SmartRim Turns Any Car into an Intelligent Parking System
SmartRim is a parking assistance system that works with a smartphone to protect the vehicle’s sides, save the rims from damage, and assist in making parking easier and safer.
Created by Steven Domenikos, SmartRim is a set of four sensors that can be installed without tools inside each wheel well of any car or SUV. The wireless, self-contained sensor combines with an iPhone application to show distances and alert drivers if they’re going to hit something while parking or driving near obstacles.
According to the insurance industry statistics, 45% of all automobile accidents happen at parking lots and 51% of all drivers have at one time scraped their alloy wheels.
The SmartRim proximity sensor uses high-frequency ultrasonic sound waves to locate curbs and obstacles. It works like a flash finder by measuring the time that the sound takes to reflect off the object. These reflections are analyzed and filtered to extract echoes that are significant and that are close to the sides of the car.
SmartRim uses an internal temperature sensor, which compensates for the speed of sound in air of different temperatures, and calibration parameters to gauge the distance between the car and the curb. To achieve good performance SmartRim takes multiple measurements per second and tracks objects to ensure that surrounding noise does not trigger a false measurement.
A SmartRim set will start at $500. First shipments are expected later this year.
