A New Player in the Rider Comms SpaceAmong the highlights at the WPS (Western Power Sports)/HardDrive National Sales Meeting at Boise, Idaho, in January was a new communications system from UCLEAR.
Being touted as a “revolutionary” step forward in rider communications and safety, the new ‘Motion’ Series is a massively updated program that has been largely kept under wraps until this year. It is now available to authorized Harley-Davidson dealerships and custom V-twin shops from the WPS/HardDrive network in the USA and through Kimpex in Canada.
Describing it as a “leap forward for communication, sound and safety,” UCLEAR Brand Sales Manager David M. Kuck told AMD “we listened to the industry and to our customers, built all-new systems around their feedback, and added in a few new patented inventions of our own. Besides these amazing new comm systems, we’ve also just published a new MSRP MAP and Amazon policy, based on dealer feedback, to protect the massive sales opportunity that we believe UCLEAR represents for WPS and HardDrive ‘Brick and Mortar’ dealers.”
The Motion 6 and Motion Infinity helmet communicators introduce Bluetooth 5.0, an all-new DynaMESH intercom network, trainable voice commands, EZ intercom pairing, motion and impact sensors, longer intercom distances, longer battery life, wireless firmware updates, and are fully ruggedized and weatherproof.
Industry firsts are said to include the first ever unlimited-rider mesh intercom with multi-hop auto switching, buttonless gesture controls and the USAFE impact sensor, which can alert your contacts with your GPS location if you’ve been in an accident. This is a version of a facility that all new motorcycles will need to be equipped with before too long - certainly within the next decade.
“These units are built to perform on any helmet and in any riding condition on the planet from the North Pole to a rainstorm at the Equator, and to be easier than ever to use. We’re especially excited about the USAFE feature, which could save riders’ lives. We’re expecting major growth in all riding segments with the Motion Series in 2019,” says David.
USAFE uses an advanced accelerometer, a triaxial crash sensor, built in. It can measure impact forces to detect and measure hard impacts. If you are unresponsive and have a connected GPS enabled mobile device, USAFE can alert (up to 3) emergency contacts of your situation and GPS location. They are contacted through both email and text via the connected phone and the USAFE contact database, and include a custom message, rider contact information, satellite view of the crash site, and a list of medical facilities near to the crash site.
Additionally, the first emergency contact receives an auto-dialed phone call. USAFE requires no subscription and is included in the Motion Infinity helmet communicator to help injured riders receive care as quickly as possible. “In the near future we may also be able to use this technology to relay G-Force data to medical caregivers. But the benefits of the system don’t stop there,” said David. “Without giving too much away to our competition, I can exclusively confirm to AMD that we plan to continue to update the capabilities of USAFE, and add to the medical data we can instantly share after an impact is measured. The hardware is already there, so as we augment our software capabilities, owners with USAFE enabled devices will receive those capabilities via wireless updates.”
“Then there is DynaMESH - the first ever unlimited-rider mesh intercom network combined with multi-hop automatic switching. It pairs with mesh and non-mesh units and auto-reorganizes as group riders change positions. This ensures stable and constant connections over the longest distances allowed by the FCC.
“There’s more. UCommand allows the rider to control the Motion Series unit by natural voice and control Apple Siri or Google Voice - the rider can train his or her own voice commands to be recognized by their choice of service in our mobile app.
“Another first is our exclusive Gesture Control - this sends out a sensor beam from the Motion Series unit allowing simple hand gestures to command the most common features such as volume and pause/restart music - even if wearing winter gloves - and fits to any helmet, not just those that are described as comms-prepared.”
The intercom distance is up to 1.2 km (3/4 mile) per person and the battery life of the unit is up to 18 hours on average. The product includes the CLEARLink Mobile App and easy wireless firmware updates, music sharing, music/intercom overlay, call conferencing, private vs group intercom toggling, universal pairing compatibility, advanced and fully user-adjustable ABF noise cancellation, a graphic equalizer to tune and balance the speaker output and PULSE PRO 2.0 ultra-premium speakers with dual boomless MEMS mics.
HARDDRIVE V-TWIN
www.hdtwin.com
www.ucleardigital.com