The maker of Falken tires has developed know-how to detect free lug nuts, and the corporate plans to debut it on a manufacturing car later this yr.

Sumitomo Rubber Industries has introduced the brand new function Sensing Core, which the corporate says can detect lug nuts which can be free by as little as one millimeter, with out using devoted sensors. As a substitute, Sensing Core depends on knowledge from a car’s managed space community (CAN), analyzing wheel velocity and different components.

This function will debut as customary tools on a automobile from an unnamed automaker this yr, Sumitomo stated, including that the corporate is in discussions with further automakers. The market the place the loose-nut detection function will debut was not mentioned, so it is unclear if it will likely be out there within the U.S.

Accidents attributable to free lug nuts have develop into an rising concern in Sumitomo’s residence market of Japan, the corporate stated, significantly forward of the colder months when drivers change over to winter tires. Whereas industrial autos typically have clips to offer visible affirmation that nuts are correctly tightened, this is not a foolproof methodology, Sumitomo claims. And passenger vehicles typically do not have them in any respect.

Sumitomo claims the Sensing Core tech is impartial of the tire make, mannequin, and measurement, permitting it for use with quite a lot of car and tire combos. The identical fundamental know-how may also be used for different purposes. Sumitomo has additionally used the identical fundamental know-how for an oblique tire strain monitoring system the corporate claims is employed by 15 car producers within the European, Japanese, Chinese language, and Indian markets.

One other potential utility is tire-wear monitoring. This is able to contain sending car knowledge to a cloud to foretell tire put on primarily based on the quantity of utilization. At the 2024 CES, Sumitomo introduced an funding in vehicle-analytics software program firm Viaduct, with the intention of integrating the latter’s software program with Sensing Core for this objective.