Robert Boschgmbh

Peter Rapps

Peter Knoll

Waldemar Ernst

Martin Noll

Meike Fehse

Ulrich Drews

Dieter Karr

Dirk Schmid

Albrecht Klotz

Winfried Konig

Micha Kalbhenn

Oliver Hartig

Peter Werner

Michael Schumann

Christian Ohl

Michael U Fischer

Herbert Arnold

Juergen Schirmer

Marcus Schneider

Tobias Kirchner

Klaus Streit

Nico Bannow

Michael Helmle

Wolfgang Ziegler

Thomas Walker

Michael Schneider

Karl Staiger

Michael Hering

Thomas Treptow

Michael Seiter

Dietmar Wannke

Hans Lubik

Bjoern Herder

Thomas Dittrich

Franz Pachner

Karl Gantenbrink

Thomas Walz

Peter Schenke

A driver assistance system of a vehicle includes: at least one ultrasonic sensor for ascertaining the distance of the vehicle from an obstacle, the sensor being supplied with electrical energy by an onboard electrical system of the vehicle; and an undervoltage detector for detecting an undervoltage in the onboard electrical system, in the event of which the power requirement of the ultrasonic sensor is reduced.

Increasing the availability of ultrasound-based driver assistance systems in the event of undervoltage in the vehicle

A method for acoustically sensing an area is described. An acoustic transmit pulse is transmitted into the area by an acoustic transducer and a received signal is acquired with the aid of the transducer, in order to receive the transmit pulse reflected back from the area. Within a post-pulse oscillation time of the transducer, which directly follows the emission of the transmit pulse, the actual phase response of the received signal is determined. In the event the actual phase response deviates from a predefined setpoint phase response, an object is detected within the area. Also described is a device for acoustically sensing an area, which is designed to carry out the method.

Method and device for acoustically sensing an area

An ultrasonic sensor having a diaphragm includes a heating element for heating the diaphragm.

Ultrasonic sensor

Provided is a diaphragm cup for an ultrasonic transducer having a hollow area for carrying a diaphragm, which is electroplated, preferably with a chrome coating.

Diaphragm cup for an ultrasonic transducer

In an ultrasonic sensor, including a housing having a plug connector, an ultrasonic converter, and a circuit board, the housing is divided into a support and a hood enclosing the support. The support carries the circuit board, the plug connector, and the ultrasonic converter.

Ultrasound sensor

An ultrasonic transducer having a pot-like casing has an outer bottom face which is designed in part as a vibrating diaphragm. A stabilizing ring is arranged on the outside of the wall of the pot-like casing, imparting a greater rigidity to the casing and limiting the ultrasonic vibration essentially to the bottom of the pot as a vibrating diaphragm. The propagation and reception beams of the ultrasonic waves can be shaped further by an additional arrangement of a sound directing device in the area of the vibrating diaphragm.

Ultrasonic transducer

An ultrasonic transducer has a pot-like housing with an annular wall and with a bottom surface serving as diaphragm. A piezo-element which is connected with connection lines is arranged at the inner side of the bottom surface. The edge remote of the bottom surface is surrounded by a decoupling ring which is formed as a holder for the connection lines.

An arrangement having a module for installation in a bumper of a motor vehicle and having a retaining part for attaching the module to the bumper. The retaining part, in this context, is fixedly attached on the interior side of the bumper blade, so that the module can be inserted from the interior side. Provision is made in the bumper for a corresponding bore, through which the head piece of the module can be plugged in until the surface is roughly flush with the exterior surface of the bumper. As the module, an ultrasonic sensor is preferably proposed, which can be used for measuring distance in a motor vehicle. Since only the head piece of the module is visible from the outside but not its attachment parts, the resulting appearance is particularly advantageous since it is not disruptive from a design point of view.

Modular device to be inserted into a vehicle bumper

Several exemplary embodiments for an ultrasound transducer are suggested, in which the sound propagation in the vertical plane is narrow-angled and in the horizontal plane wide-angled by means of appropriate damping measures. The effect on the propagation characteristic is achieved by means of the embodiment in accordance with the invention of the oscillating diaphragm and/or the housing, as well as multiple disposition of piezo oscillators. Because of these measures, damping of the sound waves or the sensitivity of the sensor is approximately the same over the entire horizontal angle up to almost 180.degree..

A system of navigation for vehicles is proposed, which is provided with a device (14) for representing a road map as well as with a composite navigation apparatus (10, 11, 12) for the continuous instantaneous determination of the location of the vehicle and with a location display (16) on the representation of the road map. Deviations of the location from the course of the roads on the road map are detected and corrected. In order to be able to input a desired trip route (21) into the navigation system without an additional representation of the road map, prior to the beginning of the trip the desired trip route is traced by hand, using an input device (17, 18) connected to a trip route memory, with a wand (19) on the existing representation (14) of the road map, and thereby stored in the trip route memory (13). (Fig. 1).

System of navigation for vehicles

A process for determining navigation data from a map wherein a line code lattice is superposed on the map and scanned by a sensor. The crossing line codes in the lattice differ one from the other.

Process for picking up navigation data

To prevent parallax distortion, and to simplify application of masking patterns, particularly for LCD units, the mask is applied to the front-, or back-plate electrode at the side facing the liquid crystal, and opposite the interrupted, or etched front-plate electrode on the back support plate. Suitable methods are printing, particularly with a coarse or rough grain lacquer varnish or ink, the projections of the coarse grain forming the microspacers between said plates and for retaining the liquid crystal medium; other methods are galvanic deposition on the continuous electrode, and selected exposure of photographic emulsions, particularly color emulsions so that, with multi-color emulsions, multi-color effects can be obtained although only a single thickness of emulsion layer is applied.

Internal masking layer to prevent parallax in an electro-optical display

The disturbing residual transmission of a liquid crystal display device which is particularly noticeable in negative contrast devices is reduced by reference to the fact that the residual transmission is colored. The entire display surface of the liquid crystal device is provided with a transparent covering of a color complementary to the residual transmission color when the liquid crystal is not turned on. The transparent colored covering can be applied by printing as well as otherwise. In another embodiment, color shifts between turned-on and not turned-on displays are counteracted by mixing into the liquid crystal material a dichroic coloring material which has much lower absorption when the display is turned on. A light blue dichroic coloring material is suitable for LCDs which have residual transmission in the red region.

Method of making color-neutral LCD indicators of low residual

An air flow rate meter in an internal combustion engine which functions on the principle of a constant-temperature anemometer is proposed. The device includes a resistance measurement bridge with a regulatable total bridge current, and the relative orientation between the bridge diagonal voltage and the input voltage of a subsequent amplifier is variable. By means of this variation, an adjustment can be made of the set-point and actual curves of the air flow rate meter. In accordance with a first exemplary embodiment, a supplementary current is supplied to one of the connecting lines of the bridge diagonal and the amplifier; in accordance with a second exemplary embodiment, a voltage divider is located between the bridge diagonal points, and one of the voltage divider resistors is connected parallel to an amplifier having a specific offset voltage.

Air flow rate meter for an internal combustion engine

An electrically controlled fuel metering system having an air flow rate meter device in the air intake tube and a subsequent linearizing circuit layout is proposed. The linearizing circuit layout functions in accordance with the point-slope method and is embodied as a voltage-to-current converter. A first exemplary embodiment of the linearizing circuit layout has transistors coupled with one another respectively at the base and collector sides, the emitters of which are connected with different potentials and are triggered on the base side. In a second exemplary embodiment, individual transistors or transistors which are combined into groups receive their trigger signal via separate amplifiers, while the collectors in turn are carried to a common output point and the emitters likewise have different signal levels. Because of its relatively simple design, the proposed embodiments are particularly well suited to the purposes of integration.

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Karlsruhe, Germany

Peter Rapps