Vehicle rearview mirror assembly incorporating a communication system
First Claim
Patent Images
1. A rearview assembly for a vehicle comprising:
- a mirror mounting structure including a mirror housing and adapted to be mounted to the vehicle;
electronic circuitry contained in said mirror housing;
an antenna for a wireless telephone mounted to said mirror mounting structure; and
an electromagnetic shield provided between said electronic circuitry and said antenna to substantially block electromagnetic radiation generated by said electronic circuitry from reaching said antenna.
0 Assignments
0 Petitions
Accused Products
Abstract
A vehicle communication and control system is provided that may be more readily installed in a vehicle and that utilizes minimal additional wiring. According to some of the disclosed embodiments, the electrical components of the “brick” of a communication and control system are integrated into a rearview mirror assembly. Preferably, the microwave antenna for the GPS and the cellular telephone antenna are also integrated into the rearview mirror assembly. Various functions and features of the system are also disclosed.
-
Citations
25 Claims
-
1. A rearview assembly for a vehicle comprising:
-
a mirror mounting structure including a mirror housing and adapted to be mounted to the vehicle;
electronic circuitry contained in said mirror housing;
an antenna for a wireless telephone mounted to said mirror mounting structure; and
an electromagnetic shield provided between said electronic circuitry and said antenna to substantially block electromagnetic radiation generated by said electronic circuitry from reaching said antenna. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8)
-
-
9. An electrical circuit for a vehicle comprising:
-
at least one microphone transducer for generating an electrical signal representing a received audio signal;
a processing circuit coupled to said microphone transducer for processing the electrical signal;
a voice recognition circuit coupled to said processing circuit for performing voice recognition on the processed electrical signals generated by said processing circuit; and
a wireless telephone transceiver coupled to said processing circuit for transmitting the processed electrical signal through a wireless telephone link, wherein said processing circuit processes the electrical signal received from said microphone transducer differently for output to said voice recognition circuit than for output to said wireless telephone transceiver, and wherein at least one of said voice recognition circuit, processing circuit, microphone transducer, and wireless telephone transceiver is supported by a rearview mirror assembly mounted to the vehicle. - View Dependent Claims (10, 11)
-
-
12. A telematics system for installation in a vehicle having an electronic module configured to control a feature of the vehicle that affects the ability of the vehicle to be driven, said telematics system comprising:
-
a global position identification component for identifying the location of the vehicle;
a telephone transceiver component coupled to said global position identification component for transmitting the location of the vehicle to a remote system; and
a controller component coupled to said global position identification component and said telephone transceiver component, wherein at least one of said components is configured to periodically communicate with the electronic module and to thereby acknowledge that each of said components is present and functional such that if the electronic module does not receive periodic acknowledgement of the presence and/or functionality of said components, the electronic module affects the ability of the vehicle to be driven. - View Dependent Claims (13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22)
-
-
23. A telephone system for installation in a vehicle having an electronic module for determining whether an ignition key has been inserted into the vehicle ignition and for communicating the presence of the key in the ignition, said telephone system comprising:
-
a telephone transceiver for transmitting calls over a wireless communication link; and
a control circuit coupled to said telephone transceiver and in communication with the electronic module, said control circuit disables at least some functions of said telephone transceiver when an ignition key is not detected in the vehicle ignition. - View Dependent Claims (24, 25)
-
Specification