TRANSPORT FACILITY FOR AUTONOMOUS NAVIGATION AND METHOD FOR DETERMINING DAMAGE TO A MOTOR VEHICLE

• US 20140052323A1
• Filed: 08/16/2013
• Published: 02/20/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 08/17/2012
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Audi AG (Volkswagen AG)
• Original Assignee: Audi AG (Volkswagen AG)
• Inventors: Reichel, Michael, Siegel, Andreas
• Granted Patent: US 8,892,293 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 701/23
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 17/00 Digital computing or data processing equipment or methods, specially adapted for specific functions information retrieval, database structures or file system structures therefor G06F16/00
• CPC Class Codes: G07C 5/085 using electronic data carriers

Abstract

Damage caused by accidents that occur during autonomous driving of a motor vehicle should be reliably detected. For this purpose, a transport facility with a driving area which can be autonomously driven by a motor vehicle, has a detection device for detecting a first state of the motor vehicle in an entrance area outside the driving area and for detecting a second state in an exit area located within the driving area. In addition, transport facility has an evaluation device for determining a possible difference between the second state and the first state relating to damage of the motor vehicle.

Claims

1. A transport facility comprising:

a driving area configured for autonomous navigation by a motor vehicle,

a stationary detection device configured to detect a first state of the motor vehicle in an entrance area outside the driving area and to detect a second state of the motor vehicle in an exit area inside the driving area, and

an evaluation device configured to detect a difference between the second state and the first state relating to damage of the motor vehicle, said evaluation device configured to match data from the stationary detection device to internal vehicle data.

2. The transport facility of claim 1, wherein the driving area is an area selected from a parking lot, a parking garage, a tunnel section and a section of highway.

3. The transport facility of claim 1, wherein the first state and second state of the motor vehicle refer to an outer skin of the motor vehicle.

4. The transport facility of claim 1, wherein the detection device is configured to wirelessly receive the internal vehicle data from the motor vehicle, and to provide the received data to the evaluation device for detecting damage to the motor vehicle.

5. The transport facility of claim 3, wherein the evaluation device is configured to represent each of the first state and the second state of the motor vehicle by a model of the outer skin of the motor vehicle.

6. The transport facility of claim 5, wherein the model is represented on a visualization device.

7. The transport facility of claim 5, wherein the evaluation device is configured to perform a classification of the vehicle based on data from the stationary detection device, to provide a reference outer skin based on the classification and to determine damage to the motor vehicle in the entrance area based on the model of the outer skin in the first state and of the reference outer skin.

8. The transport facility of claim 1, further comprising a communication device configured to transmit the data about relating to at least one of the first and the second state to the motor vehicle or a mobile device.

9. The transport facility of claim 8, wherein the communication device is configured to receive a query and to transmit the data relating to the at least one first and second state depending on the query.

10. The transport facility of claim 1, wherein the evaluation device is configured to automatically send a message to from an external location or to receive a message from the external location, or both, when damage to the motor vehicle has been detected.

11. A method for determining damage to a motor vehicle driving in a driving area configured for autonomous navigation, the method comprising:

detecting a first state of the motor vehicle in an entrance area outside the driving area,

autonomously driving the motor vehicle in the driving area,

detecting a second state of the motor vehicle in an exit area located within the driving area, and

determining a difference between the second state and the first state by matching data from a stationary detection device to vehicle-internal data, with the determined difference relating to damage of the motor vehicle.