Electrical transmission or interconnection systems – Vehicle mounted systems – Automobile
Reexamination Certificate
2000-07-31
2002-11-05
Fleming, Fritz (Department: 2836)
Electrical transmission or interconnection systems
Vehicle mounted systems
Automobile
C307S009100, C307S010100
Reexamination Certificate
active
06476517
ABSTRACT:
This application is based on Japanese Patent Application Nos. 11-241357 filed Aug. 27, 1999 and 2000-141404 filed May 15, 2000, the contents of which are incorporated hereinto by reference.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates in general to a control system for controlling a state of a vehicle such as an automobile running on a roadway, an electric railcar running on rails, a tramcar, a ship and an airplane, and more particularly to an automatically operated and controlled door-locking system of such a vehicle, which is adapted to automatically lock at least one door of the vehicle in its closed position.
2. Discussion of Related Art
There is known an automatically door-locking system for automatically locking a door of an automotive vehicle in its closed position. This door-locking system is provided with a power-operated locking device including a power source and an actuator operable by the power source to selectively place the closed door in its locked or unlocked state. The door-locking system, which is provided on an automotive vehicle as a vehicle, is considered to be a control system adapted to control the operating state of the power-operated locking device, as a state of the vehicle. Therefore, the door-locking system may be considered as a vehicle state control system for controlling a state of a vehicle.
An example of such a door-locking-device control system for a vehicle is disclosed in JP-A-62-37479. This door-locking-device control system includes (1) a door-closure detecting device operable to detect that a door of the vehicle is operated from an open position thereof to a closed position thereof, (2) a communication device operable to communicate with a portable unit to be carried by the vehicle operator, while the portable unit is located within a predetermined distance from the vehicle, the communication device including an identifier-signal requesting device and a signal-receiving device, the identifier-signal requesting device being operable upon detection of the closed position of the door by the door-closure detecting device, to transmit to the portable unit a request signal which requests the portable unit to transmit back to the signal-receiving device an identifier signal representative of an identifier identifying the portable unit, the signal-receiving device being operable to receive the identifier signal, and (3) a locking-device controller operable when the identifier represented by the identifier signal received by the signal-receiving device matches an identifier of the vehicle, to operate the power-operated locking device of the door-locking system to lock the door in the closed position.
The door-locking device control system disclosed in the above-identified publication JP-A-62-37479 is arranged such that the identifier-signal requesting device is operated to transmit to the portable unit the request signal requesting the portable unit to transmit the identifier signal, when the door is brought into its closed position. This arrangement is based on a relatively high probability that the vehicle operator has left or got off the vehicle, when the door has been closed. Where the identifier represented by the identifier signal received by the signal-receiving device from the portable unit matches the identifier of the vehicle per se, the locking-device controller is operated to operate the power-operated locking device to lock the door in the closed position. However, the locking-device controller is adapted to operate the power-operated locking device only when the portable unit is moved apart from the vehicle by a distance larger than the above-indicated predetermined distance, that is, only when the communication device has become incapable of communicating with the portable unit. The identifier-signal requesting device of the communication device is arranged to transmit the request signal intermittently at a certain time interval after the door has been brought into its closed state. The fact that the communication device has become incapable of communicating with the portable unit is an indication that the portable unit is located at a position which is apart from the vehicle by a distance more than the predetermined distance within which the communication with the communication device is available. Based on this fact, the power-operated locking device is operated to lock the closed door in the closed position.
In the automatically controlled door-locking system for an automotive vehicle described above, the door is not locked in the closed position if the signal-receiving device of the communication device does not receive any identifier signal from the portable unit, that is, if the locking-device controller does not confirm that the received identifier identifying the portable unit identifies the vehicle per se. This may happen, for example, when the vehicle operator who has got off the vehicle swings the opened door back to the closed position, and quickly moves away from the vehicle such that the hand which has once pushed the door to its closed position releases the door while the vehicle operator moves away from the vehicle, so that the vehicle operator is soon distant from the vehicle by more than the above-indicated predetermined distance, and as a result the communication device is no longer capable of communicating with the portable unit carried by the operator after the door has been returned to the closed position. In this event, the locking-device controller will not activate the power-operated locking device to lock the closed door.
While the conventional door-locking system for a vehicle has been described above, a similar problem is encountered in other systems for controlling a state of a vehicle.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
It is therefore an object of the present invention to provide a vehicle state control system having an improved degree of control reliability, for example, an improved vehicle door-locking system capable of automatically locking a door in the closed position even if the communication device is incapable of communicating with the portable unit soon after the door has been placed in the closed position, as in an automatically controlled door-locking system according to the following first mode (1) of this invention, or an improved vehicle door-locking system capable of accurately detecting the location of the portable unit and controlling the power-operated locking device according to a result of the detection, as in an automatically controlled door-locking system according to the following sixteenth mode (16) of the invention.
The above object may be achieved according to any one of the following modes of the present invention, each of which is numbered like the appended claims and depends from the other mode or modes, where appropriate, to indicate and clarify possible combinations of elements or technical features. It is to be understood that the present invention is not limited to the technical features or any combinations thereof which will be described for illustrative purpose only. It is to be further understood that a plurality of elements or features included in any one of the following modes of the invention are not necessarily provided all together, and that the invention may be embodied without some of the elements or features described with respect to the same mode.
(1) An automatically controlled door-locking system for automatically locking at least one door of a vehicle, which includes a vehicle-operator's door provided for an operator of the vehicle, the door-locking system comprising:
a power-operated locking device including a power source, and an actuator operated by the power source for selectively locking and unlocking the at least one door placed in a closed position thereof;
a symptom-detecting device operable to detect a symptom indicating that the operator of the vehicle has an intention of getting off the vehicle;
a portable unit to be carried by the operator of the vehicle;
a first communication device operable to communicate
DeBeradinis Robert
Fleming Fritz
Oliff & Berridg,e PLC
Toyota Jidosha & Kabushiki Kaisha
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