Parking lot attendant robot system
AssigneeHonda Motor Co., Ltd.
InventorAtsuo Orita
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A parking lot attendant robot is provided with a camera for capturing an image of an vehicle and a parking space, and a receiver from receiving vehicle information such as the steering angle, shift position and vehicle speed from the vehicle. Based on the knowledge of the position of the vehicle with respect to the parking space gained from the camera and the vehicle information received from the vehicle, the robot computes the optimum parking path which the vehicle should follow. The robot signals the motorist by a visual and/or auditory display and/or a hand signal as to how the steering wheel should be turned and which way the vehicle should move or stop for the vehicle to follow this parking path and to be successfully parked in the prescribed parking space.
Claims11
A parking lot attendant robot system including a robot placed in a parking lot for giving guidance to a motorist who wishes to park an vehicle in a prescribed parking space defined within the parking lot, comprising:
- a robot (1) provided with traveling means (1b, 14b) for moving about at least within the parking lot;
- a control unit (13) for controlling various actions of the robot;
- image capturing means (11, 12) for capturing at least an image of the vehicle (2) that is desired to be guided to the parking space (31) and identifying the position of the vehicle relative to the parking space;
- parking path computing means (13) for computing a parking path which the vehicle should follow for the vehicle to be properly parked in the parking space according to the position of the vehicle identified by the image capturing means;
- a vehicle information sensor (21–24) for detecting vehicle information including a steering angle;
- vehicle information transmitting means (25) for transmitting the vehicle information to the control unit;
- guidance information generating means (13) for generating a guidance information including a target steering angle for the vehicle according to the vehicle information and the parking path computed by the parking path computing means;
- and
- guidance information transmitting means (15, 14a;
- 18, 25, 27) for transmitting the guidance information from the control unit to the vehicle or a motorist driving the vehicle.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.