Toyota Jidosha Kabushiki Kaisha

Aisin Seiki Kabushiki Kaisha

Nippon Soken, Inc.

Hideki Kusunoki

Atsushi Ogawa

Masaaki Tabata

Hideki Ohashi

Takashi Doi

Hiroaki Tanaka

Kaoru Ohashi

Toru Sugiyama

Takaharu Idogaki

Mizuho Sugiyama

Osamu Takeda

Shin Koike

Shingo Urababa

Hideo Inoue

Masaru Ishikawa

Takashi Omitsu

Noriaki Hattori

Nobuhiro Ide

Toshihisa Ishihara

Shinji Fukui

Masaki Kanatani

Kazuhisa Meguro

Junji Yamamoto

Shinichi Tomioka

Atsushi Takumi

Kazuyoshi Wakabayashi

Hitoshi Iwata

Yoshinobu Suzuki

Yutaka Taguchi

Toshiyasu Tanaka

Kouichi Morita

Suminobu Takamori

Takashi Kida

A tire inflation pressure obtaining unit obtains tire inflation pressure. An inflation pressure storing unit stores a tire inflation pressure after start of travel of a vehicle as an after-travel inflation pressure. A pressure reduction determining unit determines reduction in the tire inflation pressure based on the tire inflation pressure obtained. A reference pressure setting unit sets larger one of the after-travel inflation pressure and a predetermined lowest reference pressure as a reference pressure of tire inflation pressure determination when reduction in the tire inflation pressure is determined, and sets the lowest reference pressure as a reference pressure of tire inflation pressure determination when reduction in the tire inflation pressure is not determined. An alarm unit generates an alarm when the tire inflation pressure becomes below an alarm pressure threshold which is determined from the reference pressure.

Tire inflation pressure monitoring apparatus

An inflation pressure sensor is mounted in a wheel of a vehicle and determines a tire inflation pressure. A wheel-side communication device transmits a detected tire inflation pressure to a body-side communication device at a predetermined interval. An inflation pressure storing unit stores, as an after-travel inflation pressure, a tire inflation pressure after start of travel of the vehicle. A comparing unit compares the after-travel inflation pressure with a lowest reference pressure. The lowest reference pressure is a tire inflation pressure immediately after start of the vehicle or a predetermined recommended inflation pressure. A reference pressure setting unit sets the after-travel inflation pressure as a reference pressure of tire inflation pressure determination when the after-travel inflation pressure is higher than the lowest reference pressure, and sets the lowest reference pressure as a reference pressure of tire inflation pressure determination when the after-travel inflation pressure is equal to or lower than the lowest reference pressure. When the tire inflation pressure becomes below an alarm pressure threshold obtained from the reference pressure, an alarm unit generates an alarm.

A tire pressure control system that controls the tire pressure in the tire at each wheel of a vehicle includes: a wheel-side tire pressure sensor; a transmitter that transmits the detected tire pressure; a receiver that receives the tire pressure information from the transmitter; a tire pressure regulating device; and a control unit that drives the tire pressure regulating device based on the tire pressure information. The control unit drives the tire pressure regulating device regardless of whether the tire pressure information is received if a reception-incapable condition, in which the receiver is unable to receive the tire pressure information, has occurred.

Tire pressure control system, tire pressure control device and tire pressure control method

If a trigger unit in a set range is received after a transmission, an annunciation portion is advised of a likelihood of radio interference. In this case, no trigger signal is supplied. If identifier information that has been received corresponds to the identifier information stored in a memory after the transmission of a trigger signal, a count value remains untouched (YES in S). It is apparent that identifier information was transmitted before from one of wheel-side units that has supplied a trigger signal, and that the trigger signal has not been received by a desired one of the wheel-side units. An operator can supply a trigger signal again through a change in relative position or the like.

External signal supply unit, vehicle state acquisition system and external signal supply method

A tire pressure monitoring system, that includes a plurality of the wheel state detection unit, provided at wheel of a vehicle, and that transmits detected wheel state information. A request signal transmitter transmits a request signal to request transmission of the detected wheel state information. When each wheel state detection unit receives the request signal, it transmits the detected wheel state together with the indication information indicating that the wheel state is detected in response to the transmission request signal. The ECU sets a determination threshold value for triggering an alert regarding tire pressure based on the detected wheel state information transmitted from the plurality of wheel state detection units.

Wheel state monitoring system and wheel state detecting apparatus

A vehicle information processing apparatus provided in a vehicle is provided with a TPMS valve that includes an air pressure sensor which obtains a tire air pressure as wheel information and a wheel-side communication device that transmits the wheel information and an ID unique to that wheel-side communication device at regular intervals; an ECU which receives the wheel information from the wheel-side communication device in each TPMS valve via a vehicle body-side communication device and processes that wheel information; and an onboard battery which supplies power to the ECU. Upon receiving a command to shift into a verification mode while power is being supplied from the onboard battery, the ECU performs a predetermined verification based on a signal transmitted at regular intervals from each wheel-side communication device. After receiving the command to shift into the verification mode, the ECU remains in the verification mode until a preset condition is satisfied.

Vehicle information processing apparatus, verification method of a vehicle information processing apparatus, and ID registration method of a vehicle information processing apparatus

An antenna apparatus includes a monopole antenna forming an antenna element having a metal shell body, and the antenna element has an approximately conical part, a vertex of which is on the side of a power supply part.

Antenna apparatus and communication method employing it

A wheel-state obtaining apparatus including wheel-side devices each operable to transmit wheel-side information in response to an abrupt change of a tire air pressure of a corresponding one of wheels, when the tire air pressures of the wheels are abruptly changed in a predetermined order by an operator of the apparatus, and a body-side device operable to receive the wheel-side information from the wheel-side devices in the same order, and obtain wheel-position information indicative of a position of each wheel, on the basis of the predetermined order and a state of reception of the wheel-side information, so that the wheel positions and the wheel-side devices can be automatically correlated with each other, with high accuracy and reliability, by simply changing the tire air pressures of the wheels in the predetermined order.

Wheel-state obtaining apparatus, and wheel-position-information obtaining method

A tire-state obtaining apparatus operable to detect the states of tires of wheels and including (a) wheel-side devices each including a transmitter device (), and (b) a body-side device including a receiver device operable to receive tire information from the wheel-side devices, wherein the positions of the wheels from which sets of the tire information have been transmitted are determined on the basis of the condition in which the receiver device receives the tire information. The receiver device includes a plurality of antennas oriented to receive the tire information from the respective wheel-side devices, and the wheel corresponding to the antenna having the highest intensity of reception of the tire information can be determined as the wheel from which the tire information has been transmitted, so that the antennas need not be located near the respective wheels, to identify the wheels.

Tire-state obtaining apparatus

A vehicle tire information obtaining apparatus for obtaining tire information relating to a mounted tire and a non-mounted tire of a vehicle. The apparatus includes: (a) tire state detectors which are provided in the respective tires and each of which detects a state of the corresponding tire; (b) transmitters which are provided in the respective tires and which transmit tire data sets, as the tire information, each containing at least one tire-state data element representative of the detected state of the corresponding tire; (c) a receiver which is provided in a body of the vehicle and which receives the tire data sets transmitted by the transmitters; and (d) a non-mounted-tire information separator which separates the tire data set transmitted from the non-mounted tire, from the tire data set transmitted from the mounted tire.

Vehicle tire information obtaining apparatus and tire information processing apparatus

An apparatus operable with a system which includes a body-side device and wheel-side devices and in which vehicle-state data such as wheel-state data representative of wheel states are transmitted by radio communication from the wheel-side devices to the body-side device, together with wheel identification data identifying the wheels. The apparatus includes antennas attached to each wheel inspecting device which is arranged to rotate the corresponding so that the antennas are sequentially aligned with the wheel-side device, and transmit trigger signals in response to which the wheel identification data are transmitted from the wheel-side device to the body-side device and registered in the body-side device. The apparatus assists the system so as to automate the registration of the wheel identification data, thereby eliminating a manual operation to bring a trigger device to the positions of the wheels to command the wheel-side devices to transmit the wheel identification data.

Apparatus for assisting registration of vehicle wheel identification data, and apparatus for assisting registration of data-processing information

The invention is directed to an arrangement for providing an automatic steering control and restraining a steering wheel from being rotated in case of the automatic steering control. A rack is mounted on the vehicle to be laterally movable with respect thereto and linked to a main shaft of a steering wheel. A lateral shaft is disposed to be laterally movable with and with respect to the rack and linked at its opposite ends to steerable wheels of the vehicle. Relative positions of the rack and lateral shaft are adjusted by an adjusting device. An electromagnetic clutch is disposed to restrain at least one of the rack and the main shaft from being moved with a frictional force applied thereto in case of the automatic steering control. Consequently, the steering wheel is not rotated in the automatic steering control, while the steering wheel can be rotated manually against the frictional force.

Steering control apparatus

An angular velocity sensor having a casing in which a disk shaped permanent magnet member is arranged so that it floats on a magnetic fluid filled in the casing. A Hall motor is provided for rotating the permanent magnet about its axis in the casing, and a detection unit is provided detecting an inclination of the magnet member about an axis which is transverse to the axis about which the magnet member rotates, which inclination is generated when the sensor is subjected to an angular movement. An angular velocity of such an angular movement is calculated from the detected degree of inclination of the magnet member.

Device for detecting angular velocity

An electric control apparatus for a four-wheel steering system is designed to calculate a rear wheel steering angle on a basis of a control rule corresponding with a steering mode selected from a plurality of rear wheel steering modes thereby to steer a set of dirigible rear road wheels at the calculated steering angle. The electric control apparatus is further designed to calculate a difference between new and old steering angles calculated when the selected steering mode has been changed to another one of the steering modes and immediately after change of the selected steering mode, to gradually decreasing an absolute value of the calculated difference at a predetermined time interval, to correct the new steering angle in accordance with the absolute value of the calculated difference until the absolute value becomes zero after change of the selected steering mode and to control an actual steering angle of the rear road wheels in accordance with the corrected new steering angle.

Growing community of inventors

Nishikamo-gun, Japan

Hideki Kusunoki