Drivers usually deliver their pets alongside for the journey, and Ford may need a technique to preserve them safer. The corporate lately filed a patent software with the US Patent and Trademark Workplace (USPTO) for a pet restraint system.
The applying notes that pets are transported in cages, which nonetheless enable them vital freedom of motion in a car’s cabin. Which may preserve the animals glad, but it surely’s not splendid in a crash, or even when the car turns into unsettled. That is why human passengers put on seat belts, in any case.
Ford pet restraint system patent picture
The restraint system described within the patent software is a bit like a mixture of seat belts and a leash, actually. A number of straps connect to the pet’s collar and the ISOFIX anchor factors usually used for youngster seats.
These straps are linked to retractors, which may absorb slack just like the inertia reels in seat belts when wanted, in response to the applying. They’re managed by sensors that measure acceleration and steering to sense circumstances that may result in pets getting thrown across the cabin, or decide whether or not a collision is happening.
Ford pet restraint system patent picture
Different sensors can monitor the place the car is on a chosen route, and modify the restraints based mostly on anticipated street circumstances. Ford additionally features a digital camera to observe pet passengers.
As with different patent functions, it is unclear if the pet restraint system will truly attain manufacturing. Ford particularly has a behavior of firing off patent functions for novel options in speedy succession. However such a system may very well be a great complement to software-based methods like Tesla’s Canine Mode, or Toyota’s Cabin Consciousness tech, at present being examined as a technique to forestall youngsters or pets from being left in automobiles.
