Real-time road grade, slope and elevation measurement using differential pressure apparatus and method
AssigneeHoriba Instruments, Inc.
InventorLeo Alphonse Gerard Breton
Life of this patent
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Abstract
An apparatus includes a hermitically sealed rigid vessel, a differential pressure sensor, and a controller. The differential pressure sensor measures a difference between ambient pressure in a vicinity of the vessel and internal pressure in the vessel, and outputs a signal indicative of the difference. The controller computes a change in elevation of the apparatus between a first location and a second location based on a value of the signal associated with the first location and a value of the signal associated with the second location.
Claims20
An apparatus comprising:
- a hermitically sealed rigid vessel;
- a differential pressure sensor arranged to measure a difference between ambient pressure in a vicinity of the vessel and internal pressure in the vessel, and to output a signal indicative of the difference;
- and
- a controller programmed to compute a change in elevation of the apparatus between a first location and a second location based on a value of the signal associated with the first location and a value of the signal associated with the second location.
An apparatus comprising:
- a straight conduit attachable to an outside of a vehicle, having open ends oriented in a longitudinal direction of the vehicle, defining a static port, and having an internal diameter and length between any one of the open ends and the static port that precludes a straight line path between any one of the open ends and the static port.
A method for calculating true elevation comprising:
- selecting a reference elevation;
- calculating an elevation change based on a measured pressure;
- and
- calculating an estimated true elevation error performed on a subset of elevation data reported by a global positioning receiver, the subset selected based on parameters reported by the global positioning receiver.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.