- Mercedes wants to cut trunk wiring using spring-loaded contacts.
- Patent replaces flexible tailgate wires with mechanical switches.
- Taillight complexity added weight, wiring, and higher repair costs.
As vehicles grow more sophisticated, so too does the tangle of wiring that powers their features. Wiring harnesses have long been big, heavy, and complicated, and now they’re getting even more intricate as manufacturers load their latest models with more tech than ever.
To address this growing web of cables, Mercedes-Benz has come up with a novel approach that could simplify things around the tailgate or trunk area.
Read: Porsche Patents A Crazy New W12 Engine
To reduce the number of wires running into these movable panels, Mercedes has filed a patent for a surprisingly analog solution. The design might not reinvent the wheel, but it could help shed some bulk and streamline certain electrical connections.
Rethinking the Rear End
The newly filed patent, first spotted by CarBuzz, was registered with Germany’s intellectual property office. It outlines a spring-loaded mechanical switch designed to sit inside movable panels like a tailgate. Rather than routing wires through flexible conduits, the switch would transfer power to rear lights through physical contact points.
Such a solution would be particularly useful for vehicles where the taillights move with the tailgate, necessitating longer wires to be run to them. Those flexible wiring covers seen near trunk hinges exist purely to accommodate this movement, adding cost, bulk, and additional failure points over time.
Included in the patent is a depiction of what looks to be the rear-end of the current GLS, which has taillights that split in two when the tailgate is open. In this case, the switch could send power from the outer sections of the light to the rest of the light. Shorter wiring paths could then feed into the switching hardware rather than looping through the tailgate itself.
An Old Trick in a New Context
Using spring-loaded contacts like this isn’t a novel idea and has been used for decades, albeit it isn’t frequently seen in the automotive space. It could work well, helping to save a small amount of weight and complexity by reducing the number of wires running into the tailgate.
The challenge lies in the environment. Tailgates tend to collect grime, especially on vehicles that see a lot of use in bad weather or off-road. Electrical contacts in these spots would need to be well protected and self-cleaning to remain reliable over time. If not, the whole system could fail with something as simple as a layer of dust.
No current Mercedes model uses switches like this, and just because the carmaker has this patent, that doesn’t mean any of its future vehicles will use such switches.
While the concept is clever, making it both practical and reliable could demand significant effort from the company’s R&D team. That kind of investment may not come quickly, so it’s hard to imagine this showing up in production anytime soon.
Simplifying Complexity
Also: Why You May Never Replace A Whole Mercedes Headlight Again
Still, the idea does align with Mercedes-Benz’s recent push toward more modular, repair-friendly components, an approach aimed at reducing waste by allowing individual elements to be serviced rather than replaced outright, including headlamps.
