CRUISE CONTROL APPARATUS

• US 20130211689A1
• Filed: 02/07/2013
• Published: 08/15/2013
• Est. Priority Date: 02/13/2012
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: DENSO Corporation
• Original Assignee: DENSO Corporation
• Inventors: Mizutani, Akiyoshi, Matsuoka, Keiji, Shimizu, Koji
• Granted Patent: US 9,399,397 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 701/96
• CPC Class Codes: B60K 31/00 Vehicle fittings, acting on a single sub-unit only, for automatically controlling vehicle speed, i.e. preventing speed from exceeding an arbitrarily established velocity or maintaining speed at a particular velocity, as selected by the vehicle operator fittings acting on two or more sub-units B60W30/14; speedometers G01P; systems or devices for controlling speed in general G05D13/00 ; in traffic anti-collision system for road vehicles G08G1/16
• CPC Class Codes: B60W 2420/403 Image sensing, e.g. optical camera
• CPC Class Codes: B60W 2420/408 Radar; Laser, e.g. lidar
• CPC Class Codes: B60W 30/16 Control of distance between vehicles, e.g. keeping a distance to preceding vehicle

Abstract

The cruise control apparatus includes a headway control means for making a first determination as to whether or not at least one recognized front vehicle running ahead of an own vehicle is a preceding vehicle present in an own-vehicle lane in which the own vehicle is running, performing a headway control to cause the own vehicle to run following the preceding vehicle when the first determination is affirmative, and a vehicle type recognizing means for recognizing a type of the recognized front vehicle. The headway control means is configured to change a way to perform the headway control depending on the type (vehicle size, for example) of the recognized front vehicle.

Claims

1. A cruise control apparatus comprising:

a headway control means for making a first determination as to whether or not at least one recognized front vehicle running ahead of an own vehicle is a preceding vehicle present in an own-vehicle lane in which the own vehicle is running, performing a headway control to cause the own vehicle to run following the preceding vehicle when the first determination is affirmative; and

a vehicle type recognizing means for recognizing a type of the recognized front vehicle,

wherein the headway control means is configured to change a way to perform the headway control depending on the type of the recognized front vehicle.

2. The cruise control apparatus according to claim 1,

wherein

the head control operates to calculate an own-lane probability that the recognized front vehicle is present in the own-vehicle lane based on a position of the recognized front vehicle, perform a filtering operation on the calculated own-lane probability to generate a filtered own-lane probability a temporal variation of which is reduced compared to a temporal variation of the calculated own-lane probability, and make the first determination based on the filtered own-lane probability,

the vehicle type recognizing means is configured to make a second determination as to whether or not the recognized front vehicle is a large size vehicle, and

the headway control means is configured to change the way to perform the headway control such that a degree of reduction of the temporal variation of the filtered own-lane probability by the filtering operation is larger when a result of the second determination is affirmative than when the result of the second determination is negative.

3. The cruise control apparatus according to claim 1,

wherein

the head control operates to perform a filtering operation on a detected front vehicle lateral position as a position of the recognized front vehicle along a width direction of the own vehicle to generate a filtered front vehicle lateral position a temporal variation of which is smaller than a temporal variation of the detected front vehicle lateral position, and make the first determination based on the filtered front vehicle lateral position,

the vehicle type recognizing means is configured to make a second determination as to whether or not the recognized front vehicle is a large size vehicle, and

the headway control means is configured to change the way to perform the headway control such that a degree of reduction of the temporal variation of the filtered front vehicle lateral position is larger when a result of the second determination is affirmative than when the result of the second determination is negative.

4. The cruise control apparatus according to claim 1,

wherein

the head control operates to calculate an own-lane probability that the recognized front vehicle is present in the own-vehicle lane based on a position of the recognized front vehicle, and make the first determination based on the calculated own-lane probability,

the vehicle type recognizing means is configured to make a second determination as to whether or not the recognized front vehicle is a large size vehicle, and

the headway control means is configured to change the way to perform the headway control such that the own-lane probability is calculated to be higher when a result the second determination is affirmative than when the result of the second determination is negative.

5. The cruise control apparatus according to claim 1,

wherein

the headway control means includes a squeezing detection means for determining whether or not the recognized front vehicle has squeezed into the own-vehicle lane and a leaving detection means for determining whether or not the preceding vehicle has left the own-vehicle lane,

the vehicle type recognizing means is configured to make a second determination whether or not the recognized front vehicle is a large size vehicle, and

the headway control means is configured to change the way to perform the headway control such that responsiveness of the squeezing detection means and the leaving detection means is set lower when the first determination is affirmative than when the first determination is negative.