Vehicle behavior control device

A vehicle behavior control device for acquiring information via radio communication equipment, which transmits and receives the information by inter-vehicle communication, and for controlling acceleration and deceleration of a vehicle, the vehicle behavior control device comprising:

• a velocity acquisition device for acquiring a vehicle velocity of the vehicle successively;
• a current position acquisition device for acquiring a current position of the vehicle successively;
• a preceding vehicle determination device for determining a preceding vehicle of the vehicle, wherein the inter-vehicle communication between the vehicle and the preceding vehicle is established;
• a following distance detection device for detecting a following distance between the vehicle and the preceding vehicle;
• a preceding vehicle information acquisition device for successively acquiring preceding vehicle information, which is transmitted successively from the preceding vehicle by the inter-vehicle communication, via the radio communication equipment, wherein the preceding vehicle information includes preceding vehicle condition information providing a preceding vehicle velocity of the preceding vehicle;
• a relative velocity calculation device for successively calculating a relative velocity between the vehicle and the preceding vehicle according to the vehicle velocity and the preceding vehicle velocity;
• a first evaluation index calculation device for calculating a first evaluation index, which indicates an approaching and separating state of the vehicle with respect to the preceding vehicle in view of the preceding vehicle velocity, wherein the first evaluation index becomes larger as the relative velocity of approaching the preceding vehicle becomes higher, and the first evaluation index becomes larger as the following distance with the preceding vehicle becomes shorter, and wherein the first evaluation index has an increasing gradient with respect to a narrowing change of the following distance, the increasing gradient which becomes steeper as the following distance becomes shorter;
• a first deceleration target determination device for determining whether the first evaluation index exceeds a predetermined first deceleration threshold;
• and
• a following deceleration calculation device for calculating a first required deceleration when the first deceleration target determination device determines that the first evaluation index exceeds the first deceleration threshold, wherein the first required deceleration provides to match an actual relative velocity between the vehicle and the preceding vehicle with a first target relative velocity, and wherein the first target relative velocity is determined based on the first evaluation index and the following distance to the preceding vehicle.