Vitesco Technologies Gmbh

Continental Automotive Gmbh

Continental Automotive France

Continental Automotive Technologies Gmbh

Fabien Joseph

Stéphane Eloy

Benjamin Marconato

Nicolas Oberti

Valerie Gouzenne Coutier

Marie-Nathalie Larue

Disclosed is a method for determining the angular position of a shaft by a sensor including a toothed wheel including p teeth distributed at equal angles and an additional tooth and a sensitive element that is able to detect a tooth, including the following steps: receiving a tooth signal and the date thereof; shifting the preceding time intervals: Tn−3←Tn−2, Tn−2←Tn−1, Tn−1←Tn; determining the current time interval according to the formula Tn=tn−tn−1; calculating a ratio according to the formula Rn=(Tn*Tn−3)/(Tn−1*Tn−2); and comparing the ratio with a threshold, if the ratio is greater than the threshold, the current tooth signal corresponds to the second tooth immediately following the first tooth, itself immediately following the additional tooth.

Determining the angular position by means of an x+1-tooth camshaft sensor

A sensor for a motor vehicle, the vehicle including a combustion engine and an engine control computer. The engine includes at least one drive shaft able to be driven in rotation, the at least one drive shaft having at least one magnetic element, the sensor being disposed facing the at least one magnetic element, the computer being configured to determine the angular position of the at least one drive shaft in relation to a predefined reference angular position on the basis of an output signal supplied by the sensor, the sensor being characterized in that it is able to generate a square wave output signal. Each square wave is characterized by an initial instant and a temporal width, by associating each initial instant with a predefined angular position of the drive shaft.

Magnetic sensor for a vehicle drive shaft

Disclosed is a camshaft toothed wheel, forming a target for a camshaft position sensor, the toothed wheel including a circular body including two opposite main faces, and at least six teeth distributed over the circumference of the circular body, each tooth including two edges, one corresponding to a rising edge and the other to a falling edge, as a function of a direction of rotation of the wheel, the toothed wheel having asymmetry of revolution. The six teeth are shaped so that the toothed wheel includes, considering the same main face and the same direction of rotation of the wheel: four edges of the same first rising or falling type spaced 90° apart, respectively; and six edges of the same second falling or rising type, respectively, spaced 60° apart, respectively.

Reversible target for a 3-, 4- or 6-cylinder engine

A method for controlling a variable valve timing system using minimum speed positions. The minimum speed positions allow the movement and the position of the various camshafts to be controlled.

Control of a variable valve timing

A method, for an internal combustion engine including an intake camshaft equipped with a variable intake valve timing device including an intake timing actuator and an exhaust camshaft equipped with a variable exhaust valve timing device including an exhaust timing actuator, of detecting inverted connection of the intake timing actuator with the exhaust timing actuator, including: measuring the angular position of the intake camshaft and the angular position of the exhaust camshaft; commanding one of the two timing actuators according to a setpoint and keeping the other of the two timing actuators immobile; measuring the angular positions of the intake camshaft and of the exhaust camshaft; and comparing: if the angular position of the camshaft corresponding to the timing actuator that's been commanded has not been modified, and if the angular position of the camshaft corresponding to the immobile timing actuator has been modified, inverted connection can be diagnosed.

Method for detecting an inverted connection of the intake timing actuator and the exhaust timing actuator

A toothed wheel forming a target for a camshaft position sensor includes a circular body provided with two opposite main faces and is provided on its circumference with teeth. The series of teeth includes eight teeth, each tooth having, for a given first direction of rotation of the wheel, a rising edge and a falling edge and two neighboring teeth being separated by a recessed part. The edges of a first type, rising or falling, are evenly distributed at the periphery of the toothed wheel. The angular length of the recessed parts is greater than or equal to arctan(Llow/R)°CAM, where R is the radius and Llow is the minimum distance between two teeth to detect a low level, except for one recessed part, and the angular length of a tooth is greater than arctan(Lhigh/R)°CAM, except for one tooth, where Lhigh is the minimum length of a tooth allowing detection.

Camshaft toothed wheel and synchronization method using such a wheel

Disclosed is a method for synchronizing a combustion engine of a motor vehicle, including the steps of detection of the reference position of a first toothed wheel during a rotation of the crankshaft from the measurements sent by a first measuring sensor, detection of rising and falling edges of the teeth of a second toothed wheel during a concomitant rotation of the camshaft from the measurements sent by a second measuring sensor, identification of the detected edges with a first tolerance threshold on the angular position of the camshaft from recorded positions of the edges to synchronize the engine, the recorded positions being predetermined by learning from theoretical positions with a second tolerance threshold on the angular position of the camshaft, the first tolerance threshold being less than the second tolerance threshold, and synchronization of the engine from the identified edges of the teeth of the second toothed wheel.

Method for synchronising a combustion engine

A camshaft toothed wheel, forming a target for a camshaft rotation sensor, including a plurality of teeth distributed over its circumference. The toothed wheel including a first set of four teeth each spaced apart by 90&#xb0;, and a second set of six teeth each spaced apart by 60&#xb0;. The teeth of each set being distributed such that the wheel includes two portions of its circumference without an active edge of teeth over an angle of at least 35&#xb0; and which are spaced apart by 180&#xb0;. The teeth of the first set of teeth and of the second set of teeth being arranged such that no tooth is common to the first set of teeth and to the second set of teeth.

Camshaft toothed wheel for a 3-, 4- or 6-cylinder engine with variable valve timing

A method for synchronizing an internal combustion engine includes: a) a first step of acquiring, by the camshaft sensor, signals corresponding to at least five cam edges x; b) a second step of determining the value, from the camshaft signal, of a first, second and third actual ratio; c) a third step of establishing, for each actual value ratio obtained in b), a list of possible cam edges x by comparing the values of the first, second and third actual ratios, respectively, with a tolerance window corresponding to a value of a first, second or third theoretical ratio for a given cam edge x, each weighted by a tolerance factor k; and d) a fourth step of determining the cam edge x seen by the camshaft sensor, the cam edge actually seen by the sensor corresponding to the cam edge x common to the three lists established in c).

Method for synchronizing an internal combustion engine

Disclosed is a method for detecting physical stoppage of an internal combustion engine, including: at least four cylinders, a set of cylinder pressure sensors, configured such that, over the course of a combustion cycle of the engine, there is at least one cylinder in the compression or expansion phase whose pressure is measured by a pressure sensor of the set, the method including the following steps: measuring the pressure in a cylinder in the compression or expansion phase, calculating, from the pressure measured in the cylinder, a ratio between a pressure variation in the cylinder and the pressure in the cylinder, and detecting a physical stoppage of the engine if the measured pressure is decreasing and if the calculated ratio is constant.

Method for detecting physical stoppage of an engine

Disclosed is a toothed wheel for a camshaft, forming a target for a camshaft position sensor, the toothed wheel including a circular body including two opposite main faces, and at least four teeth distributed around the circumference of the circular body, each tooth including two edges, one corresponding to a rising edge and the other to a falling edge, according to a direction of rotation of the wheel, the angular separation between the edges of each tooth being different for each tooth, characterized in that the four teeth are shaped so that the toothed wheel includes, considering the same main face and the same direction of rotation of the wheel: four edges of the same first rising or falling type spaced apart by 90&#xb0; respectively, and three edges of the second falling or rising type respectively, spaced apart by 120&#xb0; respectively.

Reversible camshaft target

A method for diagnosing an inversion of a crankshaft sensor includes the following steps: acquiring a signal by way of the crankshaft sensor, at each detection of a tooth, determining a tooth time elapsed since the previous tooth detection, at each detection of a tooth, calculating a ratio Ri of the tooth times according to the formula Ri=(Ti&#x2212;1)/(Ti*Ti&#x2212;2), where Ri is the ratio, Ti is the last tooth time, Ti&#x2212;1 is the penultimate tooth time, and Ti&#x2212;2 is the tooth time preceding the penultimate tooth time, comparing the ratio Ri with a low threshold Sb, indicative of a turn marker, and a high threshold Sh, indicative of an absence of inversion, a ratio Ri between the two thresholds Sb, Sh being indicative of an inversion.

Method and device for detecting an inverted connection of a crankshaft sensor

A method for detecting the physical stoppage of an internal combustion engine including a crankshaft that drives a toothed wheel having a plurality of teeth, each tooth corresponding to different angular positions of the crankshaft, a sensor positioned next to the toothed wheel generates a signal characteristic of the passage of a tooth. The method detects a tooth from the signal generated by the sensor, identifies the tooth detected, triggers a timeout, and detects stoppage of the engine if the passage of a tooth adjacent to the tooth detected has not been detected before the end of the timeout. The value of the timeout is dependent on the tooth identified, and including: determining crankshaft angular position depending on the tooth identified, the value of the timeout dependent on the angular position of the crankshaft, determining the preferential stopping positions of the crankshaft and assigning a first timeout value for the preferential stopping positions and assigning at least a second value for the other positions of the crankshaft. The first timeout value being less than the second timeout value.

Disclosed is a method for processing a primary signal produced by a sensor detecting the rotation of a rotating target. The primary signal includes pulses having, for a given speed of rotation of the target, a first positive voltage level for rotation in a first determined direction or a second positive voltage level for the opposite direction. A first secondary signal is generated by comparing the primary signal to a first determined voltage threshold between the first and second voltages. A second secondary signal is generated by comparing the primary signal to a second determined voltage threshold between the second voltage level and zero. A determined delay is introduced in the second secondary signal. A determined time threshold is compared to the duration between an active edge of the second secondary signal and the last preceding active edge of the first secondary signal, indicating direction.

Method and device for processing a signal produced by a sensor for detecting the rotation of a rotating target

Disclosed is a method for estimating a physical stoppage of an engine of a motor vehicle, subject to bounce-back, a target equipped with teeth being borne by the crankshaft and successive passes of the teeth past a sensor being detected, a first time count incrementing since a last detection of the passing of a tooth and being associated with a first time threshold with the first count being reset to zero when the time between passes of two successive teeth is below the first threshold. A second count associated with a second time threshold is performed, with this count being suspended when and for as long as a time between the passes of two successive teeth is below the second threshold, the engine being estimated to have stopped as soon as the counts have respectively reached the first and second thresholds.

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Castanet Tolosan, France

Fabien Joseph