DE102015206916A1 - Driver assistance system for the use of high-precision maps - Google Patents

Abstract

The invention relates to a driver assistance system for increasing the driving comfort or driving safety in a vehicle having a computing unit and a position determination unit. The position determination unit determines the position of the vehicle and the arithmetic unit takes a road condition in the vicinity of the vehicle digital map data. The arithmetic unit is also designed to adapt at least one device in the vehicle on the basis of the digital road-map data.

Description

Field of the invention

The invention relates to a driver assistance system for increasing the driving comfort or the driving safety in a vehicle, a vehicle having such a driver assistance system, a method for increasing the driving comfort or driving safety in a vehicle, a program element and a computer-readable medium.

background

Driver assistance systems are often equipped with sensors to detect the surroundings of the vehicle. If a situation is detected that has a decisive effect on the driving dynamics or also the driving comfort, the operating state of the vehicle can be adapted accordingly. If, for example, a strong curve is detected by acceleration sensors, the hardness and thus the lateral support in the seat of the vehicle can be increased locally by means of an inflatable seat cushion. Roadway sensors are also known which detect the roadway condition, in particular with regard to the friction coefficient of the roadway. If a particularly smooth roadway is detected, then, for example, the traction control of the vehicle can be adjusted so that slippage on the roadway during acceleration is reduced.

Summary of the invention

It is an object of the invention to improve driver assistance systems.

This object is solved by the features of the independent claims. Further developments of the invention will become apparent from the dependent claims and the description below.

A first aspect of the invention relates to a driver assistance system for increasing the ride comfort or the driving safety in a vehicle. The driver assistance system has a computing unit and a position determination unit. The position determining unit is designed to determine the position of the vehicle, and the arithmetic unit is designed to take a road condition in the vicinity of the vehicle digital map data. The arithmetic unit is furthermore designed to adapt at least one device in the vehicle on the basis of the digital map data on the road condition.

The vehicle is, for example, a passenger car, a truck, a vans or an electric vehicle.

The position determination unit is, for example, a commercially available navigation device whose specific position is read out. Usually, a navigation system in a vehicle based on satellite-based transit time difference measurement. For example, the publicly available, that is unencrypted frequencies of the satellite systems NAVSTAR, GLONASS or Galileo can be used. However, a position determination system with improved accuracy may also be used, such as a satellite-based system in conjunction with an inertial navigation system or in addition to transit-time difference measurement of satellite signals, a method based on the phase difference measurement of satellite signals.

Digital map data is data that can be stored in memory and can contain information about the environment or objects in the environment. There is always a reference of the data to the respective position of the object or thing over which the respective property is stored.

With the position known by the position determination unit, it is possible to compare with the data stored in the digital maps. In this respect, those objects or things and their data can be read from the digital maps, which are located in the vicinity of the vehicle. If, for example, the geodetic coordinates of the vehicle are determined by the position determination unit, the road surface condition can be read out within a radius of, for example, 300 m or 500 m or 2 km of the vehicle. With the help of this information, a device can then be adapted in the vehicle. Consequently, an adaptation of at least one device of the vehicle not only relies on data derived from environmental view sensors, but may also use the information from digital maps.

In other words, digital map data is used, for example, to adapt a device in the vehicle in advance, that is, before an effect occurs by driving on the road. Also, the digital maps can provide very detailed knowledge about the roadway. Thus, the error rate with which a device is mistakenly adjusted can be minimized.

It may be an advantageous effect of the invention that driver assistance systems more reliably perform their respective actions.

According to one embodiment of the invention, the device is a seat of the vehicle.

A seat of the vehicle can be adapted in various ways. For example, the side-stopping flanks may be hardened by higher air pressure in an air chamber located there.

According to one embodiment of the invention, the device is a device for setting the drive mode of the vehicle.

In some vehicles, the drive mode is switchable. That is, optionally, for example, an axle can be added to optionally receive four-wheel drive. Also, for example, a differential lock can be activated if prevail to the road direction asymmetric friction conditions. This can prevent that all or most of the drive power affects only one wheel of a driven axle. If, for example, the information is obtained from the digital map data that a much lower coefficient of friction prevails in the right half of the lane than on the left half of the lane, then the differential lock can be activated. If, for example, taken from the digital map data, that the coefficient of friction of the road is generally very low, so can be switched from front-wheel drive to four-wheel drive, for example.

According to one embodiment of the invention, the device is a chassis of the vehicle.

Adaptive trolleys can change their degree of hardness or even deflect one or more wheels. Especially in curves, it may be interesting to store the wheels located in the outer curve harder than the inside. This can reduce a wide tilting of the vehicle outward by the centrifugal force. It may also be that the digital maps information to be taken on a very rough or bumpy road. Then it may be advantageous to adjust the suspension harder or softer in its entirety depending on the speed of the vehicle.

According to one embodiment of the invention, the device is a traction control of the vehicle.

Even a traction control can be adjusted based on the information in the digital maps. A traction control, also called anti-skid system, is intended to prevent the wheels from spinning when accelerating. There may also be a certain degree of slippage to achieve the maximum possible acceleration - which may be against the life of the wheels. For example, if the information in the digital map data indicates a very low coefficient of friction road, more slippage may be allowed than on a very high friction roadway. In both cases, such a similar acceleration could be achieved, with slight slippage on low friction surfaces only minimizing the life of a wheel.

These described examples of devices that are adapted may also be used in combination. For example, in a curve, a seat and the chassis are adjusted simultaneously or sequentially. The adaptation of one device does not preclude the adaptation of another. Only one device or any number of devices can be adapted on the basis of the information in the digital map data.

According to one embodiment of the invention, the driver assistance system furthermore has a communication unit which is designed to communicate the digital map data with a computing unit which is spatially separate from the vehicle.

"Communicate" may mean "to send only" or "to receive only", or to transmit data between two devices in both directions, that is, to transmit and receive at each device. The terms transmitter and receiver are interchangeable in the latter case, since both devices can assume the role of a transmitter or a receiver, but in turn alternately.

For example, the remote computing unit is a server that is the global source for the digital cards. Or else, the locally separate processing unit is housed in another vehicle. In both cases, the vehicle communicates the digital map data over a network, such as a wireless network. It may be, for example, the usual mobile network or another wireless Internet connection. Through the data transmission, it may be possible for the driver assistance system to receive frequent updates of the map data, or else for the driver assistance system to only receive the respectively required map data. For example, only digital map data associated with the immediate environment of the vehicle may be transmitted. For example, the road condition data is transmitted from a server at the request of the driver assistance system. In this case, the driver assistance system communicates its position to the server or other spatially separated computing unit, and at the same time sends a request for transmission of the map data extending to a certain extent around the vehicle. Examples of the validity of the digital map data would be 300m, 800m, 1.5km or 3.5km around the vehicle or also in the expected direction of travel of the vehicle.

According to one embodiment of the invention, the driver assistance system further comprises a sensor unit, which is designed to detect the road condition in the surroundings of the vehicle, wherein the arithmetic unit is executed, the road condition detected by the sensor unit in the environment of the vehicle with the digital map data for road condition in the vicinity of the vehicle to merge and wherein the computing unit is designed to adapt the at least one device in the vehicle based on the merged data on the road condition.

The extraction of map data and the subsequent adaptation of a device of the vehicle may mean, on the one hand, that only the digital map data serve as a source of information on the road condition; on the other hand, however, that the digital map data are fused with the data from a sensor unit. Thus, the advantages of the various sources of information can be combined, or in other words, the sensor data is supported by the highly accurate map data.

According to one embodiment of the invention, the driver assistance system further comprises a memory unit, wherein the memory unit is designed to keep the digital map data stored.

Such a memory unit can either be designed as a permanent memory as a source of map data, or as a buffer, that is as a buffer. In particular, when digital map data is transmitted from a spatially separate computing unit to the driver assistance system, buffering of the digital map data in the memory unit is expedient. For example, disruptions to the network connection may occur, which can often occur in tunnels, sparsely populated areas, power outages, mountain valleys, or next to skyscrapers on the road.

According to one embodiment of the invention, the sensor unit has a sensor selected from the group consisting of radar sensor, camera, stereo camera, laser scanner and ultrasound sensor.

For example, radar sensors can be used in raster function to generate images of surfaces. Also, cameras can be used for this purpose, and these are also particularly suitable to detect road courses, for example, curves. The same purpose can be served by laser scanners. Above all, the functioning of cameras is heavily dependent on the weather, so that in dense fog or heavy rainfall support by the digital map data can be beneficial.

According to one embodiment of the invention, the road condition is at least one of curve radius, road friction coefficient and road gradient.

The road condition in this case refers, for example, to the road, in particular the guidance of the road on which the vehicle is located. For example, to adjust the suspension, or to adjust the lateral support of a seat, the radius of curvature along with the current speed of the vehicle is of particular interest. The road coefficient of friction may be crucial for traction control to adaptively establish limits. For example, a front-wheel drive vehicle can transmit little torque to the road at very steep roadway gradients. Therefore, the drive could be throttled accordingly to avoid heavy slippage. All of this road condition information may be included in the digital map data.

According to another aspect of the invention, a vehicle is provided with a driver assistance system as described above and below.

In accordance with another aspect of the invention, a method for a vehicle for increasing ride comfort or driving safety in a vehicle is provided. In a first step, the position of the vehicle is determined by a position determination unit; in a second step, the determination of the road condition in the vicinity of the vehicle takes place from digital map data; In a further, third step, the adaptation of at least one device in the vehicle to increase the driving comfort or driving safety based on the data on the road condition takes place.

According to one embodiment of the invention, the method described above further comprises the steps of: detecting the road condition in the surroundings of the vehicle by a sensor unit; and merging the digital map data with the road surface condition data collected by the sensor unit in the vicinity of the vehicle.

These additional steps would be taken before the last step described above, adjusting the device. That is, first the sensor unit would detect the road surface, then these data from the sensor unit would be merged with the digital map data, and in the last step, the adaptation of the respective device would take place.

According to another aspect of the invention, there is provided a program element which, when executed on the arithmetic unit, instructs the sensor unit and the arithmetic unit to execute the method described above.

According to a further aspect of the invention, a computer-readable medium is specified on which the program element described above is stored.

In the following, embodiments of the invention will be described with reference to the figures. Therein, like reference characters designate the same or similar elements. However, identical or similar elements can also be designated by different reference symbols.

Brief description of the figures

1 shows a vehicle on a curved road according to an embodiment of the invention.

2 shows a vehicle on a straight road according to another embodiment of the invention.

3 shows a method for increasing the ride comfort or driving safety in a vehicle according to another embodiment of the invention.

4 shows a vehicle with a driver assistance system according to another embodiment of the invention.

Detailed description of embodiments

The illustrations in the figures are schematic and not to scale.

1 shows a vehicle 1 which is traveling on a winding road. In front of the vehicle 1 is a curve with the local radius of curvature r. In this example, a camera unit recognizes the sensor unit 10 the curve and in particular the radius of curvature r. However, the camera unit has limited range and accuracy, and visibility may be affected by fog or precipitation. The driver assistance system therefore supports the sensor data by means of digital map data. The position determination unit 50 First of all, it detects the position of the vehicle 1 , This position is transmitted by the driver assistance system to the server 6 , The server 6 then transmits over the communication unit 30 of the vehicle 1 the driver assistance system digital map data for the environment of the vehicle 1 in a radius of for example 2km. These digital maps store the position and extent of the radius r curve. So also the driver assistance system is the relative vector of the curve to the vehicle 1 , ie the relative position of the curve to the vehicle 1 , known.

By dividing the square of the speed of the vehicle by the curve radius, the driver assistance system can calculate a lateral acceleration in the curve with radius r. Exceeds this lateral acceleration a certain limit, for example, 0.2 g or 2m / s ² , so can as an example of the device 100 the so-called roll compensation can be activated. The roll compensation stiffens the respective chassis parts, which face the outside of the curve. If the center of the radius of curvature in the direction of travel is right, then the outside of the curve to the left of the vehicle, that is, the left front suspension and the left rear suspension are set harder, for example by a corresponding pneumatic than the right side. Also, hydraulics can actively lift the left side of the vehicle to translate the lateral acceleration into a normal acceleration. As a result, the vehicle occupants seem to rather in the seat 5 pushed in as to the side. Also a seat 5 With printable side edges can be adjusted accordingly, so that during the turn the side of the seat 5 is set harder, which is turned to the outside of the curve.

2 shows a vehicle 1 on a straight lane. The vehicle 1 has a sensor unit 10 which has, for example, a camera unit. The camera unit scans the road condition, for example the surface condition of the roadway. For example, the road surface roughness can be deduced from a high-resolution image of the roadway. Also can be concluded by a polychromatic spectral analysis on the composition of the road surface. Using this data, for example, a coefficient of friction of the road can be estimated. However, this optical estimation method has limited accuracy and reliability. Analogous to the example described above, the vehicle 1 with his driver assistance system support the data obtained by the sensor unit by digital map data. The data from the sensor unit 10 and the digital maps are thus fused into a single estimate.

In this example, another vehicle has estimated a coefficient of friction of the road due to slip at startup. This coefficient of friction was deposited by the other vehicle in a digital map, or a digital map was updated from the other vehicle with this coefficient of friction estimation. The locally separated computing unit 6 So this case is in the other vehicle. Via Datalink can be the driver assistance system of the vehicle 1 retrieve the digital maps from the other vehicle. In these digital maps is an estimate of the coefficient of friction of the roadway, in front of the vehicle 1 lying, the driver assistance system known.

Subsequently, the driver assistance system of the vehicle 1 a device 100 adapt to the information of the merged friction coefficient estimation. In this example, the device is 100 the traction control of the vehicle, which adapts to the coefficient of friction that the vehicle 1 with maximum possible acceleration, for example at 30% slip.

3 FIG. 10 shows an exemplary method for increasing ride comfort or driving safety in a vehicle 1 , In the first step, the determination S1 of the position of the vehicle takes place 1 by a position determination unit 50 , Subsequently, the determination S2 of the road surface in the vicinity of the vehicle takes place 1 from digital map data. In the next step, the detection S3 of the road surface in the vicinity of the vehicle takes place 1 through a sensor unit 10 , Further, by merging S4 of the digital map data with that of the sensor unit 10 recorded data on the road surface in the vicinity of the vehicle 1 more detailed information available. Finally, the driver assistance system causes the adaptation S5 of at least one device 100 in the vehicle 1 to increase ride comfort or driving safety based on road surface data.

4 shows a vehicle 1 with a driver assistance system for increasing the ride comfort or driving safety with a seat 5 , a spatially separated computing unit 6 , a sensor unit 10 , a computing unit 20 , a communication unit 30 , a storage unit 40 , a position determination unit 50 and a device 100 , which is adapted to the ride comfort or driving safety of the vehicle 1 to increase.

In addition, it should be noted that "comprising" and "having" does not exclude other elements or steps, and "a" or "an" does not exclude a plurality. It should also be appreciated that features or steps described with reference to any of the above embodiments may also be used in combination with other features or steps of other embodiments described above. Reference signs in the claims are not to be regarded as limitations.

LIST OF REFERENCE NUMBERS

1

vehicle

5

Seat

6

Locally separated arithmetic unit

10

sensor unit

20

computer unit

30

communication unit

40

storage unit

50

Position Determination Entity

100

 contraption

S1

Determine

S2

Determine

S5

To adjust

S3

To capture

S4

Merge

Claims (15)

Driver assistance system for increasing the driving comfort or driving safety in a vehicle ( 1 ), comprising: a computing unit ( 20 ), and a position determination unit ( 50 ), wherein the position determination unit ( 50 ), the position of the vehicle ( 1 ), wherein the arithmetic unit ( 20 ), a road condition in the vicinity of the vehicle ( 1 ) digital map data, wherein the arithmetic unit ( 20 ) is carried out, due to the digital road surface characteristics map data (at least one device ( 100 ) in the vehicle ( 1 ). Driver assistance system according to claim 1, wherein the device ( 100 ) a seat ( 5 ) of the vehicle ( 1 ). Driver assistance system according to claim 1, wherein the device ( 100 ) a device for setting the drive mode of the vehicle ( 1 ). Driver assistance system according to claim 1, wherein the device ( 100 ) a chassis of the vehicle ( 1 ). Driver assistance system according to claim 1, wherein the device ( 100 ) a traction control of the vehicle ( 1 ). Driver assistance system according to one of the preceding claims, further comprising: a communication unit ( 30 ) carried out with one of the vehicle ( 1 ) spatially separated computing unit ( 6 ) to communicate the digital map data. Driver assistance system according to one of the preceding claims, further comprising: a sensor unit ( 10 ), which is carried out, the road condition in the environment of the vehicle ( 1 ), wherein the arithmetic unit ( 20 ) carried out by the sensor unit ( 10 ) recorded road condition in the vicinity of the vehicle ( 1 ) with the digital road-condition map data in the vicinity of the vehicle ( 1 ), and wherein the arithmetic unit ( 20 ), the at least one device is based on the merged road surface data ( 100 ) in the vehicle ( 1 ). Driver assistance system according to one of the preceding claims, further comprising: a memory unit ( 40 ), wherein the memory unit ( 40 ) is executed to keep the digital map data stored. Driver assistance system according to one of claims 7 or 8, wherein the sensor unit ( 10 ) comprises a sensor selected from the group consisting of radar sensor, camera, stereo camera, laser scanner and ultrasonic sensor. Driver assistance system according to one of the preceding claims, wherein the road surface is at least one of curve radius, Fahrreibreibwert and road gradient. Vehicle ( 1 ) with a driver assistance system according to one of the preceding claims. Method for increasing driving comfort or driving safety in a vehicle ( 1 ), comprising the steps of: - determining (S1) the position of the vehicle ( 1 ) by a position determination unit ( 50 ); Determining (S2) the road condition in the surroundings of the vehicle ( 1 ) from digital map data; Adapting (S5) at least one device ( 100 ) in the vehicle ( 1 ) to increase ride comfort or driving safety based on the road surface data. The method of claim 12, further comprising the steps of: detecting (S3) the road condition in the environment of the vehicle ( 1 ) by a sensor unit ( 10 ); Merging (S4) the digital map data with that of the sensor unit ( 10 ) recorded data on the road surface in the vicinity of the vehicle ( 1 ). Program element that when it is on the arithmetic unit ( 20 ) of a driver assistance system that guides the driver assistance system to carry out the method according to one of claims 12 or 13. Computer-readable medium on which the program element according to claim 14 is stored.

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