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US 8,542,128 B2Granted
Parking assist apparatus and method
AssigneeToyota Jidosha Kabushiki Kaisha
InventorsYukiko Kawabata, Yasushi Makino, Yuichi Kubota, Tomohiko Endo, Takuya Itou
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A parking assisting apparatus that can reduce a burden of a driver at a preliminary stage of parking. The parking assisting apparatus assists parking of a vehicle and includes an obstacle detector that detects an obstacle near the vehicle and an information outputting mechanism that informs the driver of a parking space adjacent to the obstacle detected by the obstacle detector.
Claims9
A parking assisting apparatus for assisting parking of a vehicle moving in a forward direction, comprising:
- obstacle detecting means for detecting an obstacle near the vehicle moving in the forward direction;
- parking space detecting means for detecting a parking space based on detected results of the obstacle detecting means;
- deflection angle calculating means for calculating a deflection angle α that represents a change amount of a direction of the vehicle in a predetermined travel distance before a current position of the vehicle, the deflection angle α being calculated based on an output from each of a steering angle sensor and a vehicle speed sensor;
- and
- information outputting means for outputting an initial notice that informs a driver that the parking space exists adjacent to the obstacle detected by the obstacle detecting means,
- wherein the information outputting means determines whether to output the initial notice based on the deflection angle α calculated by the deflection angle calculating means, and
- wherein the initial notice is output if
- the parking space adjacent to the obstacle detected by the obstacle detecting means is detected by the parking space detecting means, and
- if an absolute value of the deflection angle α calculated by the deflection angle calculating means is within a predetermined range of 0<|α|<θ1, where θ1 is a predetermined value.
6 more elements
A parking assisting method of assisting parking of a vehicle moving in a forward direction, comprising:
- detecting an obstacle near the vehicle moving in the forward direction;
- detecting a parking space based on results of the detected obstacle;
- calculating a deflection angle that represents a change amount of a direction of the vehicle in a predetermined travel distance before a current position of the vehicle, the deflection angle being calculated based on an output from each of a steering angle sensor and a vehicle speed sensor;
- and
- outputting an initial notice that informs a driver that the parking space exists adjacent to the obstacle detected during the step of detecting an obstacle,
- wherein prior to the step of outputting the initial notice it is determined whether the initial notice should be output based on the deflection angle calculated during the step of calculating a deflection angle, and
- wherein the initial notice is output if
- the parking space adjacent to the detected obstacle is detected during the step of detecting a parking space, and
- if an absolute value of the deflection angle α calculated during the deflection angle calculating step is within a predetermined range of 0<|α|<θ1, where θ1 is a predetermined value.
6 more elements
A parking assisting apparatus for assisting parking of a vehicle moving in a forward direction, comprising:
- a control device that is connected to an obstacle detecting sensor that detects an obstacle near the vehicle moving in the forward direction, said control device being configured to detect a parking space based on the detected obstacle and being configured to calculate a deflection angle that represents a change amount of a direction of the vehicle in a predetermined travel distance before a current position of the vehicle and to output an initial notice that informs a driver that a parking space exists adjacent to the obstacle detected by the obstacle detecting sensor,
- wherein said control device is further configured to determine whether to output the initial notice based on a calculated deflection angle, the deflection angle being calculated based on an output from each of a steering angle sensor and a vehicle speed sensor, and
- wherein the initial notice is output if
- the parking space adjacent to the obstacle detected by the obstacle detecting sensor is detected during parking space detecting, and
- if an absolute value of the deflection angle α calculated during the deflection angle calculating is within a predetermined range of 0<|α|<θ1, where θ1 is a predetermined value.
2 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.