Distance measuring device for a vehicle

A distance measuring device comprising:

• a light transmitter for scan-illuminating a pulsed light beam in a predetermined angular range;
• a light receiver comprising a photoelectric converter which receives a reflected pulsed light beam reflected from an object for converting the light beam into an electric signal and at least two amplifiers, each of which receives and amplifies said output signal of said photoelectric converter and has a different gain to output a light reception signal corresponding to the amount of the light beam received by said photoelectric converter;
• said distance measuring device outputting a distance measurement data comprising a distance data indicative of a distance to the object on the basis of a time difference between a timing when said light transmitter illuminates the pulsed light beam and a timing when said light receiver receives the reflected pulsed light beam as a retroreflection time;
• a plurality of retroreflection time detectors for, on the basis of output signals of said at least two amplifiers of said light receiver, measuring retroreflection times of a plurality of reflected pulsed light beams with respect to one transmitted pulsed light beam;
• and
• a distance calculator for, on the basis of outputs of said plurality of retroreflection time detectors, calculating distance data of distances to a plurality of objects.