Skip to main content

Continental sensor adjusts vehicle height

German manufacturer Continental says its Ultrasonic Height and Pressure Sensor (UHPS) can adjust the height of commercial vehicles electronically to improve the efficiency of urban buses. The company says UHPS allows drivers to control the air springs when lowering one side of the bus at bus stops - rather than having to let the air out from the spring completely. UHPS uses ultrasound to measure the height and pressure in the air spring and sends the value to the electronic control unit, which automatica
October 15, 2018 Read time: 2 mins

German manufacturer 260 Continental says its Ultrasonic Height and Pressure Sensor (UHPS) can adjust the height of commercial vehicles electronically to improve the efficiency of urban buses.

The company says UHPS allows drivers to control the air springs when lowering one side of the bus at bus stops - rather than having to let the air out from the spring completely.

UHPS uses ultrasound to measure the height and pressure in the air spring and sends the value to the electronic control unit, which automatically opens or closes the air spring valves. Drivers can pre-select target values in the control unit before starting their journey depending on whether they are travelling through a city or freeway.

The interaction between the control unit and air spring maintains the appropriate height and is also expected to prevent energy from being lost when the bus is lowered or raised.

Continental has also developed a heat-resistant material to protect the air springs from the extreme temperatures from exhaust systems of the engines and other heat sources.

For more information on companies in this article

Related Content

  • Wider uses for weigh in motion data
    March 18, 2014
    Colin Sowman talks to Terry Bergan of International Road Dynamics about the latest uses of weigh-in-motion systems. Raising allowable truck weight limits improve transport efficiency but leaves an ever-increasing number of bridges vulnerable to being overloaded and damaged by vehicles heavier, and in some cases far heavier, than they were designed to carry. The simplistic solution is to impose weight restrictions and erect appropriate signs - but this could have severe knock-on effect on trucking operations
  • Hot spot detector prevents road tunnel fires
    December 9, 2013
    Sick’s new hot spot detector system proved its worth only one week after being installed by preventing a fire in the Karawanks Tunnel, Austria. A semi-trailer truck with a wheel temperature exceeding 200 degrees centigrade triggered the alarm as it passed the hot spot detector. Closer inspection indicated that in addition to the overheated brake, the vehicle was also travelling with two cracked brake discs. Developed by Sick’s Swiss subsidiary ECTN and based on the Sick LMS511 laser sensor with the T
  • CCTV brings transit safety into view
    September 15, 2014
    David Crawford looks at camera-based vulnerable road users protection systems.Safe and efficient operation of road-based transit depends on minimising the risks of incidents involving other vehicles or vulnerable road users such as pedestrians, cyclists and passengers boarding or alighting from buses or trams. The extent and quality of the visibility available to drivers is crucial in preventing and avoiding incidents. Conventionally, they have had to rely on fairly basic equipment - essentially the human
  • Trailer buses - flexible and cost efficient passenger transport
    January 25, 2012
    A study of the German local public passenger transport market, initiated by Göppel Bus and carried out by Consultatio Venture, revealed unsurprising results that would apply to just about any operation in this sector throughout the world: the pressure on costs and capacity peaks pose the greatest problems for local public passenger transport operations.