Collision avoidance system for rail line vehicles
DCFirst Claim
Patent Images
1. A collision avoidance system comprising:
- one or more vehicle mounted modules, each vehicle mounted module mountable on a rail vehicle, each vehicle mounted module comprising;
a transponder sensor module operable to send and receive data wirelessly, the transponder module comprising a first ultra wideband unit and a first antenna;
a control electronics module comprising a processor in communication with at least the transponder sensor module unit; and
a user interface module including a user interface, the user interface being operable to provide rail vehicle information to a vehicle operator and to receive input from the vehicle operator; and
wherein each vehicle mounted module is operable to communicate with at least one other vehicle mounted module mounted on at least one other rail vehicle, and wherein each vehicle mounted module is operable to apply a time of flight technique to determine a separation distance between the rail vehicles.
8 Assignments
Litigations
1 Petition
Accused Products
Abstract
A collision avoidance system (CAS) is described that includes one or more sensor technologies, including, for example, an Ultra Wideband (UWB) sensing technology. The collision avoidance system is designed to reliably track the location and speed of vehicles and the distance between vehicles over a wide variety of track and terrain. The collision avoidance system may utilize information from a variety of sensor technologies to determine whether one or more vehicles violate speed and/or separation criteria, and may generate a warning.
25 Citations
28 Claims
-
1. A collision avoidance system comprising:
-
one or more vehicle mounted modules, each vehicle mounted module mountable on a rail vehicle, each vehicle mounted module comprising; a transponder sensor module operable to send and receive data wirelessly, the transponder module comprising a first ultra wideband unit and a first antenna; a control electronics module comprising a processor in communication with at least the transponder sensor module unit; and a user interface module including a user interface, the user interface being operable to provide rail vehicle information to a vehicle operator and to receive input from the vehicle operator; and
wherein each vehicle mounted module is operable to communicate with at least one other vehicle mounted module mounted on at least one other rail vehicle, and wherein each vehicle mounted module is operable to apply a time of flight technique to determine a separation distance between the rail vehicles. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 23)
-
-
17. A rail vehicle module mountable on a rail vehicle, the module comprising:
-
a transponder sensor module comprising; a radio communication unit operable to employ time of flight techniques to detect a distance between the rail vehicle and at least one other vehicle; a wireless communications antenna operable to send and receive data over the air; and a global positioning system unit operable to receive information from one or more satellites to determine an absolute position of the rail vehicle; a control electronics module comprising a processor in communication with at least the first transponder sensor module; and a user interface module including a user interface operable to provide rail vehicle information to a vehicle operator and to receive input from the vehicle operator;
wherein the rail vehicle module communicates with at least one other module mounted on at least one other vehicle to detect a separation distance between the rail vehicle and the at least one other vehicle. - View Dependent Claims (18, 19, 20, 21, 22)
-
-
24. A collision avoidance system comprising
one or more vehicle mounted modules, each vehicle mounted module mountable on a rail vehicle, each vehicle mounted module comprising: -
a transponder sensor module comprising; a radio communication unit operable to employ time of flight techniques to detect a distance between rail vehicles; and a global positioning system unit operable to receive information from one or more satellites to determine an absolute position of the rail line vehicle; a control electronics module comprising a processor, the control electronics module being in communication with at least the transponder sensor module; and a user interface operable to provide rail vehicle information to a vehicle operator and to receive input from the vehicle operator; wherein each of the two or more rail vehicle modules communicate to determine a separation distance between each rail vehicle, and wherein each rail vehicle module is operable to use information provided by the radio communication unit and the global positioning system unit to determine whether one or more vehicle separation criteria are violated, and to generate a warning signal if one or more vehicle separation criteria are violated. - View Dependent Claims (25, 26, 27, 28)
-
Specification