Hyundai, Kia reinvent the wheel — and snow tire

Futurride
2 min readDec 14, 2023

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Hyundai, Kia reinvent the wheel—and snow tire

The partners have developed two corner-unit technologies: a wheel drive system that integrates drive components into the wheels for electric vehicles that could open up new vehicle design possibilities, and a shape-memory alloy that can act as a snow chain at the touch of a button.
Hyundai Motor and Kia have revealed two new innovative wheel and tire technologies focused on EV design and snow driving, respectively.

The first is a new wheel drive system for electric vehicles (EVs), which the partners claim will open up new vehicle design possibilities. It integrates drive components into the wheel to deliver better efficiency, power, and durability without impacting ride comfort for improved packaging potential and passenger space, greater driving range, and PBV (purpose-built vehicle) development.

The second new technology is a new snow chain-integrated tire system for winter driving conditions. It uses shape memory alloy inside a wheel and tire to act as a snow chain at the touch of a button.



Uni Wheel drive system improves packaging

The Uni Wheel, short for Universal Wheel Drive System, is designed to improve available space inside an EV by moving the main drive system components to the vacant space within each wheel hub. Check out the video here.

In internal-combustion-engine vehicles, power is transmitted from the engine through the transmission to the wheels via driveshafts and constant velocity (CV) joints. In EVs, the engine and transmission are replace
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Futurride
Futurride

Written by Futurride

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