Direction indicating device

• US 7,093,371 B2
• Filed: 11/25/2003
• Issued: 08/22/2006
• Est. Priority Date: 12/11/2002
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Mitsubishi Denki Kabushiki Kaisha (Mitsubishi Electric Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Mitsubishi Denki Kabushiki Kaisha (Mitsubishi Electric Corporation)
• Inventors: Takeuchi, Kunihito, Sato, Fumitaka
• Primary Examiner(s): Gutierrez, Diego
• Assistant Examiner(s): JOHNSON, AMY COHEN
• Application Number:
  US10/720,348
• Publication Number:
  US 20040111907A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,001 Days
• Field of Search: 332/64, 333/55.R, 333/56, 333/57
• US Class Current: 33/355.00R
• CPC Class Codes: G01C 17/38 Testing, calibrating, or compensating of compasses

Abstract

A direction indicating device in which a current display direction is determined in consideration of the historical information of a direction of vehicle specified by a direction specifying unit 1 and a previous display direction, to be specific, in a case where the current direction of vehicle specified by the direction specifying unit 1 agrees with a previous direction of vehicle, the current display direction is changed to agree with the current direction of vehicle, and in a case where the current direction of vehicle specified by the direction specifying unit 1 is different from the previous direction of vehicle, the current display direction is made to agree with the previous display direction.

Claims

1. A direction indicating device comprising:

a directional section specifying unit that detects geomagnetism to specify a directional section of a vehicle;

a display directional section determining unit that determines a current display directional section in consideration of historical information of the directional section of the vehicle specified by the directional section specifying unit and a previous display directional section; and

a directional section providing unit that provides the current display directional section determined by the display directional section determining unit.

2. The direction indicating device as claimed in claim 1, wherein the directional section specifying unit repeatedly detects geomagnetism and finds a mean value of the geomagnetism during a sampling period and specifies the directional section to which the mean value of the geomagnetism belongs, as the direction of the vehicle.

3. The direction indicating device as claimed in claim 1, wherein when the current directional section of the vehicle specified by the directional section specifying unit agrees with a previous directional section of the vehicle, the display directional section determining unit makes the current display directional section agree with the current directional section of the vehicle.

4. The direction indicating device as claimed in claim 2, wherein when the current directional section of the vehicle specified by the directional section specifying unit agrees with the previous directional section of the vehicle, if the latest mean value of geomagnetism is within a margin region provided to prevent chattering at a boundary of the directional sections, the display directional section determining unit makes the current display directional section agree with the previous display directional section, and if the latest mean value of geomagnetism is without the margin region, the display directional section determining unit makes the current display directional section agree with the current directional section of vehicle.

5. The direction indicating device is claimed in claim 4, wherein when the current directional section of the vehicle specified by the directional section specifying unit, the previous directional section of the vehicle and the second previous directional section of the vehicle agree with each other, the display directional section determining unit narrows the margin region.

6. The direction indicating device as claimed in claim 5, wherein when the current directional section of the vehicle specified by the directional section specifying unit is different from the previous directional section of the vehicle, the display directional section determining unit returns the margin region to its original size.

7. The direction indicating device as claimed in claim 1, wherein when the current directional section of the vehicle specified by the directional section specifying unit is different from the previous directional section of the vehicle, the display directional section determining unit makes the current display directional section agree with the previous display directional section.

8. The direction indicating device as claimed in claim 1, wherein when the current directional section of the vehicle is different from the previous directional section of the vehicle, the display directional section determining unit determines a traveling directional section of the vehicle from the current directional section of the vehicle, the previous directional section of the vehicle, and the previous display directional section, and if the traveling directional section is constant, the display directional section determining unit updates the current display directional section to the traveling directional section side of the vehicle by one directional section from the previous display directional section.