The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Aug. 08, 1995
Filed:
Dec. 05, 1994
Charles E Steffens, Jr, Washington, MI (US);
Thomas H Vos, Rochester, MI (US);
Scott B Gentry, Romeo, MI (US);
Joseph F Mazur, Washington, MI (US);
Brian K Blackburn, Rochester, MI (US);
TRW Vehicle Safety Systems Inc., Lyndhurst, OH (US);
Abstract
A vehicle occupant restraint system (10) comprises a vehicle seat (12) including a seat bottom (14), a seat back (16), and an occupant position sensor (20) mounted in the seat back. The occupant position sensor is located about sixteen inches above a flat plane (99) of the seat bottom of the vehicle seat and below a head rest (11) of the vehicle seat. The seat back of the vehicle seat includes foam material (40) to which the occupant position sensor is secured. The seat back of the vehicle seat also includes fabric material (41) which covers the occupant position sensor secured to the foam material. The fabric material and the foam material of the seat back cooperate to protect the occupant position sensor and hide the occupant position sensor from view. The occupant position sensor senses the position of an occupant in the vehicle seat and provides a position signal (21) functionally related to the position of the occupant in the vehicle seat. An occupant restraint (17) actuates in response to a deceleration signal (31) indicative of sudden vehicle deceleration above a predetermined threshold such as occurs in a vehicle collision. When actuated, the occupant restraint restrains the occupant in the vehicle seat. The operation of the occupant restraint is controlled as a function of the position signal from the occupant position sensor.