Toyota Jidosha Kabushiki Kaisha

Masahiko Maeda

Hideaki Yaguchi

Kunihiko Jinno

Tadashi Nakagawa

In a hybrid vehicle, when the ECO switchis turned on, Step Sdetermines whether or not a driving state is an economy driving state based on an ECO mode driving state determination map having a tendency not to regard the driving state as the economy driving state in comparison with a normal driving state determination map. A determination result of Step Sis displayed on a meter display unitin the form of an illumination or an extinction of an ECO markso as to inform the driving state is the economy driving state or not (Step S).

Vehicle and control method thereof

When determined that a driver's accelerator operation is rough during the turn-on condition of an ECO switchwhile a hybrid vehicleis driven without an operation of an engine(Step S), a threshold value Pref with respect to a power demand P* is set to a value Pthat is larger than a value Pof the turn-off condition of the ECO switchso as to give priority to fuel consumption of the engine(Step S). Then, the engine, motors MGand MGare controlled with a start of the engineas necessary so as to ensure torque equivalent to a torque demand Tr* (Steps S-S).

Hybrid vehicle and control method thereof

In a hybrid vehicle, when an ECO switchis 'on' when a brake demand operation is performed by a driver, a target regeneration distribution rate d is set using an ECO mode regeneration distribution rate setting map that gives priority to energy efficiency in comparison to a normal regeneration distribution rate setting map that is used when the ECO switchis 'off' and a braking force demand BF* that is based on the brake demand operation of the driver (S), and a motor MGand a brake unitare controlled so that the braking force demand BF* is obtained based on the target regeneration distribution rate d (Sto S).

In a hybrid vehicle, an engine, motors MGand MGare controlled so that the engineis operated at a target operation point set at Stepbased on a torque demand Tr* and the motor MGoutputs lower power for driving in comparison with a turn-off condition of an ECO switchwhen the ECO switchis turned on upon driving with power from both the engineand the motor MG(Steps S-Sand S-S).

In a hybrid vehicle, when the ECO switchis turned on, an intermittent permissive ceiling speed Vref for permitting an intermittent operation of an engineis set to a second vehicle speed more than a first vehicle speed used on a turn-off condition of the ECO switch(S). The engineand a motor MGare controlled so that a driving power equivalent to a torque demand Tr* is ensured with the intermittent operation of the enginewhen a vehicle speed V is not more than the intermittent permissive ceiling speed Vref (S,S,S-S).

In a hybrid vehicle, when an ECO switchis turned off while an intermittent operation of an engineis prohibited in response to a warm-up demand of the engineaccording to a cooling water temperature Tw or a heating demand, the engineis autonomously operated at a target rotational speed Ne* derived and set from a normal autonomous rotational speed setting map (Steps, S). When the ECO switchis turned on while the warm-up is demanded, the engineis autonomously operated at the target rotational speed Ne* set based on an ECO mode autonomous rotational speed setting map so as to be not more than the value derived from the normal autonomous rotational speed setting map (Steps, S).

Growing community of inventors

Nagoya, Japan

Masahiko Maeda