Overdrive control apparatus
AssigneesNippon Soken, Inc., Toyota Jidosha Kogyo Kabushiki Kaisha
InventorsYasuhisa Yoshino, Akira Kuno, Hidetoshi Shimizu, Harumasa Minegishi
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Abstract
An overdrive control apparatus is provided with a gradient sensor unit for sensing a gradient of a vehicle running road. The overdrive control apparatus releases an overdrive mode of an automatic change gear device which is set up for a level drive of the vehicle in accordance with a sensing signal from the gradient sensing unit.
Claims7
An overdrive control apparatus for automotive vehicles for controlling a transmission having a plurality of transmission ranges and an overdrive range, which is sequentially and automatically changed in response to the output signals of a vehicle speed sensor and an engine load sensor comprising:
- gradient sensor means for detecting the gradient of a running road of the vehicle to provide a signal indicative of whether the road has an ascending gradient of more than a first predetermined value or a descending gradient of less than a second predetermined value;
- and
- release means responsive to the gradient signal of said gradient sensor means and irrespective of the output signals of said vehicle speed sensor and said engine load sensor for forcibly releasing the transmission from the overdrive range to said plurality of transmission ranges only when the transmission is positioned at the overdrive range.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.