JP4860393B2 - Wiper device - Google Patents

Description

  The present invention relates to a wiper device that includes a plurality of motors and swings one wiper arm at a time by each motor.

The wiper device for wiping off the front glass of an automobile has a wiper motor on each of the driver's seat and passenger's seat, one wiper arm is attached to the wiper motor, and each wiper arm is individually motor-driven. There is a dual motor wiper device. Since this type of wiper device has an independent wiper motor, it is possible to change the wiping pattern on the driver seat side and on the passenger seat side. Moreover, the freedom degree of a vehicle body layout can be raised by making a wiper motor independent. Furthermore, since the wiper arm is reversed by moving the motor forward and backward, there is an advantage that the overrun of the wiper arm can be reduced.
By the way, in such a wiper device in which the wiper motor can be driven independently, it is necessary to adjust the position of each wiper blade so that the two wiper blades do not interfere on the wiping surface. Therefore, in the conventional wiper device, the first wiper motor and the second wiper motor are connected by a signal line, a control unit is provided in the first wiper motor, and a sensor for detecting the rotational position and the relative rotational position is provided in the second wiper motor. There is one provided (for example, see Patent Document 1). The control unit acquires information about the position of the rotation axis of the second wiper motor detected by the sensor through the communication line, and controls the rotation of the first wiper motor.
Special table 2004-521004 gazette

By the way, if a communication error occurs, such as when noise is superimposed on the data transmitted to the control unit, the control units will not be able to confirm each other's wiper position. May come into contact. Therefore, it is desirable to provide a separate signal line so that the wiper arm does not interfere even when a communication error occurs. An example of a signal input by another system is a pulse signal formed in accordance with the rotation of both wiper motors. In this case, when the wiper position cannot be communicated due to a communication error, the two wiper motors are synchronously controlled using a pulse signal that detects the rotation of the wiper motor input to the control unit.
However, if a deviation occurs between the pulse signals generated by each of the two wiper motors while the wiper arm repeats the swinging motion, the deviation gradually increases and the wiper arms may interfere with each other.
The present invention has been made in view of such circumstances, and it is a main object of the present invention to reliably prevent interference between wiper arms even in a state where the respective control units cannot directly confirm the mutual wiper positions. To do.

The invention according to claim 1 of the present invention that solves the above-described problems has a plurality of wiper motors, and a wiper arm is connected to each of the plurality of wiper motors one by one, and is integrally provided with each wiper motor to drive and control the wiper motor. Communication of data indicating the position of the wiper arm among the communications performed between the control devices in a wiper device that connects the control devices so that they can communicate with each other and swings the wiper arm by rotating the wiper motor forward and backward. Determining means for determining that a failure has occurred , counting pulse signals output from a rotation detection sensor assembled in the wiper motor, and counting means for specifying the position of the wiper arm based on the count value; when the determination means determines that a communication failure, stop intermittently said wiper arm And drive control means for moving to a position, when moving the wiper arm to the intermittent stop position when a communication failure, to replace the count value of said counting means, the count value corresponding to the intermittent stop position of the wiper arm, or the The wiper device is characterized in that each control device has correction means for correcting the count value so as to be reset .
In this wiper device, the wiper arm operates intermittently when communication at the wiper position becomes impossible. When the wiper arm reaches the intermittent stop position in the process of intermittent operation, the deviation of the pulse signal for detecting the rotational position of the wiper motor is corrected at that timing.

According to a second aspect of the present invention, in the wiper device according to the first aspect, when the communication failure occurs, the wiper arm on the passenger seat side is moved to the intermittent stop position, and then the wiper arm on the driver seat side is moved to the intermittent stop position. Then, the correction of the count value of the corresponding count means is performed by each correction means .
In this wiper device, since the wiper arm performs a normal intermittent operation, water drops on the glass surface can be wiped even when a communication failure occurs.

  According to the present invention, by correcting the rotational position of the wiper motor at the intermittent stop position, it is possible to prevent the wiper arm from contacting due to the displacement of the wiper motor. Since the wiper operates intermittently when a communication failure occurs, the driver can be notified of the occurrence of the communication failure.

The best mode for carrying out the invention will be described in detail with reference to the drawings.
As shown in FIG. 1, the wiper device 1 includes a first control device 4 and a first wiper motor 5 that are connected to a switch 2 provided in a vehicle interior by a communication line 3, and three to the first control device 4. It has the 2nd control apparatus 7 and the 2nd wiper motor 8 which were connected via the two communication lines 6A, 6B, 6C, and the wiper arms 9 and 10 are connected with each wiper motor 5 and 8 one each.

  The switch 2 is an input device that accepts a driver's operation, and can input a signal for turning on and off the wiper device 1 and a signal for controlling the operations (intermittent operation and swing speed) of the wiper arms 9 and 10. ing. The communication between the switch 2 and the first control device 4 uses serial communication using an in-vehicle LAN, for example, CAN (Controller Area Network) or LIN (Local Interconnect Network).

  The first control device 4 has a CPU (central processing unit, drive control means) 21 to which a signal from the switch 2 is input, and stores a fixed data necessary for rotation control of the first motor 5. And a memory 22B capable of temporarily storing data. Furthermore, it has the communication circuit 24 used when communicating with the driver circuit 23 (drive control means) of the 1st wiper motor 5, and the 2nd control apparatus 7. FIG. Here, the CPU 21 counts the pulse signal output according to the rotational position of the first wiper motor 5, the correction means 52 for correcting the count value of the pulse signal, and communication using the communication line 6A. It functions as the determination means 53 for determining the error.

  The first wiper motor 5 has a stator and a rotor, and rotates the rotor according to the energization pattern input from the first control device 4. A rotation detection sensor 25 for detecting the rotation angle of the rotor and a direction detection sensor 26 for detecting the rotation direction are attached to the first wiper motor 5. These sensors 25 and 26 use Hall elements that output pulse signals in response to changes in magnetic poles accompanying the rotation of the rotor. For example, when the direction detection sensor 26 is disposed at a position that is 90 ° out of phase with respect to the rotation detection sensor 25, the rotation direction is specified from the signal level of the direction detection sensor 26 at the time of the rise of the pulse signal of the rotation detection sensor 25. Can do.

  The rotational axis of the rotor of the first wiper motor 5 is input to the gear box 27. The gear box 27 has an internal structure in which the rotational speed of the rotary shaft is reduced before being transmitted to the crank arm 28. The tip of the crank arm 28 is connected to the wiper arm 9 via a drive lever 29. The rotational movement of the first wiper motor 5 is converted into a swinging movement of the wiper arm 9 via a link mechanism including a crank arm 28 and a drive lever 29. A wiper blade 30 is attached to the tip of the wiper arm 9. The wiper blade 30 is provided with a rubber member for wiping off water droplets on the glass surface.

  The second control device 7 has the same configuration as the first control device 4. That is, the CPU 21 and the driver circuit 23 functioning as driving means, the memory 22A and the memory 22B, and the communication circuit 24 are included. The CPU 21 functions as a counting unit 51, a correcting unit 52, and a determining unit 53.

  The second wiper motor 8 has the same configuration as the first wiper motor 5, and the rotation detection sensor 25 and the direction detection sensor 26 can detect the rotation angle and the rotation direction of the rotor. The rotating shaft of the rotor is connected to a link mechanism including a crank arm 28 and a drive lever 29 via a gear box 27, and the wiper arm 10 can swing. A wiper blade 30 is attached to the tip of the wiper arm 10. The link mechanism and the wiper arm 10 are arranged substantially symmetrically with the link mechanism and the wiper arm 9 on the first wiper motor 5 side. The wiper arm 9 on the first wiper motor 5 side is disposed on the driver's seat side, and the wiper arm 10 on the second wiper motor 8 side is disposed on the passenger seat side.

  Communication lines 6A, 6B, and 6C connecting the first control device 4 and the second control device 7 have the two wiper motors 5 and 6 with the first control device 4 as a master and the second control device 7 as a slave. This is a dedicated communication line for synchronous control. The communication line 6A is used for communicating the positions of the wiper arms 9 and 10 (hereinafter referred to as wiper positions). An example of the communication protocol is a UART (Universal Asynchronous Receiver Transmitter) protocol. As shown in FIG. 2, the data configuration to be communicated includes data indicating position information, wiper Lo / Hi operation information, and the like, and each is configured as data D composed of a plurality of bits. In this case, five frames of data D1 to D5 are continuous in one frame. In this embodiment, the ID bits (data order) in the data D1 to D5 are omitted. By doing so, the communication speed is increased and the burden on the CPU 21 is reduced.

The communication line 6B transmits and receives a pulse signal (rotation pulse signal) output from the rotation detection sensor 25 assembled to each of the first wiper motor 5 and the second wiper motor 8 between the two control devices 4 and 7. Used for. An example of the rotation pulse signal is shown in FIG.
The communication line 6C transmits and receives a pulse signal (direction pulse signal) output from the direction detection sensor 26 assembled to each of the first wiper motor 5 and the second wiper motor 8 between the two control devices 4 and 7. Used for. An example of the direction pulse signal is shown in FIG. In FIG. 3, the direction pulse signal is a signal having a phase advanced by 90 ° with respect to the rotation pulse signal during forward rotation. At the time of reverse rotation, a pulse signal is generated at a timing at which the phase is advanced by 90 ° with respect to the rotation pulse signal, and the signal level is reversed with respect to that at the time of normal rotation. Therefore, the rotation position of the rotor can be specified by counting the number of pulses of the rotation pulse signal by the counting means 51, and when the rising edge of the rotation pulse signal is detected, the signal level of the directional pulse is checked to detect the wiper motors 5, 8. The direction of rotation can be identified.

Next, the operation of this embodiment will be described.
When the driver operates the switch 2, the first control device 4 calculates position information for wiping the glass surface with the wiper arm 9 with reference to the control data stored in the memory 22 </ b> A. A command signal for the first wiper motor 5 is created based on the position information, the first wiper motor 5 is driven via the driver circuit 23, and the second control device 7 is caused to receive position information and other operation information via the communication line 6A. Send etc. The second control device 7 calculates position information for wiping the glass surface with the wiper arm 10 with reference to the control data stored in its own memory 22A. A command signal for the second wiper motor 8 is created based on the position information, and the second wiper motor 8 is driven via the driver circuit 23. Furthermore, position information and other operation information are transmitted from the second control device 7 to the first control device 4 through the communication line 6A.

  The first wiper motor 5 receives the current supply from the driver circuit 23 and rotates the rotor. The rotation of the rotor is decelerated by the gear box 27 and then transmitted to the crank arm 28 to rotate the crank arm 28. The rotation of the crank arm 28 is transmitted to the wiper arm 9 via the drive lever 29, and the wiper blade 30 wipes off water droplets and the like on the driver's seat side of the glass surface. As the rotor rotates, the sensors 25 and 26 generate pulse signals at the respective timings. This pulse signal is input to the CPU 21 and used for rotation control of the first wiper motor 5. When the first wiper motor 5 is reversely rotated, the wiper arm 9 is reversed. When forward rotation and reverse rotation of the first wiper motor 5 are alternately performed, water droplets and the like on the glass surface are wiped while the wiper arm 9 is swung. Similarly, the wiper arm 10 is swung by the rotation of the second wiper motor 8 on the passenger seat side, and water droplets on the passenger seat side of the glass surface are wiped off.

Here, processing when data communication is performed between the two control devices 4 and 7 will be described with reference to FIG.
First, a normal wiping operation is performed (step S101), and the determination unit 53 checks whether there is a communication error (step S102). The determination of the communication error includes, for example, a case where a necessary data amount cannot be received within a predetermined communication time, a case where noise is received, or a case where data is corrupted due to noise.
If a communication error is detected (Yes in step S102), the wiper arms 9 and 10 are moved to the intermittent stop position (step S103). The intermittent stop position is a lower inversion position, and the wiper arm 9 on the driver's seat side is disposed above the wiper arm 10 on the passenger seat side. In other words, the CPU 21 and the driver circuit 23 control the rotation of the wiper motors 5 and 9 so that the wiper arm 9 on the driver's seat side reaches the lower reverse position after the wiper arm 10 on the passenger seat side first reaches the lower reverse position. I do.

  When the wiper arms 9 and 10 reach the intermittent stop position (Yes in step S104), the correction means 52 corrects the count value of the rotation pulse signal counted by the counting means 51 (step S105). Since the rotational position of the wiper motors 5 and 8 at the intermittent stop position and the rotational direction when shifting from the intermittent stop position to the wiping operation are determined in advance, the count value of the counting means 51 is determined when the wiper arms 9 and 10 are at the intermittent stop position. Replace with the original count value or reset the count value.

Thereafter, the wiper motors 5 and 8 are driven to cause the wiper arms 9 and 10 to reciprocate once to perform the wiping operation once (step S106), and to the intermittent stop position (step S107). When the wiper arm 10 and the wiper arm 9 reach the intermittent stop position in this order (Yes in step S108), the correction unit 52 corrects the pulse count (step S109). Further, at this timing, the determination unit 53 determines whether or not the communication is restored to the normal state (step S110), and if it is in the normal state, the process returns to step S101.
If the communication has not returned to the normal state (No in step S110), when the intermittent time has elapsed (Yes in step S111), the process returns to step S110 to check the communication state. The intermittent time refers to a stop time between the wiping operation and the wiping operation during normal intermittent operation.

The processing from step S101 to step S110 is repeated until the switch 2 is turned off.
The communication from the first control device 4 to the second control device 7 has been described so far. However, the second control device 7 transfers to the first control device 4 using a time zone during which data is not transmitted. When communicating position information, the first control device 4 performs the same processing.

According to this embodiment, the position information cannot be directly communicated between the two control devices 4 and 8 due to a communication abnormality, and the swing control of the wiper arm 9 and 10 is controlled by the rotation pulse signal and the direction pulse signal. In addition, since the rotation pulse signal is corrected at the intermittent stop position, it is possible to prevent the positional deviation between the two wiper arms 9 and 10 from increasing during the wiping operation under the abnormal communication state. For this reason, interference of the wiper arms 9 and 10 is prevented.
It is not necessary to perform special communication that constantly corrects pulses under abnormal communication conditions, and the apparatus configuration can be simplified.
If a communication error occurs while the wiper device 1 is continuously wiping the glass surface in high mode or low mode, the wiper device 1 automatically shifts to intermittent operation. Can be easily recognized.

Note that the present invention can be widely applied without being limited to the above-described embodiment.
For example, the intermittent stop position is not limited to the lower reverse position, and may be another position.
The configuration may be such that not only the rotation pulse signal but also the direction pulse signal is corrected. Furthermore, the configuration may be such that the drive control of the two wiper motors 5 and 8 is performed by communicating only the position information and the rotation pulse signal without using the direction pulse signal.
The configurations of the wiper arms 9 and 10 and the link mechanism are not limited to the embodiment. Further, the first control device 4 and the first wiper motor 5 may be disposed on the passenger seat side. You may have three or more control apparatuses, wiper motors, and wiper arms. By using one control device as a master and the remaining two control devices as slaves, the same operations and effects as described above can be obtained.

It is a block diagram which shows the structure of the wiper apparatus which concerns on embodiment of this invention. It is a figure which shows typically the data communicated between control apparatuses. It is a figure which shows typically a rotation pulse signal and a direction pulse signal. It is a flowchart of the process of the data communicated between control apparatuses.

Explanation of symbols

DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 Wiper apparatus 4 1st control apparatus 5 1st wiper motor 6A, 6B, 6C Communication line 7 2nd control apparatus 8 2nd wiper motor 9, 10 Wiper arm 21 CPU (drive control means)
23 Driver circuit (drive control means)
52 Correction means 53 Determination means

Claims (2)

Have multiple wiper motors,
The wiper arms are connected to the plurality of wiper motors one by one,
In the wiper device that is integrally provided with each wiper motor, and that connects the control devices that drive and control the wiper motor so that they can communicate with each other, and that the wiper motor swings by rotating the wiper motor forward and backward,
Of the communication performed between the control devices, a determination unit that determines that a failure has occurred in communication of data indicating the position of the wiper arm;
Counting means for counting the pulse signal output from the rotation detection sensor assembled in the wiper motor, and specifying the position of the wiper arm based on the count value;
Drive control means for moving the wiper arm to an intermittent stop position when the determination means determines a communication failure;
When moving the wiper arm to the intermittent stop position when a communication failure, the count value of said counting means, to replace the count value corresponding to the intermittent stop position of the wiper arm, or the correction is to reset the count value Correction means;
Each of the control devices has a wiper device. At the time of communication failure, after the wiper arm on the passenger seat side is moved to the intermittent stop position, the wiper arm on the driver seat side is moved to the intermittent stop position, and then the count value of the corresponding count means by each correction means is set. The wiper device according to claim 1, wherein correction is performed.

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