Hyundai/Kia Develop a Robot for Hands-Free EV Charging

• Plenty of ideas exist to eliminate the trouble of plugging an EV into a heavy charging cable. From wireless pads to robot arms, people have been working on this technology for a while now.

• Hyundai Motor Group is the latest to investigate human-free EV charging tech and will display its new Automatic Charging Robot at the Seoul Mobility Show that starts next week.

• Using a built-in laser, cameras, AI wheels, and a movable arm, the ACR can—with the right EV—make charging your Ioniq 6 as easy as pushing a button on the key fob.

As simple as it can be to charge an electric vehicle at a known location like home or work, it could always be easier. WiTricity is working on wireless EV charging and has been for a decade. In 2015, Tesla showed a video of a metal "snake" that could plug a charging cable into an EV automatically. Ram is working on an inductive charging robot for its upcoming electric truck. This month in Seoul, Hyundai and Kia will display the latest of these automated charging technologies, this one called ACR.

The Automatic Charging Robot is somewhat similar to Tesla's metal snake, but it is more advanced. The snake had a proprietary Tesla connector built in, while the Hyundai Motor Group's ACR instead has a hand that can hold different plugs. Granted, most of the time, it will use a J1772 or CCS connector, but it's good to see this kind of forward-thinking compatibility. In fact, HMG designed the ACR to operate in any environment, "regardless of charger location, weather and potential obstacles," the company said. It's a waterproof and dustproof (IP65 rated) robot that uses a stationary safety pole with a built-in laser sensor installed in the ground nearby to warn the robot when it might run into a stationary or moving obstacle.