Toyota Jidosha Kabushiki Kaisha

Panasonic Corporation

Hirotada Otake

Takeshi Matsumura

Shinya Sannodo

Hideki Takamatsu

Kohei Tochigi

Yuta Ikezawa

Shogo Ito

Masaki Takano

Hiroshi Mizuno

Yoshiyuki Hashimoto

Masanori Hirose

Tsuyoshi Nishio

Yoshihisa Yamada

Masami Kondo

Shinichi Soejima

Masaaki Yamaoka

Hirohito Ide

Ken Koibuchi

Eiji Sakaguchi

Akihiro Yanaka

Akihisa Yokoyama

Nobuharu Katsuki

Hiroshi Naitou

Keisuke Kawai

Yuta Okazaki

Shinji Fujikawa

Tomokiyo Suzuki

Katsuyuki Kawai

Masayoshi Hoshino

Tsuyoshi Shimizu

Tsuneo Miyakoshi

Shigeyuki Kido

A vehicle travel control apparatus includes an actuator and an electronic control unit. The electronic control unit is configured to determine whether a driver of a vehicle is in an abnormal state where the driver loses an ability of driving the vehicle. The electronic control unit is also configured to stop the vehicle at an abnormality determination time point onward, and control a vehicle speed by using the actuator such that the vehicle speed does not become lower than a lower limit vehicle speed in a period from the abnormality determination time point to a time point when the vehicle is stopped. The lower limit vehicle speed is set in accordance with a road shape influencing timing when a driver of another vehicle traveling behind the vehicle visually recognizes the vehicle.

Vehicle travel control apparatus

Driving support ECU transmits a communication connection request to a help net center HNC when a driver of a vehicle has been determined to be in an abnormal state where the driver loses an ability to drive the vehicle, and when the communication connection to the help net center HNC has been established, the driving support ECU transmits the help signal (the positional information of the vehicle) and decelerates the vehicle at a constant deceleration to make the vehicle stop. On the other hand, when the communication connection to the help net center HNC has not been established, the driving support ECU makes the vehicle travel at a constant speed. Accordingly, it is possible to make the vehicle stop under a situation where the help net center HNC recognizes the vehicle position inside which the driver who has been determined to be in the abnormal state is.

Vehicle traveling control apparatus

A driving assistance device is configured to perform deceleration control in such a way that a vehicle stops at a target position determined by a deceleration target ahead of the vehicle. The driving assistance device is configured to calculate a predicted vehicle speed of the vehicle at the target position when the deceleration control is performed, based on the current vehicle speed of the vehicle, the distance to the target position, and the deceleration that varies depending on the type of the deceleration target. When the predicted vehicle speed is higher than a predetermined value, the driving assistance device is configured not to perform the deceleration control or to reduce the deceleration in the deceleration control.

Driving assistance device

A driving assistance apparatus is provided with: a recognizer configured to recognize a surrounding situation of a host vehicle; a controller programmed to execute a deceleration assistance control of assisting in decelerating a host vehicle when a predetermined condition is satisfied; a determinator configured to determine whether or not the host vehicle is traveling on a roadway on the basis of the recognized surrounding situation; and a restraining device configured to restrain execution of the deceleration assistance control by a controller if it is determined that the host vehicle is not traveling on a roadway, in comparison with a situation in which it is determined that the host vehicle is traveling on a roadway.

Driving assistance apparatus

A stop line position estimation device includes a traffic signal recognition unit configured to recognize a traffic signal at an intersection ahead of a vehicle and a stop line position estimation unit configured to estimate that a position of the stop line is a position from the traffic signal by a first distance toward the vehicle side. When the traffic signal recognition unit recognizes a plurality of traffic signals and the stop line position estimation unit recognizes an immediate front traffic signal and a rear traffic signal based on a positional relationship between the traffic signals, the stop line position estimation unit estimates that the position of the stop line is a position from the immediate front traffic signal by a second distance toward the vehicle side. The second distance is shorter than the first distance.

Stop line position estimation device and vehicle control system

A vehicle travel control apparatus includes an anomaly monitoring section for determining, through monitoring, whether or not a driver is in an anomalous state in which the driver has lost his or her ability to drive the vehicle, and a deceleration section for automatically stopping the vehicle by decelerating the vehicle after a final anomaly determined time which is a point in time when the anomaly monitoring section finally determines that the driver is in the anomalous state. The deceleration section prohibits deceleration of the vehicle in the case where the deceleration section determines that the vehicle is present in the deceleration prohibited section after the final anomaly determination time.

A vehicle traveling control apparatus stops a vehicle when the driver is under the abnormal state that the driver loses an ability of driving the vehicle, and then performs a stopped state maintaining control to maintain the vehicle at the stopped state. The control apparatus forbids a termination of the stopped state maintaining control if the acceleration pedal operation amount is equal to or greater than a threshold value greater than zero when the termination of the stopped state maintaining control is requested.

A driver is prevented from carrying out hands-free driving while lane keeping assist control is being carried out, thereby appropriately determining an abnormal state of the driver. When a steering wheel no-operation state continues for a first period or more, a driving support ECU sets a control mode of LKA to a 'weaker mode', thereby decreasing a control amount of the LKA. As a result, an own vehicle swerves within a travel lane, and the driver neglecting the steering wheel operation can be prompted to operate the steering wheel. Further, when the no-driving operation state continues for a second period or more, the driving support ECU establishes determination that the driver is in an abnormal state, returns the LKA to a 'normal mode', and decelerates and stops the own vehicle.

Vehicle control device

Driving support ECU sets a driver's state to 'temporarily abnormal' and decelerates a vehicle when a driver of the vehicle has been first determined to be in an abnormal state where the driver loses an ability to drive the vehicle. Driving support ECU changes the driver's state to 'regularly abnormal' in a case when the abnormal state of the driver remains unchanged when a vehicle speed decreases to a set vehicle speed, and at this point, reports to a help net center HNC. With this configuration, a report to the help net center HNC can be made at an appropriate timing.

Driving support ECU determines that a driver is in an abnormal state when a state where a steering amount correlation value which changes when a steering wheel SW of a vehicle is operated does not change continues over more than or equal to an abnormality determination threshold time. When the driver is determined to be in the abnormal state, the ECU decelerates the vehicle, makes a hazard lamp blink and invalidates an acceleration request based on a change in an operation amount of an accelerator pedal. The ECU terminates decelerating of the vehicle and permits the acceleration override when a specific driving operation (an operation that the accelerator pedal changes from an operating state to a non-operating state and then again changes to the operating state within a predetermined threshold time) is determined to have occurred after the driver has been determined to be in the abnormal state.

Vehicle control apparatus

An electrostatic steering wheel hold detection device includes: a first heater element located in a steering wheel, and has one end electrically connected to a power source; an inductor&#x2014;that is electrically connected to an other end of the first heater element; a second heater element that is included in the steering wheel, and has one end electrically connected to the other end of the first heater element via the inductor; and a sensor circuit that is electrically connected to a connection point between the first heater element and the inductor, and detects, from a change in capacitance at the connection point, whether or not the steering wheel is held. An other end of the second heater element is electrically connected to a ground. The second heater element is located lower than the first heater element in the steering wheel when the steering wheel is in a neutral position.

Electrostatic steering wheel hold detection device

A vehicle traveling control apparatus of the invention stops a vehicle by causing a braking force applying device to apply a braking force to the vehicle after determining that a driver is under an abnormal state. When a stop of a control for maintaining a vehicle at a stopped state is requested while a shift lever is set at a range other than parking and neutral ranges, the apparatus limits a driving force requested for a driving force supplying device to supply to drive wheels, to a value smaller than a driver's requesting driving force.

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Susono, Japan

Hirotada Otake