INDIRECT TIRE WEAR STATE PREDICTION SYSTEM AND METHOD

• US 20170113494A1
• Filed: 10/21/2015
• Published: 04/27/2017
• Est. Priority Date: 10/21/2015
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company
• Original Assignee: Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company
• Inventors: Singh, Kanwar Bharat, Engel, Marc
• Granted Patent: US 9,873,293 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• CPC Class Codes: B60C 11/246 Tread wear monitoring systems
• CPC Class Codes: B60C 23/0408 transmitting the signals by non-mechanical means from the wheel or tyre to a vehicle body mounted receiver
• CPC Class Codes: B60C 23/0415 Automatically identifying wheel mounted units, e.g. after replacement or exchange of wheels
• CPC Class Codes: B60C 23/0486 comprising additional sensors in the wheel or tyre mounted monitoring device, e.g. movement sensors, microphones or earth magnetic field sensors
• CPC Class Codes: G01M 17/02 Tyres
• CPC Class Codes: G01S 19/24 Acquisition or tracking or demodulation of signals transmitted by the system synchronisation aspects of direct sequence spread spectrum modulation H04B1/7073

Abstract

A tire wear state estimation system estimates forces and sliding velocity generated in a tire contact patch, determines frictional energy from the tire force and sliding velocity, and generates an estimate of tire wear state based upon the frictional work done by the tire. A tire wear estimate, pursuant to the system and methodology, is made by determining the amount of frictional work performed by the tire through the integrated use of tire-mounted, GPS sourced, and vehicle-mounted sensor information.

Claims

1. A tire wear state estimation system comprising:

at least one tire supporting a vehicle;

a plurality of tire-mounted devices operable to supply tire-specific contact dynamics information;

at least one inertial measurement unit operable to supply sliding velocity information from a tire contact patch formed by the one tire rolling over a ground surface;

an ambient condition monitoring system operable to supply ambient condition information;

a tire force and sliding velocity estimator operable to determine a tire force estimate and a tire sliding velocity estimate from the tire-specific contact dynamics information and the sliding velocity information;

a tire frictional energy estimator operable to estimate tire frictional energy from the tire force estimate and the tire sliding velocity estimate;

a tire frictional work estimator operable to determine a tire frictional work estimate from the tire frictional energy estimate;

a tire wear rate estimator operable to generate a tire wear rate estimate from the tire frictional work estimate and the ambient condition information,

2. The tire wear state estimation system of claim 1, wherein the tire-mounted devices comprise:

at least one pressure-measuring sensor affixed to the one tire operable to supply by a data transmission measured tire inflation pressure data;

a tire identification transponder affixed to the one tire operable to supply by data transmission tire-specific identification data; and

a tire temperature sensor affixed to the one tire operable to supply by data transmission measured tire temperature data.

3. The tire wear state estimation system of claim 1, wherein the ambient condition information comprises at least one condition from the group consisting of ambient weather condition, road surface roughness and ambient temperature.

4. The tire wear state estimation system of claim 3, wherein the ambient condition monitoring system comprises a global positioning system operable to transmit the ambient condition information to the tire wear rate estimator.

5. The tire wear state estimation system of claim 1, wherein the inertial measurement unit comprises at least one vehicle-mounted and CAN-bus accessible sensor operable to make a three axes of rotation rate measurement and a three axes of acceleration measurement.

6. The tire wear state estimation system of claim 1, wherein the inertial measurement unit comprises a hand-held phone equipped with an application program operable to make a three axes of rotation rate measurement and a three axes of acceleration measurement.

7. The tire wear state estimation system of claim 1, wherein the tire wear rate estimator operably generates the tire wear rate estimate from a correlation of the tire wear state to the frictional work estimate adjusted by a plurality of abrasion compensation parameters.

8. The tire wear estimation system of claim 7, wherein the abrasion compensation parameters include tire-specific construction characteristics, road-surface characteristics, ambient temperature characteristics, and road surface interfacial contaminant condition characteristics.

9. A tire wear state estimation system comprising:

at least one tire supporting a vehicle;

a plurality of tire-mounted devices operable to supply tire-specific information affecting tire contact patch dynamics;

at least one inertial measurement unit operable to supply sliding velocity information from a tire contact patch formed by the one tire rolling over a ground surface;

a friction work estimator operable to calculate a friction work estimate done by the at least one tire from the tire-specific information and the sliding velocity information;

a tire wear rate estimator operable to generate a tire wear rate estimation from drawing a proportional correlation between the tire wear rate estimation and the calculated friction work estimate.

10. The tire wear state estimation system according to claim 9, wherein the tire wear rate estimator in generating the tire wear rate estimation operably employs externally supplied abrasion-impacting information influencing abrasion characteristics of at least one material composing the at least one tire.

11. The tire wear state estimation system according to claim 10, wherein the tire-specific information comprise at least one tire characteristic taken from the group consisting of tire inflation pressure, tire temperature, tire material composition hardness, tire material composition molecular structure, tire material composition elongation at break, tire material composition wear resistance, tire material composition degree of vulcanization, tire material composition carbon black content.

12. The tire wear state estimation system according to claim 10 wherein the abrasion-impacting information comprises at least one external characteristic taken from the group consisting of road surface smoothness, road surface grading condition, road surface composition, ambient air temperature, road surface temperature and presence of interfacial contaminants on the road surface.

13. The tire wear state estimation system of claim 9, wherein the friction work estimator includes a tire force estimator and sliding velocity estimator operable to respectively generate a tire force estimate and a sliding velocity estimate from the tire-specific information and the sliding velocity information.

18. The method of making a tire wear state estimation according to claim 9, further comprising:

employing a tire force estimator operable to generate a tire force estimate for the tire contact patch;

employing a sliding velocity estimator operable to generate a sliding velocity estimate for the tire contact patch from the tire-specific information and the sliding velocity information.

14. A method of making a tire wear state estimation comprising:

supporting a vehicle by at least one tire;

mounting a plurality of tire-specific information-providing devices to the at least one tire operable to supply tire-specific information affecting tire contact patch dynamics;

utilizing at least one inertial measurement unit to supply sliding velocity information from a tire contact patch formed by the one tire rolling over a ground surface;

employing a friction work estimator operable to calculate a friction work estimate done by the at least one tire from the tire-specific information and the sliding velocity information;

employing a tire wear rate estimator operable to generate a tire wear rate estimation from drawing a proportional correlation between the tire wear rate estimation and the calculated friction work estimate.

15. The method of making a tire wear state estimation according to claim 14, wherein further comprising using within the tire wear rate estimator externally supplied abrasion-impacting information influencing abrasion characteristics of at least one material composing the at least one tire.

16. The method of making a tire wear state estimation according to claim 15, wherein the tire-specific information comprises at least one tire characteristic taken from the group consisting of tire inflation pressure, tire temperature, tire material composition hardness, tire material composition molecular structure, tire material composition elongation at break, tire material composition wear resistance, tire material composition degree of vulcanization, tire material composition carbon black content.

17. The method of making a tire wear state estimation according to claim 15 wherein the abrasion-impacting information comprises at least one external characteristic taken from the group consisting of road surface smoothness, road surface grading condition, road surface composition, ambient air temperature, road surface temperature, and presence of interfacial contaminants on the road surface.