Motors get hot and it’s quite reasonable to not include tons of cooling just so that you can adjust your seat for hours on end.
That said the implementation is still stupid as time isn’t the right measure to judge motor temperature, motor temperature is. Thermocouples cost fractions of a cent, the motors probably already include one or two as they already have smarts (being hooked up to the CAN bus and not straight voltage). Which would also take care of differing environmental temperatures as obviously the motors are worse at shedding heat when it’s scorching hot in the car.
Potatoe Potatoh. Point is you size the overall system for quick adjustments, not continuous use. If you can get by with less weight and cost then you do as continuous use does not even begin to appear in the requirements sheet.
Do you think that being able to fiddle with your seat position for minutes on end is any way insufficient? Will you ever come close to actually using that feature?
If you answered those with “no”, then any extra weight and cost is too much. If you answered with “yes” then get a massage chair and leave the poor car be a car. Feature set follows function.
Require more IO, add complexity to any wiring harnesses, make repair or replacement more difficult. This all increases cost, probably more than a mass-produced seat motor used by other manufacturers.
For weight and cost, a proper design would have been negligible. Why do you think every other car isn’t made this way if it comes down to cost?
Require more IO, add complexity to any wiring harnesses, make repair or replacement more difficult.
None of those: In modern cars you just plug those things into the CAN bus. One connector.
Why do you think every other car isn’t made this way if it comes down to cost?
Most cars don’t have seat adjustment motors. And as to others that have that functionality being able to operate it continuously: [citation needed]. Remember these are off the shelf German car supply parts, you’ll find the exact same hardware in, say, a BMW.
Motors get hot and it’s quite reasonable to not include tons of cooling just so that you can adjust your seat for hours on end.
That said the implementation is still stupid as time isn’t the right measure to judge motor temperature, motor temperature is. Thermocouples cost fractions of a cent, the motors probably already include one or two as they already have smarts (being hooked up to the CAN bus and not straight voltage). Which would also take care of differing environmental temperatures as obviously the motors are worse at shedding heat when it’s scorching hot in the car.
You don’t add cooling, you size the motors to have enough thermal mass and mount them to metal chassis.
Potatoe Potatoh. Point is you size the overall system for quick adjustments, not continuous use. If you can get by with less weight and cost then you do as continuous use does not even begin to appear in the requirements sheet.
How much weight and cost do you think that’s going to add?
Do you think that being able to fiddle with your seat position for minutes on end is any way insufficient? Will you ever come close to actually using that feature?
If you answered those with “no”, then any extra weight and cost is too much. If you answered with “yes” then get a massage chair and leave the poor car be a car. Feature set follows function.
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Adding this functionality will:
Require more IO, add complexity to any wiring harnesses, make repair or replacement more difficult. This all increases cost, probably more than a mass-produced seat motor used by other manufacturers.
For weight and cost, a proper design would have been negligible. Why do you think every other car isn’t made this way if it comes down to cost?
None of those: In modern cars you just plug those things into the CAN bus. One connector.
Most cars don’t have seat adjustment motors. And as to others that have that functionality being able to operate it continuously: [citation needed]. Remember these are off the shelf German car supply parts, you’ll find the exact same hardware in, say, a BMW.