Nippon Soken, Inc.

Denso Corporation

Nippondenso Co., Ltd.

Toyota Jidosha Kabushiki Kaisha

Nagoya Institute of Technology

Atsushi Hashikawa

Shoji Sakai

Satoru Mizuno

Akira Kato

Masahiro Taguchi

Mitsuru Nakagawa

Katsunori Tanaka

Takeshi Sada

Yasuo Kondo

Tetsuro Kikuchi

Kenji Ueda

Takahiko Yoshida

Atsuo Ishizuka

Satosi Kuwakado

Takaharu Kozawa

Nozomi Kitagawa

Tomoatsu Makino

Naoki Mizuno

Noriaki Kawai

Muneo Yorinaga

Yasuyoshi Hirai

Masahiro Shiozawa

Yoshifumi Morita

Kazutaka Katoh

Atsushi Ichikawa

Shuichi Yamashita

Kazuhito Nomura

Yasuyuki Sakai

Katsunori Goto

Sadhisa Onimaru

Yasuhiko Koike

Masahiro Sou

An apparatus is provided to control a power voltage on a power-supplying line extending from a generator and connecting to a battery and eclectic loads. The apparatus is mounted on a vehicle and comprises a detecting device, a calculator, and a controller. The detecting device detects pairs of voltage and current of the battery. The calculator calculating a control current on the basis of the detected pairs of voltage and current and a target voltage for the power voltage. The pairs of voltage and current are used to calculate an internal resistance and/or a regression line of the battery. The controller controlling a charge and discharge current of the battery on the basis of the control current so that the power voltage is controlled to the target voltage.

Method and apparatus for calculating battery state and apparatus for controlling power voltage in vehicle

A charged state detecting apparatus for a secondary battery is provided, which can suppress deterioration in the accuracy of detecting a charged state, such as an SOC, the deterioration being caused by variation of a polarization state of a battery. The charged state detecting apparatus stabilizes an amount of polarization of the battery, stops power generation upon confirmation of the stabilization of the polarization amount, and sufficiently alters the current of the battery to sample a required number of data pairs of voltage and current of the battery. Using these data pairs, the charged state detecting apparatus detects a charged state, such as the SOC, of the battery.

Apparatus for detecting charged state of secondary battery

A neural network type of apparatus is provided to detect an internal state of a secondary battery implemented in a battery system. The apparatus comprises a detecting unit, producing unit and estimating unit. The detecting unit detects electric signals indicating an operating state of the battery. The producing unit produces, using the electric signals, an input parameter required for estimating the internal state of the battery. The input parameter reflects calibration of a present charged state of the battery which is attributable to at least one of a present degraded state of the battery and a difference in types of the battery. The estimating unit estimates an output parameter indicating the charged state of the battery by applying the input parameter to neural network calculation.

Method and apparatus for detecting charged state of secondary battery based on neural network calculation

A degradation judgment method, for a storage battery, according to the invention detects generation of a gas (hydrogen, oxygen, etc) after the start of charging of a lead-acid storage battery 10 and measures the electrical characteristics (voltage, current, resistance, etc) of the lead-acid storage battery upon generation of the gas and a gas concentration, a gas generation quantity and a gas generation speed. These measurement values are compared with the results of determination of the relation calculated in advance between the degradation condition and these various quantities and the degradation condition of the lead-acid storage battery is judged.

Method and apparatus for judging degradation of storage battery

A pressed-contact type semiconductor device in which a main electrode surface of a semiconductor element is contacted with an electrode plate by a pressed-contact, which can reduce both an electric resistance and a thermal resistance between the main electrode surface of the semiconductor element and the electrode plate. The pressed-contact type semiconductor device ( ) is provided with a semiconductor element ( ) having electrode surfaces, a pair of electrode plates ( ) contacted with the electrode surfaces by the pressed-contact, a pair of insulating plates ( ) contacted with the outer side of the pair of the electrode plates by the pressed-contact, and a pair of radiating plates ( ) contacted with the outer side of the pair of the insulating plates by the pressed-contact. A contact intermediary member ( ), which is made up of particle member having at least thermal conductivity and electric conductivity, is intercalated between the semiconductor element and the electrode plate. The particle member of the contact intermediary member includes large particles having an average particle diameter of more than 2 &mgr;m, and small particles having an average particle diameter of to or less than 2 &mgr;m. Contact intermediary members ( ) are intercalated into gaps generated between the electrode plate and the insulating plate, and between the insulating plate and the radiating plate so as to fill up these gaps. The contact intemediary members are made of powder material having at least thermal conductivity.

Electric apparatus having a contact intermediary member and method for manufacturing the same

An optical information reading apparatus such as a bar code reader includes a mirror drive unit rotatable to oscillate a movable scanning mirror simultaneously about a first axis and a second axis perpendicular to the first axis so that a laser beam irradiated from a laser unit is directed by the movable scanning mirror vertically and horizontally to scan parallel arranged plural rows bar codes with a raster scanning pattern. Since the raster scanning pattern can be formed by the combination of a single scanning mirror and a single mirror drive unit, the optical information reading apparatus is simple in construction and compact in size. In addition, the number of vertical scanning lines is not limited as opposed to a limited number of vertical scanning lines formed a polygon mirror incorporated in the conventional apparatus.

Optical information reading apparatus

An optical information reading apparatus for optically reading information recorded on a recording medium with a laser light beam emitted from a light source. The apparatus comprises a hologram device for receiving at its center portion a laser light beam. The hologram diffracts the received light so as to produce a first diffracted light beam and is arranged to receive at its entire surface light to be reflected from the recording medium and to diffract the received light so as to produce a second diffracted light beam. This hologram device is arranged to be driven by a motor so as to move the first diffracted light beam for a scanning operation. Also included in the reading apparatus is a reflection assembly for reflecting the first diffracted light beam from the hologram device toward the recording medium and further for reflecting light reflected from the recording medium toward substantially the entire surface of the hologram device whereby the hologram device produces the second diffracted light beam. The second diffracted light beam is directed to a light-receiving device which in turn performs a photoelectric conversion in accordance with the intensity of the received light beam to read the information recorded on the recording medium. This arrangement allows the size-reduction of the apparatus concurrently with accurately reading out the information.

Apparatus for optically reading information

A bar code reader includes a hologram receiving a scanning light beam in sequence from a scanning light beam source for directing the scanning light beam to a bar code to be read along one path so that the bar code is scanned with the scanning laser beam in two-dimensional directions, and for guiding the scanning light beam to a photo-detector along the same path after the scanning light beam is reflected from the bar code, a condenser lens disposed in an optical system between the photo-detector and the hologram for collecting the reflected scanning light beam into the photo-detector, and a light blocking member disposed in an optical system between the condenser lens and the hologram for blocking unwanted light from the photo-detector, which unwanted light advances toward an incident side of the hologram on which the scanning light beam is directed.

Bar code reader using holograms

In a fuel injection control for diesel engine, in order to eliminate engine noise, particularly, the 'idling knocking' noise occurring during engine idling, by controlling a pilot injection, a method for controlling the fuel injection includes the steps of: detecting an idling state of the diesel engine, pressure in a combustion chamber, engine rotational speed and crank angle to obtain a reference position; selecting a valve opening pressure of a fuel injection nozzle at a relatively low level when the idling state is detected, thereby setting a two peaks characteristic of a fuel injection rate within an extent of the idling rotational speed; and controlling a pressure increment rate in the combustion chamber to within a predetermined value by changing a fuel injection quantity of a pilot injection.

Fuel injection control for diesel engine

A system for controlling the throttling of intake air and pressure of fuel injection in a diesel engine, including an intake air throttling mechanism in an intake air passage and a fuel injection apparatus in a swirl chamber. The fuel injection pressure of the fuel injection apparatus is variable. The intake air throttling mechanism is operated in accordance with predetermined operating parameters of the engine to reduce the fuel injection pressure when necessary.

System for controlling throttling of intake air and pressure of fuel

An air conditioning/heating apparatus for an automobile, comprising an assembly which is located on a steering column cover of the automobile, the heater assembly comprising an air duct, a heating element arranged in the air duct for heating the air passing through the heating element, and an air outlet opening from which the air is blown out.

Air conditioning/heating apparatus for automobiles

An air heating apparatus comprises a auxillary PTC heating element in an air duct lying parallel to the length of the duct to define first and second air passages separated by the heating element. The PTC heating element has apertures through which passes air to be heated; the two air passages thereby communicating with each other by means of the apertures through the heating element. First and second valves are located at upstream and downstream ends of the first and second air passages for selectably closing and opening the upstream and downstream ends of the first and second air passages, respectively.

Dual air passage heating apparatus with ceramic heater element

Growing community of inventors

Okazaki, Japan

Atsushi Hashikawa