device and method for recognizing inscriptions on vehicle tires

• US 20160127625A1
• Filed: 02/27/2014
• Published: 05/05/2016
• Est. Priority Date: 04/23/2013
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Beissbarth Automotive Testing Solutions GmbH
• Original Assignee: Robert Bosch GmbH
• Inventors: Uffenkamp, Volker, Klar, Michael, Nobis, Guenter, HANEL, Christian
• Granted Patent: US 10,313,574 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 18/251 of input or preprocessed data
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 2207/30252 Vehicle exterior; Vicinity of vehicle
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 7/20 Analysis of motion motion estimation for coding, decoding, compressing or decompressing digital video signals H04N19/43, H04N19/51
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 7/73 using feature-based methods
• CPC Class Codes: G06V 10/225 based on a marking or identifier characterising the area
• CPC Class Codes: G06V 10/242 by image rotation, e.g. by 90 degrees
• CPC Class Codes: G06V 10/803 of input or preprocessed data
• CPC Class Codes: G06V 2201/06 Recognition of objects for industrial automation
• CPC Class Codes: G06V 2201/08 Detecting or categorising vehicles
• CPC Class Codes: G06V 30/40 Document-oriented image-based pattern recognition
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 5/265 Mixing
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 7/18 Closed-circuit television [CCTV] systems, i.e. systems in which the video signal is not broadcast

Abstract

A device for recognizing the inscription on the wall of a tire, including a driving surface plane, at least one directional light source to illuminate the tire; at least one camera to record multiple images of a wall of the tire rolling on the driving surface plane; and an evaluation device to synthesize an image of the wall of the tire from the multiple recorded images and to evaluate the synthesized image with the aid of a text recognition method.

Claims

1-10. -10. (canceled)

11. A device for recognizing an inscription on a tire, comprising:

a driving surface plane;

at least one directional light source to illuminate the tire;

at least one camera to record multiple images of a wall of a tire rolling on the driving surface plane; and

an evaluation device to synthesize an image of the wall of the tire from the multiple recorded images and to evaluate the synthesized image with the aid of a text recognition method.

12. The device of claim 11, wherein multiple light sources are situated in a line along the rolling direction of the tire.

13. The device of claim 11, wherein multiple light sources are in different vertical distances from the driving surface plane.

14. The device of claim 11, wherein multiple light sources are in various positions across the rolling direction of the tire.

15. The device of claim 11, wherein at least one of the light sources has separately controllable lighting elements.

16. The device of claim 11, wherein multiple light sources are configured to illuminate the tire with light of different wavelengths.

17. The device of claim 11, wherein at least one of the light sources is operable in a flash mode.

18. The device of claim 11, further comprising:

a mirror arrangement to deflect natural sunlight and/or light of at least one headlight of the vehicle onto the wall of at least one tire.

19. A method for recognizing an inscription on a wall of a tire, the method comprising:

illuminating the tire with at least one directional light source; and

wherein the method includes the following steps;

recording multiple images of a wall of the tire as it passes by the at least one camera;

synthesizing an image of the sidewall of the tire from the recorded images; and

evaluating the synthesized image with the aid of a text recognition process.

20. The method of claim 19, wherein the synthesizing of an image of the wall of the tire includes determining the movement of local areas of the wall of the tire between two images by using an algorithm.