Mitsubishi Denki Kabushiki Kaisha

Mitsubishi Denki Kabushiki Kasiha

Kohji Hashimoto

Katsuya Nakamoto

Yuki Iwagami

Manabu Yamashita

Hiroshi Gokan

Akihiro Ishii

Mitsuhiro Kitta

Junya Tanaka

Shozo Kanzaki

Shoso Tsunekazu

Masahiko Sayama

Masahide Fujita

Hiroyuki Mitsueda

Tetsushi Watanabe

Masahiko Nomura

Masaki Nakamichi

Masaharu Yuhara

Yasuhiko Kannan

A vehicle-mounted electronic control apparatus can perform a variety of abnormality detections while reducing the control load of a microprocessor in the abnormality detection of a volatile backup memory that is backed up by an on-board battery. The apparatus includes a control CPU which is fed with power from a main power supply circuit upon closure of a power switch, a nonvolatile control memory and a backup memory. Even if the power switch is opened, the backup memory, being a partial area of a RAM memory, is fed with power through an auxiliary power supply circuit connected directly to the battery. When the battery is replaced with a new one and connected again, a power supply interruption monitoring memory is reset. At the start of operation of the control CPU, the backup memory is initialized based on reset information, and the power supply interruption monitoring memory is rewritten into a set state.

Vehicle-mounted electronic control apparatus

The constant voltage power source circuit which generates a predetermined constant voltage output Vcc by the use of power supplied from an in-vehicle battery via a power switch has a power transistor and an output voltage adjustment circuit. The output voltage adjustment circuit has a reference voltage generation circuit, a comparison amplification circuit, a resistance circuit network, and a nonvolatile second data memory selecting any of a plurality of on/off elements provided in the resistance circuit network and producing electric continuity of the selected on/off element. The constant voltage output Vcc is measured by an externally connected high accuracy voltmeter in the dispatch adjustment stage to be read out and stored via a serially connected external tool. Output voltage correction data are stored in the second data memory in such a manner as to set the external measurement voltage as a target voltage.

In-vehicle electronic control device

A constant-voltage power supply circuit unit that is fed from a vehicle-borne battery via a power switch and generates a predetermined constant-voltage output Vcc includes a power transistor and an output voltage regulating circuit unit. The output voltage regulating circuit unit includes a reference voltage generating circuit, a comparison amplifying circuit, a resistance circuit network, a non-volatile second data memory that selectively continues plural open/close elements provided in the resistance circuit network, and a temperature detector. The quantity of variation of output voltage with respect to ambient temperature detected by the temperature detector is estimated, and a setting voltage is corrected to be approximate to a predetermined output voltage, or conversion correction of AD conversion data is performed on the basis of voltage variation characteristics of an analog sensor.

Vehicle-borne electronic control device

A first control circuit portion carries out input/output control in cooperation with a microprocessor, a program memory, and a RAM memory. A second control circuit portion is in cooperation with the communication control circuit portion and the data memory to carry out serial communication with the first control circuit portion. A switch signal input to the second control circuit portion is stored in a first report packet, a digital conversion value for an analog signal input is stored in a second report packet, and the first and second packets are alternately periodically transmitted to the first control circuit portion. A multi-channel AD converter included in an analog signal input circuit starts to carry out AD conversion a prescribed time period after a first report packet is transmitted and finishes conversion before a second report packet is transmitted, so that up-to-date AD conversion data is transmitted.

In-vehicle electronic control unit

A microprocessor of an on-vehicle electronic control unit controls an on-vehicle current consumer group responsive to input signals of on-vehicle sensor groups based on control program, fixed control constant and semi-fixed control constant respectively stored in first block of a no-volatile memory, and variable control constant having been transferred from second block of the no-volatile memory to RAM memory; and content of RAM memory is learned and compensated during operation. When power supply switch is OFF, contents of the RAM memory are sequentially added to and written in the second block. When the second block is filled up to capacity, batch clear is executed and, thereafter, the latest data is written. Thus, a flash memory divided into the first and second blocks capable of executing batch clear separately is employed as a non-volatile memory, enabling to perform save processing many times with small number of times of batch clear.

On-vehicle electronic control unit

A first control circuit section (master station) and a second control circuit section (substation) communicate with each other via series-parallel converters. The master station includes regular transmission device and transmission-permitting signal generation device; and the sub station includes regular report device, confirmation reply device relative to a transmission data from the master station, and an unprocessed data table. The unprocessed data table prevents jam-up in upstream communication from the sub station to the master station, enabling to carry out timely regular transmission and regular reporting. Transmission from the sub station to the master station is performed based on a transmission-permitting control signal that the master station generates. Consequently, it is possible to execute communication error processing and diminish communication control burden on the master station while properly performing the regular transmission and regular report between the master station and sub station.

Electronic control unit

In an electronic control unit, a control constant stored in a program memory is transmitted to a data memory via a serial communication circuit. First control circuit section (master station) and second control circuit section (substation) mutually communicate through series-parallel converters. The master station includes regular transmission device and storage constant confirmation processing device. The substation includes regular report device and confirmation reply device to a data transmitted from the master station. A constant set data transmitted from the master station by regular transmission device is stored in the data memory at the time of normal receiving. Confirmation information such as sum value of the entire data in the data memory is reported by regular report device. At the master station, if there is any error in the confirmation information, a constant set data is retransmitted with regular transmission device. Reliability of data in the data memory is improved.

First and second control circuit sections that mutually communicate via a series-parallel converter comprise first and second adder-subtracter respectively. When any receiving error occurs in each control circuit section, a variation valueis added to the adder-subtracter on the receiving side. When data is normally received, a variation valueis subtracted from the adder-subtracter. Initial value of the adder-subtracter is set to 9. When a current value exceeds 11, first and second error detection signal is generated to carry out alarm display or initialization, and initialization and restart of the other-side control circuit section.

An on-vehicle electronic control device includes an auxiliary microprocessor and subjects a microprocessor allocated to a main part of control to an external diagnosis, thereby improving reliability of performance. A microprocessor including a nonvolatile program memory into which a control program is written is serially connected to an auxiliary microprocessor including an auxiliary nonvolatile program memory. The microprocessor and the auxiliary microprocessor function in cooperation to control on-vehicle electric load groups in response to input signals from on-vehicle sensor groups and on-vehicle analog sensor group. The nonvolatile program memory and the microprocessor are subjected to runaway monitoring performed by a watchdog timer and to an external checksum diagnosis performed periodically by the auxiliary microprocessor. If an anomaly occurs in the runaway monitoring, the external checksum diagnosis, and a checksum interval, parts of electric loads are cut off of power supply by load power relay.

On-vehicle electronic control device

An electronic control unit includes a serial communication circuit capable of easily confirming presence or absence of communication error while regular transmission/regular report between master station and sub station are performed timely. First and second control circuit sections(master station) and(substation) communicate mutually via series-parallel converters. The master station includes regular transmission deviceand irregular transmission device. The substation includes regular report device, confirmation reply deviceand report reply devicerelative to transmission data from the master station, and unprocessed data table. The confirmation reply deviceand report reply deviceconfirm whether or not downstream communication from the master station to sub station is normal. When any error is present in regular report data through upstream communication, the error is confirmed on the fact the irregular transmission devicemakes retransmission readout request.

A voltage generated by a variable analog signal source is input to first and second input terminals of a multi-channel A/D converter via an analog signal input circuit including an analog switch and first and second amplifiers, and a resulting digital conversion value is written to a data memory via a microprocessor. Digital conversion values corresponding to voltages at the first and second input terminals that are obtained when the analog switch is opened are stored as first and second error voltages and used for producing first and second correction voltages, respectively. When the input voltage is low, a value obtained by dividing, by a compensation gain, a second correction voltage corresponding to a second input voltage that is produced by the second amplifier and input to the second input terminal as an enlarged range input terminal is selected.

Vehicular electronic control unit

Intake throttle valvestodisposed on the intake pipestofor each cylinder of a multi-cylinder engineare provided with motorstofor controlling valve opening of the intake throttle valves. The microprocessorcontrols throttle valve opening in response to a degree of stepping on an accelerator pedalin cooperation with a program memoryA. The control of valve opening by each motor is sequentially subject to time division processing in the exhaust stroke of each cylinder, and a current valve opening is stored and held by a feedback control circuit sectionB,C in the other strokes, thereby the control burden on the microprocessor being reduced.

Electronic throttle control device

A microprocessorcontrols an electrical load groupresponsive to content of a non-volatile program memoryand operation state of an input sensor groupA monitoring control circuit sectionsequentially transmits a large number of question items with an inquiry packet, and compares response content from the microprocessorwith correct answer information to carry out an error determination. The microprocessordiagnoses an interval of receiving an inquiry packet to monitor in reverse the monitoring operation of the monitoring control circuit section. Thus, in an electronic control unit having a microprocessor built-in, a monitoring control circuit is obtained that alternatively executes at regular intervals a part of control programs to carry out operation inspection during operation.

Electronic control unit including monitoring control circuit

In an on-vehicle electronic control unit, error in output voltages from a constant voltage power supply circuit (C.V.P.S.) for use in a reference power supply of an A/D converter, occurs due to temperature rise. Whereby, there is a problem of the decrease of an A/D conversion accuracy. A C.V.P.S. supplies a voltage to analog sensors and to an AD converter. Furthermore, an output from a temperature sensor that is disposed in the neighborhood of the C.V.P.S. is stored in a memory as a contrast temperature data T at a time point of shipping. In addition, voltage fluctuation characteristic data due to the change of temperatures of the C.V.P.S. and detection fluctuation characteristic data accompanied by the change of voltages of the analog sensor group have preliminarily been stored, and the fluctuations in digital converted values accompanied with the change of temperatures in the neighborhood of the C.V.P.S. are compensated.

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Tokyo, Japan

Kohji Hashimoto