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US 9,132,802 B2Granted
Seatbelt device
AssigneeAutoliv Development AB
InventorsKatsuhiro Ito, Yusuke Shinya, Ganta Hibata, Jin Hayashihara
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A deviation in rotational angle caused between an adjustment gear and a sensor housing is compensated for with a profile of a cable winding groove of a pulley of an attitude control mechanism to accurately synchronize the inclination angle of a seat back and the rotational angle of the sensor housing with each other. Thus, it is possible to keep an inertial element support surface, which serves as a sensor reference surface, accurately horizontal even at any seat back inclination angle to improve the accuracy of an acceleration sensor.
Claims19
A seatbelt device for a reclining seat of a vehicle, the seatbelt device comprising:
- a seatbelt retractor attached to a seat back of the reclining seat and configured to wind up a seatbelt when necessary;
- and
- a cable advancing/retracting mechanism disposed at a coupling portion at which the seat back and a seat cushion of the reclining seat are coupled to each other and configured to detect an inclination angle of the seat back when the seat back is tilted in a front-back direction of a vehicle, the cable advancing/retracting mechanism including a cable configured to transmit the inclination angle to the seatbelt retractor and advance and retract in a longitudinal direction of the cable over a distance corresponding to the inclination angle of the seat back,
- the seatbelt retractor including:
- a retractor frame fixed to the seat back as inclined in a left-right direction of the vehicle with respect to a line extending in an up-down direction at a center of the seat back in the left-right direction;
- a spindle supported by the retractor frame and configured to wind up the seatbelt;
- an acceleration sensor attached to the retractor frame to detect acceleration in the front-back direction of the vehicle;
- a lock mechanism configured to lock draw-out operation for the seatbelt in accordance with the acceleration in the front-back direction of the vehicle detected by the acceleration sensor;
- and
- an attitude control mechanism configured to keep a sensor reference surface of the acceleration sensor horizontal,
- the acceleration sensor including:
- a sensor cover fixed to the retractor frame;
- an inertial element configured to be moved in the front-back direction of the vehicle when acceleration that is equal to or more than a predetermined value is applied in the front-back direction of the vehicle;
- a sensor housing supported on the sensor cover and having a swing axis extending along the left-right direction of the vehicle and an inertial element support surface on which the inertial element is placed;
- and
- an actuation member configured to actuate the lock mechanism to lock the draw-out operation in conjunction with movement of the inertial element in the front-back direction of the vehicle, and
- the attitude control mechanism including:
- a rotary member configured to be turned by an angle corresponding to a distance over which the cable is advanced or retracted by the cable advancing/retracting mechanism;
- and
- a rotation transfer mechanism configured to transfer rotation of the rotary member to the sensor housing to swing the sensor housing in the front-back direction of the vehicle, wherein
- a turning axis of the rotary member and the swing axis of the sensor housing intersect each other at a predetermined angle with respect to the left-right direction of the vehicle with the swing axis of the sensor housing arranged in a horizontal direction with respect to the left-right direction of the vehicle,
- the inertial element support surface of the sensor housing is kept horizontal by swing motion of the sensor housing in the front-back direction of the vehicle even if the seat back is tilted in the front-back direction of the vehicle,
- a rotational track surface of the rotary member and a rotational track surface of the sensor housing are non-parallel with each other, and
- a compensation unit is provided between the cable advancing/retracting mechanism and the attitude control mechanism, the compensation unit being configured to compensate for a deviation in rotational angle caused by such non-parallelism between the two rotational track surfaces when the rotation transfer mechanism transmits rotation from the rotary member to the sensor housing.
21 more elements
A seatbelt device for a reclining seat of a vehicle, the seatbelt device comprising:
- a seatbelt retractor attached to a seat back of the reclining seat and configured to wind up a seatbelt when necessary;
- and
- a cable advancing/retracting mechanism disposed at a coupling portion at which the seat back and a seat cushion of the reclining seat are coupled to each other and configured to detect an inclination angle of the seat back when the seat back is tilted in a front-back direction of a vehicle, the cable advancing/retracting mechanism including a cable configured to transmit the inclination angle to the seatbelt retractor and advance and retract in a longitudinal direction of the cable over a distance corresponding to the inclination angle of the seat back,
- the seatbelt retractor including:
- a retractor frame fixed to the seat back as inclined in a left-right direction of the vehicle with respect to a line extending in an up-down direction at a center of the seat back in the left-right direction;
- a spindle supported by the retractor frame and configured to wind up the seatbelt;
- an acceleration sensor attached to the retractor frame to detect acceleration in the front-back direction of the vehicle;
- a lock mechanism configured to lock draw-out operation for the seatbelt in accordance with the acceleration in the front-back direction of the vehicle detected by the acceleration sensor;
- and
- an attitude control mechanism configured to keep a sensor reference surface of the acceleration sensor horizontal, and
- the acceleration sensor including:
- a sensor cover fixed to the retractor frame;
- an inertial element configured to be moved in the front-back direction of the vehicle when acceleration that is equal to or more than a predetermined value is applied in the front-back direction of the vehicle;
- a sensor housing supported on the sensor cover and having a swing axis extending along the left-right direction of the vehicle and an inertial element support surface on which the inertial element is placed;
- and
- an actuation member configured to actuate the lock mechanism to lock the draw-out operation in conjunction with movement of the inertial element in the front-back direction of the vehicle, wherein
- the attitude control mechanism includes a pulley configured to convert advancing and retracting motion of the cable of the cable advancing/retracting mechanism into rotational motion, and a rotational track surface of the pulley and a rotational track surface of the sensor housing are non-parallel with each other, and
- a compensation unit is provided between the cable advancing/retracting mechanism and the attitude control mechanism, the compensation unit being configured to compensate for a deviation in rotational angle caused by such non-parallelism between the two rotational track surfaces when rotation is transmitted from the pulley to the sensor housing.
15 more elements
A seatbelt device for a reclining seat of a vehicle, the seatbelt device comprising:
- a seatbelt retractor attached to a seat back of the reclining seat and configured to wind up a seatbelt when necessary;
- and
- a cable advancing/retracting mechanism including a cable configured to transmit an inclination angle between the seat back and seat cushion to the seatbelt retractor and to advance and retract the cable over a distance corresponding to the inclination angle of the seat back,
- the seatbelt retractor including an acceleration sensor attached to a retractor frame to detect acceleration in a front-back direction of the vehicle, a lock mechanism configured to lock draw-out operation for the seatbelt in accordance with the acceleration in the front-back direction of the vehicle detected by the acceleration sensor, and an attitude control mechanism configured to keep a sensor reference surface of the acceleration sensor horizontal, the acceleration sensor including an inertial element configured to be moved in the front-back direction of the vehicle when acceleration that is equal to or more than a predetermined value is applied in the front-back direction of the vehicle, the attitude control mechanism including a rotary member configured to be turned by an angle corresponding to a distance over which the cable is advanced or retracted;
- and
- a compensation unit provided between the cable advancing/retracting mechanism and the attitude control mechanism, the compensation unit being configured to compensate for a deviation in rotational angle caused by non-parallelism between a rotational axis of the rotary member and a rotational axis of the acceleration sensor, the rotational axis of the acceleration sensor permitting rotation in the front-back direction of the vehicle;
- wherein the rotary member is a pulley, the pulley defining a cable winding portion that receives the cable, the cable winding portion defining a non-constant radius of curvature which constitutes the compensation unit.
4 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.