Sunroof controller

#This non-provisional patent application claims priority under 35 U.S.C. §119(a) from Patent Application No. 201310589514.0 filed in The People's Republic of China on Nov. 20, 2013, the entire contents of which are hereby incorporated by reference.

#This invention relates generally to a control equipment and in particular to an automotive vehicle sunroof controller and a control method thereof.

#With the rapid advancement of automotive electronics, there has been an increasing quantity of electrical control units in modern vehicles. These electrical control units can be divided into powertrain system control (e.g., engine control and transmission control), chassis control (e.g., ABS system) and body control. Body Control Module (“BCM”) is mainly used for improving the driving convenience and ride comfort. BCM system covers a wide range including lamp control, doors/windows control, seat control, air-condition control, instrument panel control, etc, and realizes performance and safety of a vehicle together with other systems. With the development of automation control, more and more body electrical equipment is used on an automotive body, which forces BCM to control more units. More information are shared between each electrical equipments, thus a strengthened data communication function is required for a BCM. Therefore, a single centralized BCM is hard to fulfill these huge functions, which leads to a trend of bus and network type of BCM. Lin (Local interconnect network) bus control method is also used for BCM communication, especially for BCM for simple control requirement of small communication traffic and slow communication rate, e.g., auto wiper and anti-pinch system.

#A preferred embodiment of the invention will now be described, by way of example only, with reference to figures of the accompanying drawings. In the figures, identical structures, elements or parts that appear in more than one figure are generally labeled with a same reference numeral in all the figures in which they appear. Dimensions of components and features shown in the figures are generally chosen for convenience and clarity of presentation and are not necessarily shown to scale. The figures are listed below.

#FIG. 1(a)˜1(d) illustrate the cooperation between the sunroof and the sunshade when the panorama sunroof is opened, according to an embodiment of the present invention.

#FIG. 2 is an electrical schematic diagram illustrating the panorama sunroof drive system, according to an embodiment of the present invention.

#FIGS. 1(a)˜1(d) illustrate the cooperation between the sunroof glass and the sunshade when the panorama sunroof is being opened. A metal roof 10 of an automotive vehicle is equipped with a sunroof glass a sunshade 20, and the sunroof glass includes a movable glass 30 and an unmovable glass 40. Generally speaking, a user interface of a driver may include four switches which are opening sunroof glass, closing sunroof glass, opening sunshade and closing sunshade. In case movable glass 30 and sunshade 20 do not conflict the position of each other, a user may activate the corresponding switch to give an order to movable glass 30 or sunshade 20, then movable glass 30 or sunshade 20 operates accordingly.

#Basically, when movable glass 30 is being opened from original close position, sunshade 20 need to move for a small distance, so as to avoid any conflict of their position. Therefore, when movable glass 30 begins to tilt up, sunshade 20 begins to move accordingly. As movable glass 30 slides, if sunshade 20 is in same position with the movable glass 30, sunshade 20 must move simultaneously so as to forbid sunshade 20 to be exposed to external environment.

#Referring to FIG. 1a, both movable glass 30 and sunshade 20 are in fully closed position originally. Movable glass 30 is approximately in the same plane with unmovable glass 40, and is parallel with sunshade 20.