Methods and Apparatus for Dynamic Powertrain Management

• US 20110270468A1
• Filed: 05/09/2011
• Published: 11/03/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 05/09/2011
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Ford Global Technologies, LLC (Ford Motor Company)
• Original Assignee: Ford Global Technologies, LLC (Ford Motor Company)
• Inventors: Phillips, Anthony Mark, Filev, Dimitar Petrov, Tseng, Fling, McGee, Ryan Abraham, Kristinsson, Johannes Geir
• Granted Patent: US 8,386,091 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 701/2
• CPC Class Codes: B60W 2050/046 involving external transmission of data to or from the vehicle, e.g. via telemetry, satellite, Global Positioning System [GPS]
• CPC Class Codes: B60W 2556/50 of positioning data, e.g. GPS [Global Positioning System] data
• CPC Class Codes: B60W 2556/55 using telemetry
• CPC Class Codes: B60W 30/18 Propelling the vehicle
• CPC Class Codes: G07C 5/008 communicating information to a remotely located station transmission systems for measured values G08C
• CPC Class Codes: G07C 5/085 using electronic data carriers

Abstract

A computer-implemented method includes determining that a vehicle powertrain feature is engaged. The method further includes relaying, to a remote computing source, a request for a computation to be performed relating to the engaged powertrain feature. The method additionally includes receiving a result of the computation at a vehicle computing system and transferring the result of the computation to a powertrain for use in controlling the powertrain feature.

Claims

1. A computer-implemented method comprising:

determining that a vehicle powertrain feature is engaged;

relaying, to a remote computing source, a request for a computation to be performed relating to the engaged powertrain feature;

receiving a result of the computation at a vehicle computing system; and

transferring the result of the computation to a powertrain for use in controlling the powertrain feature.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the powertrain feature is a cruise control feature.

3. The method of claim 2, wherein the computation is a fuel usage optimization computation.

4. The method of claim 3, wherein the result includes instructing the cruise control to deviate from a set speed.

5. The method of claim 1, further comprising, relaying one or more relevant pieces of vehicle data relating to the computation.

6. The method of claim 5, wherein the relaying includes relaying a vehicle route.

7. The method of claim 6, wherein the method further includes predicting a vehicle route if no route is currently available for relaying to the remote source.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein the result of the computation is a high-level directive and wherein the transferring further includes translating the result into language understandable by the powertrain.

9. The method of claim 1, further comprising detecting a change in the state of the vehicle;

and

initiating a new session with the remote computing source based at least in part on the change in vehicle state.

10. The method of claim 1, further comprising repeating the determining, relaying, receiving and transferring steps periodically over the course of a route until at least one of a destination is reached or the powertrain feature is disabled.

11. A system comprising:

a vehicle computing system operable to communicate with at least a remote server to obtain cloud based computing services;

a remote server operable to receive information from and send information to the vehicle computing system;

wherein the vehicle computing system is operable to determine that a vehicle powertrain feature is engaged,

wherein the vehicle computing system is further operable to relay, to a remote computing source, a request for a computation to be performed relating to the engaged powertrain feature,

wherein the vehicle computing system is further operable to receive a result of the computation at a vehicle computing system, and

wherein the vehicle computing system is further operable to transfer the result of the computation to a powertrain for use in controlling the powertrain feature.

12. The system of claim 11, wherein the powertrain feature is a cruise control feature.

13. The system of claim 12, wherein the computation is a fuel usage optimization computation.

14. The system of claim 11, wherein the vehicle computing system is operable to relay one or more relevant pieces of vehicle data relating to the computation.

15. The system of claim 14, wherein the relevant data includes route information.

16. The system of claim 15, wherein the remote server is operable to predict a vehicle route if no route information is available for relay from the vehicle computing system.

20. The storage medium of claim 16, wherein the result of the computation is a high-level directive and wherein the transferring further includes translating the result into language understandable by the powertrain.

17. A computer readable storage medium storing instructions that, when executed, cause a vehicle computing system to perform the method comprising:

determining that a vehicle powertrain feature is engaged;

relaying, to a remote computing source, a request for a computation to be performed relating to the engaged powertrain feature;

receiving a result of the computation at a vehicle computing system; and

transferring the result of the computation to a powertrain for use in controlling the powertrain feature.

18. The storage medium of claim 17, wherein the powertrain feature is a cruise control feature.

19. The storage medium of claim 18, wherein the computation is a fuel usage optimization computation.