Denso Corporation

Denso Corpora Tion

So-ken Corporation

Yu Koyama

Tetsuya Aoyama

Mitsuyasu Matsuura

Satoru Noro

Taketo Harada

Takuya Nomura

Hideki Otsuka

Masayoshi Satake

Takafumi Nishi

Kohei Kozuki

Masayoshi Ooishi

Yohei Suzuki

Syoya Ishida

Dai Kondou

Dai Kondo

Masaya Takatsuji

Youhei Suzuki

Hideki Ootsuka

Sakiko Nishino

Mitsumasa Miyazaki

An object detection device includes a transceiver configured to transmit/receive an ultrasonic wave; a drive signal generation unit configured to generate a drive signal for driving the transceiver; a transmitter circuit configured to cause the transceiver to transmit a probe wave, which is an ultrasonic wave, by driving the transceiver based on the drive signal; and a receiver circuit configured to generate a reception signal corresponding to a reception result of the ultrasonic wave of the transceiver, wherein the drive signal generation unit is configured to generate the drive signal so that frequency of the probe wave changes over time. The device further includes: a voltage measurement unit configured to measure a voltage signal generated in the transceiver while the transceiver transmits the probe wave with frequency changing over time; and a state determination unit configured to make a state determination regarding the transceiver based on the voltage signal.

Object detection device

An ultrasonic sensor installable to a vehicle includes a magnetic body capable of ultrasonic vibration and an electric-magnetic converter having a conversion function between an oscillating magnetic field corresponding to the ultrasonic vibration of the magnetic body and an electric signal. The magnetic body is located on an outer surface side of an outer plate of the vehicle, which is the surface facing an external space of the vehicle. The electric-magnetic converter is located to face the magnetic body with the outer plate interposed therebetween on an inner surface side, which is a back surface of the outer surface of the outer plate.

Ultrasonic sensor

An object detection device includes a signal generation unit, a drive unit, an object determination unit, and a drive control unit. The signal generation unit generates at least one pulse signal that includes an identification code for identifying the ultrasonic wave. The drive unit drives the wave transceiver unit using a current or a voltage according to the at least one pulse signal. The object determination unit compares a code included in the received ultrasonic wave with the identification code and determines whether the received ultrasonic wave is a wave resulting from reflection of the ultrasonic wave transmitted by the wave transceiver unit, and determines whether an object is present in a predetermined detection range based on the amplitude of the received ultrasonic wave. The drive control unit reduces the current or the voltage used by the drive unit when a predetermined amplitude rise time has elapsed.

An ultrasonic sensor (), that transmits probe waves which are ultrasonic waves and acquires detection waves including reflected waves which have been reflected from surrounding objects, includes a transmitter/receiver () that transmits the probe waves and acquires the detection waves, a detection wave processing section () that executes processing for passing a predetermined frequency band which includes the frequency of the probe waves, an amplitude measurement section () which measures the amplitude of the detection waves, and a judgement section () which judges whether there is adherence of foreign matter on the transmitter/receiver, based on a relationship between a time axis and values of the amplitude of the detection waves during a reverberation interval following the termination of transmitting the probe waves.

An object detection device includes: a transceiver having a predetermined resonance frequency; a driving signal generation unit generating a driving signal having a driving frequency different from the resonance frequency for driving the transceiver; a filter extracting and outputting at least one received signal from received signals of the transceiver; and a detection determination unit performing object detection determination based on the extracted at least one received signal. The received signals include a first and second received signals, the first received signal having a frequency that has been shifted from the driving frequency to the resonance frequency; and the filter has a characteristic that: when extracting the first received signal, outputs the extracted first received signal as a first output signal, and when extracting the second received signal, outputs the extracted second received signal as a second output signal, the first output signal being greater than the second output signal.

An object detection device includes a drive signal generation unit provided to generate a drive signal for driving a transmitter configured to transmit a search wave to the outside, and a control unit provided to control output of the drive signal from the drive signal generation unit to the transmitter. The drive signal generation unit generates a first drive signal corresponding to a first search wave and a second drive signal corresponding to a second search wave having an encoding scheme that is different from the encoding scheme of the first search wave. The control unit causes the drive signal generation unit to output the first drive signal and the second drive signal to the transmitter at different timings so that one of the first and second search waves is transmitted in a transmission interval between transmissions of the other search wave.

An object detection device for detecting an object by transmitting and receiving ultrasonic waves, includes a transmitter that transmits an ultrasonic wave, two or more receivers, each of which receives an ultrasonic wave and outputs an reception signal according to the received ultrasonic wave, a comparator that compares the plurality of reception signals output from the two or more receivers and calculates a degree of similarity between the plurality of reception signals, and a determiner that makes a determination as to whether there is an object to be detected, based on the degree of similarity.

An object detection apparatus detects an object in a vicinity of a moving body to which it is mounted. In the object detection apparatus, first drive signal and second drive signals for driving a transmitting unit are generated and outputted to the transmitting unit. The first drive signal corresponds to a first transmission wave included in a plurality of transmission waves that are continuously transmitted from a start to an end of a transmission process of the transmission wave, and respectively encoded based on waveform patterns. The second drive signal corresponds to a second transmission wave included in the plurality of transmission waves and transmitted after the first transmission wave. Reception determination regarding the reflected wave is performed based on a frequency signal, corresponding to a waveform pattern of the reception signal, and a reference signal that corresponds to a waveform pattern of the first drive signal.

Object detection apparatus and object detection method

In an object detection device, a signal generation unit generates a drive signal, a transmission unit transmits an ultrasonic wave as a search wave in response to the input drive signal, and a reception unit receives an ultrasonic wave to generate a received signal. A judging unit performs object detection determination based on the received signal. The drive signal has at least two frequencies, and the judging unit extracts at least two amplitudes corresponding to the at least two frequencies from the received signal, and performs determination based on a relationship between the at least two amplitudes.

An object detection device includes a drive signal generator that generates a drive signal including frequency modulation, a first correlation filter that performs correlation detection between the reception signal and a first reference signal corresponding to the drive signal, a first determiner that determines, based on the correlation signal from the first correlation filter, whether the reception signal is a reflected wave of the probe wave transmitted from the transmitter, a second correlation filter that performs correlation detection between the reception signal and a second reference signal corresponding to a portion of the drive signal, a third correlation filter that performs correlation detection between the reception signal and a third reference signal corresponding to another portion of the drive signal having higher frequencies than the second reference signal, and a second determiner that determines whether there is an object within a detection region based on correlation signals from the second and third correlation filters.

An object detection device includes a transceiver that transmits ultrasonic waves encoded with frequency modulation and receives an ultrasonic wave and outputs a reception signal, a first quadrature detector that generates and outputs a complex reception signal based on quadrature detection of the reception signal, a second quadrature detector that generates and outputs a complex reference signal based on quadrature detection of the reference signal, a correlation filter that performs correlation detection between the complex reception signal and the complex reference signal and outputs a correlation signal, and a code determiner that determines a code included in the reception signal based on the correlation signal.

An apparatus includes a drive signal generator that selectively outputs, as a drive signal, one of a first drive signal and a second drive signal. The first drive signal has a first temporal frequency change within a first frequency band that is defined from a first lowest frequency to a first highest frequency inclusive. The second drive signal has a second temporal frequency change within a second frequency band that is defined from a second lowest frequency to a second highest frequency inclusive. Each of the first and second frequency bands has a corresponding one of first and second intermediate frequencies that is defined as one of a center frequency and an average frequency of the corresponding one of the first and second frequency bands. The second intermediate frequency is different from the first intermediate frequency. The second frequency band is partially overlapped with the first frequency band.

Method and apparatus for detecting object

An object detection device that detects a corner of an object includes: a transmitter that transmits a search wave; receivers that receive a reflected wave reflected off the corner. The device determines a first path length of the search wave from the transmitter to a first receiver, and uses the positions of the transmitter and the first receiver as focal points to find a first ellipse whose distances from the transmitter and the first receiver add up to the first path length. The device determines a second path length of the search wave from the transmitter to a second receiver, and uses the positions of the transmitter and the second receiver as focal points to find a second ellipse whose distances from the transmitter and the second receiver add up to the second path length. The device finds an intersection point between the first and second ellipses as the corner.

Three-dimensional object detection device

An object detecting apparatus is configured to detect a surrounding object. The object detecting apparatus is provided with a driving signal generation unit provided to generate a driving signal that drives a transmitter unit including a transmitter emitting transmission waves externally; and a control unit provided to control an output of the driving signal transmitted to the transmitter unit from the driving signal generation unit. The driving signal generation unit is configured to generate the driving signal of which the frequency changes stepwise.

Object detecting apparatus

In a drive device for driving an ultrasonic transmitter, a drive signal generating unit generates a drive signal for driving the ultrasonic transmitter, based on a base signal having a plurality of unit frequency signals arranged in a time series, corresponding to respective codes forming a code sequence. When a first unit frequency signal and a second unit frequency signal chronologically adjacent to it are switched in a discontinuously switching state that is different from a continuously switching state where the first and second unit frequency signals are switched such that a target frequency for a transmission frequency changes continuously at a substantially constant rate, the drive signal generating unit shifts the frequency in at least a switching portion immediately after start of the second unit frequency signal, in a same direction as a direction of frequency change from the first unit frequency signal to the second unit frequency signal.

Growing community of inventors

Kariya, Japan

Yu Koyama