What happens when an engineer can't get a car to a wind tunnel for testing? Ford's solution is to bring the tunnel to the car. On this episode of Translogic, host Jonathon Buckley tours Ford's labs and factories to see what innovations they have brewing for the future.
Bucko starts his tour at a testing site learning about Ford's portable wind tunnels. Interestingly, these tools aren't necessarily used for decreasing wind resistance to gain speed, but rather they're used to find unpleasant wind noise you'd hear while driving. The giant fans are housed in portable shipping containers, which makes the tool incredibly convenient for engineers to move across the country. "We can put one of those right on a standard flatbed and haul it across the country within hours," says Mark Wiles, wind noise engineer at Ford.
Another tool that's used closely in conjunction with the wind tunnels is Ford's binaural mannequin head microphones. These mics give a three-dimensional audio picture of where exacly noise is coming from and allow engineers to analyze the recorded sound in several different ways.
The last stop on our tour is Ford's wearables lab. Engineers at Ford Motor Company have started looking into the potential applications of wearables for drivers and are currently experimenting with some of the hottest smartwatches on the market. Ford is not just looking at how smartwatches impact driver experience, but also how smarthwatch technology could be potentially embedded into the vehicle itself.
Join us as we explore Ford's cutting-edge tech on this episode of Translogic.
Bucko starts his tour at a testing site learning about Ford's portable wind tunnels. Interestingly, these tools aren't necessarily used for decreasing wind resistance to gain speed, but rather they're used to find unpleasant wind noise you'd hear while driving. The giant fans are housed in portable shipping containers, which makes the tool incredibly convenient for engineers to move across the country. "We can put one of those right on a standard flatbed and haul it across the country within hours," says Mark Wiles, wind noise engineer at Ford.
Another tool that's used closely in conjunction with the wind tunnels is Ford's binaural mannequin head microphones. These mics give a three-dimensional audio picture of where exacly noise is coming from and allow engineers to analyze the recorded sound in several different ways.
The last stop on our tour is Ford's wearables lab. Engineers at Ford Motor Company have started looking into the potential applications of wearables for drivers and are currently experimenting with some of the hottest smartwatches on the market. Ford is not just looking at how smartwatches impact driver experience, but also how smarthwatch technology could be potentially embedded into the vehicle itself.
Join us as we explore Ford's cutting-edge tech on this episode of Translogic.
- Click here to find more episodes of Translogic
- Click here to learn more about our host, Jonathon Buckley
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