Honda Giken Kogyo Kabushiki Kaisha

Kouji Sasajima

Kiyohide Nagase

Takamichi Shimada

Kouji Yamaguchi

Yoshikazu Ishikawa

Takashi Kuribayashi

Takao Kurosawa

Makoto Murata

A vehicle including a variable gear ratio steering device and an electric power steering apparatus is disclosed. The variable gear ratio steering device influences on a steering system of the vehicle and varies a ratio of a steering angle of steerable road wheels to a steering wheel angle by driving an electric motor in accordance with a vehicle speed. The electric power steering apparatus influences on the steering system of the vehicle and provides an assist steering wheel torque by driving an electric motor in accordance with a manual steering wheel torque. The vehicle comprises a power supply voltage detector for detecting a voltage of a power supply, and a control unit for controlling the electric motor of said variable gear ratio steering device in accordance with the detected voltage. When the detected voltage decreases to a certain voltage or lower, the control unit brings the variable gear ratio steering device into a slow state and thereafter stops the same.

Vehicle including a variable gear ratio steering device and an electric power steering apparatus

A vehicle sliding door opening/closing control device includes a trouble detecting circuit for detecting a trouble in a control unit which is used for controlling operation of a motor to drive a vehicle sliding door in opening and closing direction, and switching unit responsive to detection of a trouble in the control unit by the trouble detecting circuit for shorting power input terminals of the motor, and after the lapse of a predetermined time, opening the power input terminals of the motor. Upon detection of the trouble in the control unit, the power input terminals of the motor are shorted so that the motor is kept in a locked state. In this instance, if the sliding door is moving at a high speed, it is possible to apply braking to the sliding door. Thereafter, after the lapse of the predetermined time, the switching unit opens the power input terminals of the motor to release a lock on the motor, thereby allowing the sliding door to be displaced by manual.

Vehicle sliding door opening/closing control device

A vehicle sliding door opening/closing control device comprises a control unit for outputting a standby signal and shifting into a standby mode when for a predetermined time there has been no user-operation input for causing a vehicle sliding door driven by a motor to be open/close-driven and shifting into an operating mode and performing control of the motor when there has been a user-operation input and a switch unit for shorting power input terminals of the motor on the basis of the standby signal. When there has been no user-operation input for causing the sliding door to be open/close-driven for a predetermined time, by shifting into a standby mode the power consumption of the control unit can be kept small and as a result it is possible to suppress the battery power consumption of the control unit. Also, in the standby mode, by shorting the power input terminals of the motor it is possible to keep the motor in a locked state and thereby apply braking to the sliding door. Therefore, when the vehicle has been stopped or parked on sloping ground such as an upward slope or a downward slope, it is possible to prevent the sliding door from starting to move under its own weight when it is half-open.

A vehicle door operating apparatus includes a torque sensor or detecting torque applied to a knob of a vehicle door, a velocity sensor for detecting a moving velocity of the vehicle door, and a controller unit. The controller unit modifies a target current signal, corresponding to the detected torque, on the basis of an acceleration coefficient corresponding to an acceleration signal calculated from the moving velocity and a velocity coefficient corresponding to the moving velocity, to thereby generate a modified current signal. The apparatus provides a power assist to a opening/closing movement of the vehicle door, using the modified current signal. That is, the vehicle door operating apparatus generates a modified current signal on the basis of the target current signal corresponding to the detected torque, acceleration coefficient corresponding to the acceleration signal and velocity coefficient corresponding to the velocity signal, and drives a power-assist imparting electric motor on the basis of the modified current signal.

Vehicle door operating apparatus

An opening/closing device for an automobile door comprising a speed sensor for detecting a moving speed of a door, a motor for applying an opening/closing assisting force to the door, and a control unit for controlling the driving of the motor, is provided. The control unit includes an acceleration computing unit for differentiating speed signals supplied from the speed sensor to compute accelerations and output acceleration signals and a control variable setting unit for setting control variables of the motor based on acceleration signals from the acceleration computing unit. Thereby, even if a torque sensor for detecting the operating force of a person operating the door is omitted, it is possible to generate control variables corresponding to acceleration signals which are equivalent to control variables corresponding to torque to drive the motor.

Opening/closing device for automobile door

A control system for controlling the throttle opening of an engine of an automobile has a stepping motor for actuating a throttle valve disposed in an intake passage of the engine to control the throttle opening, an accelerator operation detecting unit for detecting the amount of operation of an accelerator pedal operated on by the driver of the automobile, an engine operating condition detecting unit for detecting an operating condition of the engine, and a controller for controlling the stepping motor based on detected values from the accelerator operation detecting unit and the engine operating condition detecting unit.

Throttle opening control system for automotive engine

A vehicle engine throttle valve control apparatus whereby the actuation position of an accelerator pedal, the degree of opening of the throttle valve, and the position of the vehicle gear shift are detected. One of a plurality of different throttle valve target opening degree characteristics is then selected which corresponds to the current gear shift position, and the selected characteristic is used to set a target degree of opening for the throttle valve in accordance with the accelerator pedal position. The throttle valve is driven so as to make the actual degree of throttle opening become equal to the target value. Appropriate throttle control is thereby automatically performed each time a gear shift operation is executed, without intervention by the vehicle driver.

Growing community of inventors

Wako, Japan

Kouji Sasajima