar scope, saying it intends to build a...

Feature Image

News
Energy

SAE Symposium Covers New Approaches in Thermal Management

Vehicle thermal management, once almost exclusively about safely rejecting powertrain heat, continues to evolve to dealing with two extremes in operation of battery electric...

Feature Image

News
Unmanned Systems

Quadricycle AV Pod Pops Open in London

Mobility “pods” regularly pop up in the automated-driving universe and the latest is a quadricycle prototype called MOTIV, claimed by its creators to “break the mold for future mobility...

Feature Image

Articles
Materials

The Inside Story on Adhesive Tapes for Automotive Heat Shielding

Michael VanHaerents, automotive business development manager for Avery Dennison Performance Tapes, explains the unique properties and benefits of Avery Dennison’s adhesive tapes for heat-shield attachment.

Feature Image

Articles
Design

Meet The 2020 SAE Prez

Todd Zarfos aims to help SAE navigate the disruption occurring across industry sectors.

Feature Image

Q&A
Power

Tula Turns Its Tech Toward EV Motor Control

San Jose-based Tula Technology is best known for its innovative Dynamic Skip Fire technology. Editor-in-chief Lindsay Brooke caught up with Scott Bailey, the company’s president and CEO, to find out. Read on for highlights of their conversation.

Feature Image

Articles
Automotive

The Mind of Argo AI

Argo AI is a leader in SAE Level 4 systems development, partnering with Ford and Volkswagen to put autonomous people-movers and delivery vehicles into revenue-generating road use in the next few years.

Feature Image

Articles
Manufacturing & Prototyping

ZF Establishes Level 2+ ADAS

A new realism has emerged: ADAS that ZF calls ‘Level 2+’ for passenger vehicles, and SAE Level 4 systems for commercial-vehicle applications and people/ cargo movers in defined use cases.

Feature Image

Articles
Electronics & Computers

The Inside Story on Thermal Management

TLX Technologies designs and manufactures custom electro-mechanical solenoid products for the automotive industry. In this Q&A piece, Travis Mueller, TLX Design Engineer, discusses the importance of thermal management in today’s vehicle designs.

Feature Image

Articles
Automotive

Electrifying GM

General Motors’ long, convoluted journey toward vehicle electrification has finally arrived at an earlier-than-expected destination: total commitment to a battery-electric future. GM is officially “all in” on BEVs as...

Feature Image

News
Materials

ALLEGRO Project Seeks to Boost Lightweight-Materials Durability

First define the lightweight material that best complements electric vehicle (EV) and automated-vehicle (AV) range efficiency – then optimize it for increased durability via...

Feature Image

News
Power

British HFQ Process May Enhance Aluminum’s High-Volume Future

With this year’s end stage of a major collaborative R&D project, the longstanding competition between steel and aluminum for high-volume vehicle production is set to...

Feature Image

News
Test & Measurement

Driving the 2020 Corvette Stingray

Grasping the true beauty of Chevy’s new 2020 Corvette supercar demands a deep dig. You must venture beyond the exciting-to-a-fault exterior skin and the lavish stitched-leather, buffed-metal, and...

Feature Image

INSIDER
Propulsion

Fuel-Efficient Engine for Cheaper, Lighter Spacecraft

Ending NASA’s Space Shuttle into orbit required more than 3.5 million pounds of fuel, which is about 15 times heavier than a blue whale. But a new type of engine — called a rotating...

Feature Image

INSIDER
Test & Measurement

NASA Tests Radiation Vest for Deep Space Missions

As NASA leads the way for human exploration at the Moon and beyond, space radiation is one of the biggest hazards crews face. NASA is testing the AstroRad radiation protection vest on...

Feature Image

News
Power

New Ultium Battery System Underpins GM’s EV Future

General Motors on March 4 gave media, investors and key dealers the first look at the electric-vehicle (EV) onslaught it is readying for production, along with related propulsion,...

Feature Image

Articles
Manufacturing & Prototyping

Engineering the Chevrolet Corvette's First-Ever Mid-Engine Architecture

Shifting 500 lb (227 kg) of engine mass rearward by 7.5 feet (2.3 m) and moving 300 lb (136 kg) of transmission components aft by almost three feet transformed the...

Feature Image

News
Manned Systems

New CM Labs Excavator Simulator Training Offers GPS Guidance, HMI Experience

CM Labs Simulations’ (ConExpo-Con/Agg, Booth F100911 in the Festival Hall) new excavator training exercise incorporates an integrated GPS guidance system that...

Feature Image

News
Motion Control

Case Unveils Fully-Electric Backhoe Loader, Begins Delivery This Year

Case Construction Equipment’s move toward alternative propulsion took another step forward at March’s ConExpo-Con/Agg Show when it revealed “Project Zeus,” also...

Feature Image

News
Power

FPT Reveals Compact F28 Off-Road Diesel, Hybrid Variant

Seemingly everything at the ConExpo-Con/Agg 2020 is big – from the show’s footprint to the seemingly endless number of construction machines on the grounds. But FPT Industrial...

Feature Image

INSIDER
Robotics, Automation & Control

Sky Devils Provide Critical Link to Soldiers

New Jersey Army National Guard soldiers train daily to operate the RQ-7B Shadow unmanned aerial vehicle for surveillance, targeting and communications relay.

Feature Image

INSIDER
Defense

Machine Learning Accelerates High-Performance Materials Development

Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) and its partners rely on timely development and deployment of diverse materials to support a variety of national security...

Feature Image

INSIDER
Wearables

Wearable Device Camouflages Its Wearer Regardless of the Weather

Researchers at the University of California San Diego developed a wearable technology that can hide its wearer from heat-detecting sensors such as night vision goggles, even...

Feature Image

News
Manned Systems

Executive Insights: BorgWarner VP and CTO Hakan Yilmaz

The automotive sector is in a time of enormous flux. As the foundational aspects of the industry shift, longstanding Tier-1 suppliers such as BorgWarner must continue to drive...

Feature Image

News
Energy

Hyundai Reveals Compact Electric Excavator Prototype

Hyundai Construction Equipment Americas (HCEA) demonstrated a working prototype of its electric-powered compact excavator at ConExpo-Con/Agg 2020 in Las Vegas, March 10-14. The R18E...

Feature Image

Original Equipment
Software

JLG Develops Self-Leveling Boom Lift

What started as a scale-model prototype shown at Bauma 2016 to explore the viability of a lift with a “smart” suspension has become reality for JLG Industries. At ConExpo-Con/Agg 2020, the...

Feature Image

Road Ready
Lighting

All-Wheel-Drive Returns to Chrysler Pacifica for 2021

The refresh of the 2021 model-year Chrysler Pacifica minivan premiers a top-of-the-line luxury trim, the debut of a next-generation infotainment system, and the return of...

Feature Image

News
Mechanical & Fluid Systems

Maintaining Supply When a Pandemic Strikes

Just when it seems that the auto industry isn’t facing enough challenges, COVID-19 swoops in out of the blue. No extraneous shock that’s hit the automotive sector in the past decade –...

Feature Image

News
Power

Lightyear One: 20 Miles of Daily Solar Driving Range

It’s been more than a decade since Toyota first developed a photovoltaic system for the roof of a Prius hybrid-electric vehicle (HEV). Those solar cells, available on Japan-based...

Feature Image

INSIDER
Test & Measurement

Breaking the Temperature Barrier in Aerospace Materials Testing

University of Illinois researchers have demonstrated a new method for testing microscopic aeronautical materials at ultra-high temperatures. The test combines two commonly used...

Feature Image

INSIDER
Aerospace

Crashing Into Safe Autonomous Flight

NASA’s Safeguard uses geo-fencing technology to create no-fly zones for any equipped UAV to assure it only operates in approved airspace. It can also be used to establish flight ceilings to ensure a...

Feature Image

News
Mechanical & Fluid Systems

What We’re Driving: 2020 Lincoln Aviator Reserve

For my experience of Lincoln – and I’m not particularly young – I haven’t been able to understand the “sell” of the brand. Low sales numbers and decades of declining prestige...

Feature Image

What We’re Driving
Power

What We’re Driving: 2020 BMW X3 M Competition

The concept of the high-performance SUV (more appropriately, “crossover”) can be difficult to reconcile. I understand that everyone currently wants an SUV body style and performance...

Feature Image

News
Power

The Ford Performance Racing School Settles a New Location out West

The Ford Performance Racing School (FPRS) has a new home out west. After running programs for eight years at the facility previously known as Miller Motorsports Park...

Feature Image

News
Manufacturing & Prototyping

Toyota Improves ‘Little Things’ to Refine 2020 Highlander Manufacturing

Manufacturing the fourth generation of Toyota’s Highlander crossover unfolds in the 4.5 million sq-ft2 Toyota Motor Manufacturing, Indiana (TTMI) plant in...

Feature Image

News
Materials

Porsche to Use 3D Printing to Customize Seats

Porsche is enacting a pilot program that employs 3D printing to create a customized “comfort layer” in a bucket seat that allows the user to select from several levels of support based on...

Feature Image

Articles
Manned Systems

Shifting Design of Autonomous Architectures

The controls for fully autonomous trucks must deal with inputs from a number of sensors, analyzing this data and taking actions that enable the vehicle to complete its route safely and...

Feature Image

News
Unmanned Systems

Aptiv’s Autonomous-Vehicle ‘Air-Traffic Control’

It’s well known that the safe operation of an autonomous vehicle (AV) relies on robust sensing, path planning and compute capability. What’s often overlooked is the role of a...

Feature Image

News
Test & Measurement

Vehicle Cabin-Air Filters Can Combat Coronavirus, but Effort Is Problematic

On February 4, millions of people across China – some sheltering in place – watched the online-only launch of the Geely Icon SUV. As the China-based automaker...

Feature Image

News
AR/AI

AI Moves into Military Boards and Subsystems

Artificial intelligence (AI) is inching into high-end military markets, according to the suppliers of computer and sensor boards. However, challenges like meshing AI’s rapid advances with...

Feature Image