Gps based pitch sensing for an integrated stability control system
AssigneeFord Global Technologies, LLC
InventorsJianbo Lu, Dimitar Petrov Filev, Kwaku O. Prakah-Asante, David M. Bevly, Jonathan Ryan
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Abstract
A system and method for sensing vehicle global pitch angle and rate that uses global velocities measured from a single antenna global positioning system (GPS) receiver together with sensor fusion algorithms involving sensor signals and other computed signals. This constructed, or computed, vehicle body's pitch angle may replace the role of a pitch rate sensor in an integrated stability control system. Namely, it achieves enhanced vehicle state estimation without the need for a pitch rate sensor.
Claims23
A pitch sensing system including pitch computation used by an integrated stability control system of a motor vehicle, the system comprising:
- a GPS receiver for acquiring global vehicle velocities in three dimensions;
- and
- a pitch computation estimated from the global vehicle velocities and input to the integrated stability control system.
An integrated stability control system for a motor vehicle having a GPS receiver capable of acquiring three-dimensional vehicle velocity measurements, the integrated stability control system comprising:
- a single roll rate sensor for providing a roll rate signal indicative of a roll rate of the motor vehicle;
- a pitch computation indicative of the vehicle pitch angle and pitch rate as it is estimated using at least the three-dimensional vehicle velocity measurements acquired from the GPS receiver;
- and
- a controller using at least the roll rate signal and the pitch angle signal for integrated stability control.
A method for estimating a pitch computation of a motor vehicle having a GPS receiver and at least one stability control system, the method comprising the steps of:
- acquiring three dimensional global vehicle velocity measurements from the GPS receiver;
- estimating a pitch angle of a vehicle using the three-dimensional global vehicle velocity measurements;
- inputting the estimated pitch angle to the stability control system.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.