DE102022212319A1 - Method for operating an actuating system of an automated manual transmission - Google Patents

Abstract

The invention relates to a method for operating an actuating system of an automated manual transmission, wherein an actuating element, which can be moved into different positions via an actuating actuator, in particular a pneumatic actuating actuator, is transferred from a start position to a target position via the actuating actuator. In order to avoid high impact forces, the transfer is checked as to whether the target position is an end position defined by a stop as the first criterion and whether the start position and the target position are not adjacent positions as the second criterion. If both criteria are met, the actuating element is not transferred directly from the start position to the target position, in that the actuating element is first positioned via the actuating actuator in at least one intermediate position, which is to be passed over during the movement of the actuating element from the start position to the target position, before a further movement of the actuating element is carried out via the actuating actuator to the target position. If at least one of the two criteria is not met, the control element is moved directly from the start position to the target position via the control actuator.

Description

The invention relates to a method for operating an actuating system of an automated manual transmission, wherein an actuating element, which can be moved into different positions via an actuating actuator, in particular a pneumatic actuating actuator, is transferred from a start position to a target position via the actuating actuator. The invention further relates to a control device, a computer program product and a data carrier.

Automated manual transmissions usually use actuating actuators, which can be used to perform actuating movements for selecting shift gates or for ultimately changing gears. An actuating actuator usually comprises an actuating piston, which is slidably guided in an actuating cylinder of the actuating actuator and can perform actuating movements by applying pressure to a working medium. The actuating piston is then coupled to an actuating element of an associated actuating system. In commercial vehicles in particular, the working medium is compressed air. An actuating actuator can usually move to different positions, which are each assigned to corresponding switching positions of the associated actuating system of the respective transmission. When moving in positions that are each defined by an end stop, measures are sometimes taken to avoid high impact forces on the respective end stop when moving to one of these positions, as this would otherwise cause corresponding impact noises.

The EN 10 2005 011 273 A1 a method for operating an actuating system of an automated manual transmission, wherein this actuating system is a switching device via which different gears of the manual transmission can be switched. The actuating system has an actuating element in the form of a shift sleeve, which can be moved into different positions via an actuating actuator, in which the shift sleeve switches a corresponding gear of the manual transmission. The actuating actuator is controlled in such a way that an actuation-related impact occurs with the lowest possible impact force and/or with the lowest possible impact noise. Among other things, a respective axial position of the impact is determined and stored, and this position is approached at a reduced actuating speed during subsequent actuating movements.

Based on the prior art described above, it is now the object of the present invention to provide a reliable alternative in order to reliably avoid high impact forces in an actuating system of an automated manual transmission when an actuating element moves into an end position defined by a stop.

This object is achieved from a process engineering perspective based on the generic term of claim 1 in conjunction with its characterizing features. The dependent claims that follow each of these describe advantageous developments of the invention. A control device with which an aforementioned method can be carried out is also the subject of claims 7 and 8. Furthermore, claim 9 relates to a computer program product and claim 10 to a data carrier.

According to the invention, in a method for operating an actuating system of an automated manual transmission, an actuating element which can be moved into different positions via an actuating actuator is transferred from a start position to a target position via the actuating actuator.

The actuating actuator is preferably a pneumatic actuating actuator, which in particular has an actuating piston that is guided in a translational, i.e. axially displaceable, manner in a surrounding actuating cylinder. The actuating cylinder and the actuating piston together delimit at least one actuating chamber that can be supplied with compressed air. The supply takes place by supplying the compressed air into or discharging the compressed air from the at least one actuating chamber in order to set a pressure prevailing in the at least one actuating chamber. The actuating piston in the actuating cylinder can be preloaded, in particular via a spring element, into a position from which the actuating piston can be moved by correspondingly increasing the respective pressure in the at least one actuating chamber. In this respect, the respective actuating position of the actuating piston in the actuating cylinder is defined by the ratio of the actuating force set via the pressure to the spring force of the spring element.

In particular, the pneumatic actuator is assigned an actuating device, via which the actuator can be controlled and which has at least one valve. In this case, the compressed air can be exchanged with the at least one actuating chamber via the at least one valve for changing the respective pressure in the at least one actuating chamber, which is to be understood as meaning that the at least one valve supplies compressed air to increase the respective pressure in at least one actuating chamber and supplies compressed air to reduce the respective pressure in at least one actuating chamber. With several valves and simultaneous supply and discharge, the ratio of the mass flow of supplied compressed air to the mass flow of discharged compressed air is decisive for the position in which the actuating piston in the actuating cylinder is set. This means that the different actuating positions can be set by a corresponding position of the actuating piston in the actuating cylinder.

The actuating actuator is part of an actuating system of an automated manual transmission, wherein the actuating actuator is coupled to an actuating element within the actuating system in order to be able to move this actuating element into different positions. As part of the method according to the invention for operating the actuating system, the actuating actuator transfers the actuating element from a start position, i.e. an initial position, to a target position, i.e. a desired position to be set.

The invention now includes the technical teaching that for the transfer it is checked whether the target position is an end position defined by a stop as the first criterion and whether the start position and the target position are not adjacent positions as the second criterion. If both criteria are present, the actuating element is not directly transferred from the start position to the target position, as the actuating element is first positioned via the actuating actuator in at least one intermediate position, which is to be passed over during the movement of the actuating element from the start position to the target position, before a further movement of the actuating element is carried out via the actuating actuator to the target position. If at least one of the two criteria is not present, however, the actuating element is directly transferred from the start position to the target position via the actuating actuator.

In other words, in order to carry out the transfer of the actuating element from the start position to the target position, it is first checked whether two criteria are met. The first criterion is the condition that the target position is the end position, which is defined by a stop, whereby the actuating element runs into this stop when moving to this target position. The second criterion, on the other hand, is the condition that the start position and the target position are not adjacent positions, i.e. they are not directly next to each other. If these two criteria, i.e. these two conditions, are met together, the actuating element is not moved directly and without interruption from the start position to the target position via the actuating actuator. Instead, during the transfer of the actuating element from the start position to the target position, at least one intermediate position is approached, via which the actuating element is to be moved when moving from the start position to the target position and in which the actuating element is now positioned for the interruption of the movement in the form of an intermediate stop. After this positioning, the actuator is then moved further to the target position in order to finally realize the required movement from the start position to the target position. However, if both criteria are not met or if only one of the two criteria is not present, the actuator is moved directly from the start position to the target position.

This operation of an actuating system of an automated manual transmission has the advantage that high impact forces of the actuating element can be avoided when it moves to an end position if this movement takes place over several positions. This is because if the target position is an end position defined by a stop and the start position and this target position are not adjacent to each other, at least one intermediate position is approached during the movement, which ultimately results in a lower speed of the actuating element when it moves into the end position and thus a lower impact force. This also results in less noise and lower component loads when the actuating element moves to the end position intended as the target position.

In accordance with the invention, the query of the two criteria is carried out in particular when there is a request to transfer the actuating element from the start position to the target position, wherein the query is preferably carried out before leaving the start position.

Within the scope of the invention, the two criteria are checked in parallel, although a sequential check would be conceivable as an alternative. A check of the first criterion could also be carried out before or after a check of the second criterion.

According to one embodiment of the invention, at least one position adjacent to the target position is selected as at least one intermediate position. This has the advantage that the movement of the actuating element from the start position to the target position is thus interrupted immediately before the target position is reached and thus the actuating speed when entering the end position, which is the target position, is reduced as much as possible.

According to one possible embodiment of the invention, the different positions are numbered according to their sequence, whereby a number associated with the start position and a number associated with the target position are compared with each other. In this case, each representable position of the control element is assigned a number, whereby this numbering reflects the sequence of the positions on top of each other. To query the two criteria, a number that is assigned to the start position is compared with a number that is assigned to the target position. In this way, the position of the start position in relation to the target position can advantageously be checked in a simple manner.

In a further development of the above-mentioned design option, the actuating element is moved to several intermediate positions in succession via the actuating actuator if, when both criteria are met, the numbers associated with the start position and the target position differ by more than two. In this case, several intermediate positions are approached if there is more than one intermediate position between the start position and the target position. This can be easily recorded using the numbering and has the advantage that the actuating element does not move at a high speed during the movement.

Alternatively or in addition to the aforementioned further development, if both criteria are met and the target position number is higher than the start position, a position with a number that is smaller than the corresponding number of the target position and larger than the corresponding number of the start position is selected as at least one intermediate position. If, on the other hand, both criteria are met and the target position number is lower than the start position, a position with a number that is larger than the corresponding number of the target position and smaller than the corresponding number of the start position is selected as at least one intermediate position. This makes it easy to take account of the directionality of the movement by calculating the number to be set for the at least one intermediate position depending on the location of the start position and the target position.

It is a further embodiment of the invention that a selector device is movable as the actuating element, via which different shift gates of the automated manual transmission can be selected, with each position being assigned to a shift gate. In this case, the actuating system is a selector device, via which different shift gates can be selected in the automated manual transmission. For each selectable shift gate, the actuating element of the selector device is to be arranged in an associated position, with the different positions being able to be set according to the invention via the actuating actuator. Alternatively, the actuating element can also be a shift sleeve of a shifting device, with the shift sleeve switching an associated gear of the automated manual transmission in different positions.

The invention also relates to a control device, which is in particular a transmission control device of an automated manual transmission. This control device is set up to transfer an actuating element from a start position to a target position of different positions via an actuating actuator. In addition, the control device is designed to query whether the target position is an end position defined by an end stop as the first criterion and whether the start position and target position are not adjacent positions as the second criterion, wherein the control device is also set up not to cause a direct transfer of the actuating element from the start position to the target position if both criteria are met, in that the control device first moves the actuating element via the actuating actuator into at least one intermediate position, which is to be passed over during the movement of the actuating element from the start position to the target position, before the control device causes a further movement of the actuating element into the target position via the actuating actuator. Furthermore, the control unit is designed to carry out the direct transfer of the actuating element to the target position via the actuating actuator if both criteria are not met. Furthermore, the control unit can then also be set up to implement one or more of the aforementioned variants of a method according to the invention for operating a transmission actuating system.

The method according to the invention can also be embodied as a computer program product which, when it runs on a processor, for example a processor of an aforementioned control unit, instructs the processor by software to carry out the associated method steps according to the invention. In this context In this connection, the subject matter of the invention also includes a computer-readable medium on which a computer program product as described above is stored in a retrievable manner.

• 1 eine schematische Ansicht eines Teils eines Stellsystems im Bereich eines Stellaktuators; und
• 2 ein Ablaufdiagramm eines erfindungsgemäßen Verfahrens zum Betreiben des Getriebestellsystems aus 1.

An advantageous embodiment of the invention, which is explained below, is shown in the drawings. It shows:

• 1 a schematic view of a part of a positioning system in the area of a positioning actuator; and
• 2 a flow chart of a method according to the invention for operating the transmission control system from 1 .

Out of 1 shows a schematic view of an actuating system 1 of an automated manual transmission, which is in particular a manual transmission for a commercial vehicle. The actuating system 1 comprises an actuating element 2 in the form of a selector device 3 - shown only very schematically here - via which it is possible to switch between different shift gates of the transmission, with several different gears of the transmission then being able to be switched in the individual shift gate. The selector device 3 can be arranged in one position for each shift gate, in which position it is then possible to act on a shift rod assigned to the respective shift gate in order to switch the associated gears.

The position of the selector device 3 in the actuating system 1 is automatically controlled by a control unit 4, which is in particular a transmission control unit of the automated manual transmission. The control unit 4 can adjust the selector device 3 between the different positions and thus select one of the shift gates via a pneumatic actuating actuator 5, which comprises an actuating piston 6 and an actuating cylinder 7. The actuating piston 6 is slidably guided in the actuating cylinder 7 and, together with the actuating cylinder 7, delimits a pressure chamber 8 to which compressed air can be supplied via at least one valve 9 and from which compressed air can be discharged via at least one valve 10. The valves 9 and 10 can be controlled by the control unit 4, whereby the pressure in the pressure chamber 8 and thus a position of the actuating piston 6 in the actuating cylinder 7 can be adjusted via the volume flows of compressed air guided via the valves 9 and 10.

In this case, certain setting positions are to be represented, to each of which one of the positions of the selection device 3 is to be assigned. In order to detect a current setting position of the actuating piston 6 in the actuating cylinder 7, a displacement sensor 11 is provided, via which the control unit 4 can determine a current displacement path of the actuating piston 6 in the actuating cylinder 7.

Of the positions of the selector device 3 to be displayed, the positions assigned to the lowest shift gate and the highest shift gate are end positions which are defined by stops either in the area of the selector device 3 or in the area of the actuating actuator 5. Between these end positions there are several further positions of the selector device 3 which are assigned to shift gates which lie between the lowest shift gate and the highest shift gate.

In order to avoid high impact forces when changing the shift gate of the automated manual transmission when changing to a shift gate defined by an end position by skipping intermediate shift gates, the actuating system 1 is operated within the framework of a method according to the invention, which is now described with the aid of the flow chart from 2 should be described in more detail.

The method according to the invention begins with the presence of a specification for changing the shift gate of the automated manual transmission, whereby the selectable shift gates of the manual transmission are numbered consecutively according to their order in order to carry out the method. In a first step S1, the associated numbers are determined for the currently selected shift gate and thus the start position of the selection device 3 and for the shift gate to be selected and thus the target position of the selection device 3 and are compared with one another in such a way that a distance is formed between the associated numbers.

Following this, two criteria are checked in parallel in a step S2 based on the associated numbers and the determined distance. Firstly, the associated number of the target position is used to check whether this target position is an end position that is defined by a stop. Secondly, the second criterion is to check whether the start position and the target position are adjacent to each other, for which purpose the distance between the associated numbers is checked.

If both criteria are met in step S2, the system moves on to step S3, while otherwise, ie if only one or neither of the two criteria is met, the system moves on to step S4. In step S4, the target position is left unchanged and then en, a step S5 is then carried out in which the selection device 3 is moved to the target position via the actuating actuator 5. In the course of the successive execution of steps S4 and S5, a direct movement of the selection device 3 from the start position to the target position is initiated without interruption.

If, however, both criteria were met in step S2, i.e. the target position is the end position and the distance between the positions is greater than one, then step S3 next checks whether the number of the target position is greater than the number of the start position. If this is the case, the target position is the position assigned to the highest shift gate, whereupon an intermediate position is determined that is one number smaller than the actual target position. Accordingly, this intermediate position is then the second highest shift gate next to the highest shift gate.

If, however, the result from step S3 is that the number of the target position is smaller than the number of the start position, the target position is the position assigned to the lowest shift gate. Instead of step S6, the process then moves on to step S7, in which an intermediate position is also determined, but in this case it is one number larger than the actual target position. This intermediate position is therefore the second lowest shift gate located next to the lowest shift gate.

Both after step S6 and after step S7, in a step S8, the selection device 3 is moved via the actuating actuator 5 to the specific intermediate position and then in a step S9 it is checked whether the specific intermediate position has been reached. If this is not the case, the system returns to step S8, while once a movement of the selection device 3 to the specific intermediate position is detected, the system switches to step S5. In step S5, the selection device 3 is then again moved to the actually desired target position via the actuating actuator 5. In this respect, when going through steps S3, S6 or S7, S8, S9 and finally S5, a movement of the selection device 3 to the desired target position is temporarily interrupted by first controlling an intermediate position adjacent to the target position. This then results in a lower setting speed of the selection device 3 during the final movement into the respective end position and thus also a lower impact force when approaching the respective stop.

Following step S5, the method according to the invention is then terminated by reaching the desired target position.

By means of the method according to the invention, an actuating system can thus be operated in such a way that high impact forces are reliably avoided when an actuating element moves into an end position defined by a stop.

Reference symbols

1

Positioning system

2

Actuator

3

Dialing device

4

Control unit

5

Actuator

6

Actuating piston

7

Actuating cylinder

8th

Printing room

9

Valve

10

Valve

11

Displacement sensor

S1 to S9

Individual steps

QUOTES INCLUDED IN THE DESCRIPTION

This list of documents listed by the applicant was generated automatically and is included solely to provide the reader with better information. The list is not part of the German patent or utility model application. The DPMA accepts no liability for any errors or omissions.

Cited patent literature

• DE 102005011273 A1 [0003]

Claims (10)

Method for operating an actuating system (1) of an automated manual transmission, wherein an actuating element (2), which can be moved into different positions via an actuating actuator (5), in particular a pneumatic actuating actuator (5), is transferred from a start position to a target position via the actuating actuator (5), characterized in that for the transfer it is checked whether the target position is an end position defined by a stop as the first criterion and whether the start position and the target position are positions that are not adjacent to one another as the second criterion, that if both criteria are present, no direct transfer of the actuating element (2) from the start position to the target position is carried out by the actuating element (2) being initially positioned via the actuating actuator (5) in at least one intermediate position, which is to be passed over in the course of the movement of the actuating element (2) from the start position to the target position, before a further movement of the actuating element (2) is carried out via the actuating actuator (5) to the target position. and that if at least one of the two criteria is not met, the direct transfer of the actuating element (2) via the actuating actuator (5) from the start position to the target position is carried out. Procedure according to Claim 1 , characterized in that at least one position which is adjacent to the target position is selected as at least one intermediate position. Procedure according to Claim 1 or 2 , characterized in that the different positions are numbered according to their sequence, whereby a number associated with the start position and a number associated with the target position are compared with each other. Procedure according to Claim 3 , characterized in that the actuating element (2) is moved successively into several intermediate positions via the actuating actuator (5) if, when both criteria are present, the numbers associated with the start position and the target position differ from one another by more than two. Procedure according to Claim 3 or 4 , characterized in that if both criteria are present and in the case of a number of the target position that is higher than the start position than at least one intermediate position, a position with a number is selected that is smaller than the associated number of the target position and larger than the associated number of the start position, while if both criteria are present and in the case of a number of the target position that is lower than the start position than at least one intermediate position, a position with a number is selected that is larger than the associated number of the target position and smaller than the associated number of the start position. Method according to one of the preceding claims, characterized in that a selector device (3) is movable as the actuating element (2), via which different shift gates of the automated manual transmission can be selected, one shift gate being assigned to each position. Control device (4), in particular a transmission control device, which is set up to transfer an actuating element (2) via an actuating actuator (5) from a start position to a target position of different positions, wherein the control device (4) is designed to query whether, as a first criterion, the target position is an end position defined by an end stop and whether, as a second criterion, the start position and the target position are positions that are not adjacent to one another, wherein the control device (4) is also set up not to cause a direct transfer of the actuating element (2) from the start position to the target position if both criteria are present, in that the control device (4) first moves the actuating element (2) via the actuating actuator (5) into at least one intermediate position, which is to be passed over in the course of the movement of the actuating element (2) from the start position to the target position, before the control device (4) causes a further movement of the actuating element (2) into the target position via the actuating actuator (5), and wherein the control unit (4) is designed to carry out the direct transfer of the actuating element (2) via the actuating actuator (5) into the target position if both criteria are not met. Control unit (4) after Claim 7 , which is further configured to carry out a method according to one or more of the Claims 2 until 6 to carry out. Computer program product for a control device (4) according to Claim 7 or 8th , by which a method according to one or more of the Claims 1 until 6 can be carried out, wherein a routine for operating an actuating system (1) of an automated manual transmission is implemented by corresponding control commands stored in software. Data carriers containing a computer program product Claim 9 .

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