Land vehicles – Wheeled – Attachment
Reexamination Certificate
2002-05-20
2004-11-23
Dickson, Paul N. (Department: 3616)
Land vehicles
Wheeled
Attachment
C701S049000, C342S070000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06820897
ABSTRACT:
FIELD OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates generally to methods and arrangements for obtaining information about an occupying item in a vehicle or a part in the vehicle using a wave-detecting device which receives waves emanating from or generated by a reflector or resonator. The reflector or resonator is arranged in association with the vehicle or occupying item so that the waves emanating therefrom or generated thereby can be processed to provide information about the occupying item, such as its presence, position, or information about the vehicle, such as the position of the seat when the resonator is placed in the seat.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. History and General Statement of the Problem
In 1984, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) of the U.S. Department of Transportation issued a requirement for frontal crash protection of automobile occupants. This regulation mandated “passive occupant restraints” for all passenger cars by 1992. A more recent regulation required both driver and passenger side airbags on all passenger cars and light trucks by 1998. In addition, the demand for airbags is constantly accelerating in both Europe and Japan (~36 million vehicles) and all vehicles produced in these areas and eventually worldwide (~50 million vehicles) will likely be equipped with airbags as standard equipment, if they do not include them already.
Whereas thousands of lives have been saved by airbags, significant improvements can be made. As discussed in detail in U.S. Pat. No. 5,653,462 referenced above, for a variety of reasons, vehicle occupants can be or get too close to the airbag before it deploys and can be seriously injured or killed upon deployment of the airbag.
Also, a child in a rear facing child seat, which is placed on the right front passenger seat, is in danger of being seriously injured if the passenger airbag deploys. This has now become an industry-wide concern and the U.S. automobile industry is continually searching for an easy, economical solution, which will prevent the deployment of the passenger side airbag if a rear facing child seat is present. An improvement on the invention disclosed in the above-referenced patent, as will be disclosed in greater detail below, includes more sophisticated means to identify objects within the passenger compartment and will solve this problem.
Initially, these systems will solve the out-of-position occupant and the rear facing child seat problems related to current airbag systems and prevent unneeded deployments when a seat is unoccupied. Airbags are now under development to protect rear seat occupants in vehicle crashes. A system is therefore needed to detect the presence of occupants, position, (to determine if they are out-of-position), and type(to identify the presence of a rear facing child seat) in the rear seat. Current and future automobiles may have eight or more airbags as protection is sought for rear seat occupants and from side impacts. In addition to eliminating the disturbance of unnecessary airbag deployments, the cost of replacing these airbags will be excessive if they all deploy in an accident. The improvements described below minimize this cost by not deploying an airbag for a seat, which is not occupied by a human being. An occupying item of a seat may be a living occupant such as a human being or dog, another living organism such as a plant, or an inanimate object such as a box or bag of groceries.
Side impact airbag systems began appearing on 1995 vehicles. The danger of deployment induced injuries will exist for side impact airbags as they now do for frontal impact airbags. A child with his head against the airbag is such an example. The system of this invention will minimize such injuries.
2. General Solution to the Problem and Resulting Benefits
A device to monitor the vehicle interior and identify its contents is needed to solve these and many other related problems. For example, once a Vehicle Interior Identification and Monitoring System (VIMS) for identifying and monitoring the contents of a vehicle is in place, many other products become possible including the following:
Inflators and control systems now exist which will adjust the amount of gas flowing into and/or out of the airbag to account for the size and position of the occupant and for the severity of the accident. The vehicle identification and monitoring system of this invention will control such systems based on the presence, size and position of vehicle occupants or the presence, position and orientation of an occupied child seat.
Vehicles can be provided with a standard cellular phone or other telematics communication system as well as the Global Positioning System (GPS), an automobile navigation or location system with an optional connection to a manned assistance facility, which is now available on several vehicle models. In the event of an accident, the phone may automatically call 911, or contact OnStar™ or similar service for emergency assistance and report the position of the vehicle. If the vehicle also has a system as described below for monitoring each seat location, the number and perhaps the condition of the occupants could also be reported and/or photographs of the vehicle interior before, during and/or after the accident can be transmitted. In that way, the emergency service (EMS) would know what equipment and how many ambulances to send to the accident site and prioritize the accident when several accidents occur in the same time frame. Moreover, a communication channel can be opened between the vehicle and a monitoring facility/emergency response facility or personnel to enable directions to be provided to the injured occupant(s) of the vehicle to assist in any necessary first aid prior to arrival of the emergency assistance personnel.
Once an occupant sensor is operational, the vehicle entertainment system can be improved if the number, size and location of occupants and other objects were known. However, it is not believed that, prior to the instant invention, engineers have thought to determine the number, size and/or location of the occupants and use such determination in combination with the entertainment system. Indeed, this information can be provided by the vehicle interior identification and monitoring system of this invention to thereby improve a vehicle's entertainment system. Once one considers monitoring the space in the passenger compartment an alternate method of characterizing the sonic environment comes to mind which is to send and receive a test sound to see what frequencies are reflected, absorbed or excite resonances and then adjust the spectral output of the entertainment system accordingly.
As the VIMS improves to where such things as the exact location of the occupants ears and eyes can be determined, even more significant improvements to the entertainment system become possible through the use of noise canceling sound, and the rear view mirrors can be automatically adjusted for the driver's eye location.
Another example involves the monitoring of the driver's behavior over time that can be used to warn a driver if he or she is falling asleep, or to stop the vehicle if the driver loses the capacity to control it.
Similarly to the entertainment system, the heating, ventilation and air conditioning system (HVAC) can be improved if the number, attributes and location of vehicle occupants were known. This can be used to provide a climate control system tailored to each occupant, for example, or the system can be turned off for certain seat locations if there are no occupants present at those locations.
In some cases, the position of a particular part of the occupant is of interest such as: (a) his hand or arm and whether it is in the path of a closing window so that the motion of the window needs to be stopped; (b) the position of the shoulder so that the scat belt anchorage point can be adjusted for the best protection of the occupant; or, (c) the position of the rear of the occupants head so that the headrest can be adjusted to minimize w
Breed David S.
DuVall Wilbur E
Johnson Wendell C.
Automotive Technologies International Inc.
Dickson Paul N.
Roffe Brian
To Toan C
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