JPH08295174A - Floodlight control device for vehicle - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE: To provide a floodlight control device for a vehicle capable of automatically lighting the floodlight before the vehicle goes in a dark area such as a tunnel by a simple constitution without paying a great deal of expenditure and time. CONSTITUTION: The device is equipped with a memory means 15 storing information on roads, a present position detection means 20 detecting the present position of a vehicle, and with a judging means 32 judging necessity on whether or not floodlight for a vehicle is turned on based on information on roads stored in the memory means and information on the present position of the vehicle detected by the present position detection means. Information on roads is stored in the memory means as data 17 concerning places close to the both ends of a road area where the vehicle should run with its floodlight turned on regardless of day and night. Furthermore, the judging means controls the turning on/off of floodlight while the present time data from a clock means 33 is being referred to.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a device for automatically determining lighting and extinguishing of an illuminating lamp for a vehicle such as an automobile and automatically controlling the lighting and extinguishing of the lighting.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art As a method for automatically controlling the turning on and off of a vehicle illumination lamp, an automatic light control device utilizing a photodiode or the like is mounted on a vehicle, and the lighting is automatically detected by detecting that the surroundings have become dark. It has been proposed and put into practical use to turn on a lamp (especially a headlight).

However, in this method, for example, when the headlight is turned on when traveling in a tunnel, the headlight is turned on after the photodiode detects that the vehicle has entered the tunnel and the surroundings have become dark. Immediately after entering the tunnel, you must drive with the headlights off. As described above, in the above-described conventional automatic light control device, when the surroundings are abruptly dark, a certain time lag is inevitable between the time when it is detected and the time when the headlight is actually turned on, and it is safe. It lacked sex.

Therefore, an ambient information detecting device (so-called beacon transmitter) having a transmitting function is installed on the road side of the entrance and exit of the tunnel, and the position information of the tunnel, local traffic information, ambient brightness information, etc. are transmitted to the vehicle. It has been proposed that the illumination lamp control device installed in the vehicle receives this and automatically controls the illumination lamp to be turned on and off (Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 3-57736).

According to this conventional technique, the headlight can be automatically turned on before entering the tunnel, so that the safety of vehicle traveling is ensured.

[0006]

However, according to the above-mentioned conventional technique, not only is the illumination light control device mounted on each vehicle, but also under tunnels at various places or under elevated structures that require the illumination lights to be turned on even during daytime. Surrounding information detection devices must be installed at all entrances and exits of underground parking lots.

[0007]

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION It is therefore an object of the present invention to solve the above-mentioned problems of the prior art and to provide an automatic control device for an illumination lamp for a vehicle without spending a great deal of cost and time. .

That is, according to the present invention, a storage means for storing road information, a current position detection means for detecting the current position of the vehicle, a road information stored in the storage means and a vehicle detected by the current position detection means A vehicle illumination lamp control device comprising: a determination unit that determines whether or not the vehicle illumination lamp is turned on or off based on the current position information.

The road information stored in the storage means preferably includes data on points near both ends of the road area where the illumination lamp should be turned on.

Clock means is further provided, and in addition to the road information and the current position information, the current time information from the clock means is also input to the judging means, and the judging means turns on or off the vehicle lamp based on these information. It can be configured to determine the need for turning off.

Further, the operation of the wiper can be controlled in the rain on the basis of the result of the judgment by the judging means.

The vehicle lighting control device of the present invention can be built in a navigation device. That is, road information storage means for storing road information, current position detection means for detecting the current position of the vehicle, road information stored in the road information storage means and current position information of the vehicle detected by the current position detection means. In a navigation device having a route determining means for determining a route of a vehicle from the above, an illumination lamp control data storage for creating a road area in which an illumination lamp should be turned on from road information and storing data on points near both ends of each road area Means, a clock means, and an illumination lamp control means for controlling lighting and extinguishing of the vehicle illumination lamp based on the illumination lamp control data, the current position information, and the current time information from the clock means. It is a characteristic vehicle lighting control device.

[0013]

The road information, in particular, the data relating to the points near both ends of the road area, such as tunnels, underpasses, underground parking lots, etc., that should be driven while lighting the illumination lamps day and night, is stored in the storage unit. When it is confirmed by the current position data from the current position detecting means that the running vehicle has passed the point just before entering the road area, the lighting lamp is controlled to be automatically turned on. The illumination lamp can be turned on and the wiper operation in rainy weather can be controlled to be turned off.

[0014]

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS FIG. 1 shows the configuration of a vehicle lighting control device according to an embodiment of the present invention. This control device is built in the navigation device.

Data storage unit 10 of the navigation device
Is a storage medium such as a CD-ROM or an IC card,
Various data such as voice data 11, map data 12, road data 13, and place name data 14 are stored.

The present position detecting section 20 is provided with a GPS satellite receiver 21 and receives radio waves from GPS satellites to determine the present position coordinates of the vehicle.
By using the data regarding the azimuth and actual traveling distance detected by various sensors such as 2, the distance sensor 23 and the steering sensor 24 as the correction data, it is possible to perform highly accurate position detection.

The position information such as the starting point and the destination is input by the operation of the user through the input unit 29 including a keyboard or the like.

The arithmetic processing unit 25 includes these input units 29,
Various data from the data storage unit 10 and the current position detection unit 20 are input. Based on these data, the CPU 26 calculates the route from the present location to the destination according to the program stored in the ROM 27. RAM2
Reference numeral 8 is a working memory for storing data such as a route determined by the CPU 26. The ROM 27 and the RAM 28 are connected to the CPU 26 by a data bus line.

According to the judgment result, the CPU 26 synthesizes the voice data 11 to create a voice instruction signal,
By outputting from the voice output unit 30, the driver is guided to the course. In addition, the map data 1 is displayed on the display unit 31 including a CRT display or a liquid crystal display.
2, a road map drawn based on the road data 13, etc. is displayed, and the current position detection unit 2 is displayed on this road map.
The current position detected by 0 is displayed and the CPU
A recommended route is displayed as a result of the judgment by 26.

The structure described above is generally known as a conventional navigation device.

In this embodiment, the data storage unit 10
An illumination lamp control data storage unit 15 for storing data necessary for automatic control of the illumination lamp is provided in the storage unit 1, and area data 16 and illumination ON / OFF point data 17 are stored.

Here, the area data 16 refers to data relating to a certain area such as a tunnel, an underpass of a railway or a road, an underground parking lot, etc., in which an illumination lamp needs to be turned on even in the daytime. It is created based on the road data 13. Further, the area data 16 can be created as one area by collecting road regions in which a plurality of tunnels frequently appear intermittently in a mountainous area or the like. Further, both end positions of each area registered as the area data 16 are stored as illumination ON / OFF point data 17.

The present embodiment is further provided with an illumination lamp control section 32 including a CPU. The lighting control unit 32 includes
The area data 16 and the lighting ON / OFF point data 17 stored in the illumination lamp control data storage unit 15 are input, and the current position data detected by the current position detection unit 20 is input via the arithmetic processing unit 25. To be done.
Further, the current time data from the clock means 33 is input.

The illumination lamp control unit 32 is activated by receiving a detection signal from the traveling detection unit 34 which detects that the vehicle is currently traveling and turning on the activation switch 35,
Area data 16, lighting ON / OFF point data 1
7. Based on various data such as current position data and time zone data, the necessity of lighting / turning off the lighting is judged, and based on the judgment result, the headlight 36 and the small light 37 mounted on the vehicle are lit. / Automatically controls the turning off.

For example, the point immediately before entering the tunnel stored as the area data 16 (for example, a point about 200 m before the tunnel entrance, or a point about 400 m before the tunnel entrance) is stored as the lighting ON point data. In this case, the illumination light control unit 32 determines that the vehicle has arrived at the immediately preceding point based on the current position data from the current position detection unit 20 and automatically turns on the headlight 36. Similarly, when it is determined from the current position data that the vehicle has passed a point stored as the illumination OFF point data (for example, a point immediately after the tunnel exit), the headlight 36 is automatically turned off.

As described above, in the mountainous area where the tunnels are continuous, instead of creating the area data 16 for each individual tunnel, the first tunnel entrance to the last of a plurality of continuous tunnels is used. The road area to the tunnel exit can be treated as one area. When the area data 16 is created in this way,
After the automatic lighting at the point just before the first tunnel entrance, until the last tunnel is exited, the illumination light will continue to light, so notify the driver that the tunnel is a continuous section. , Can promote safe driving.

Note that, under an elevated structure, underground parking lot, or the like, the headlight 36 may not be turned on, and only the small light 37 may be turned on. Alternatively, the degree of darkness in the area may be detected by a photodiode or the like, and the headlight 36 or the small light 37 may be selectively turned on.

Further, since the current time data from the clock means 33 is input to the lighting control section 32 independently of the area data 16 and the lighting ON / OFF point data 17, the lighting control section 32 is , Regardless of the vehicle driving area, it is automatically controlled so that it lights up in the evening and goes out in the early morning. In this case, the headlights and small lights are turned on or off so that the small lights 37 are first turned on in the evening and then the headlights 36 are turned on, and the headlights 36 are turned off first and then the small lights 37 are turned off in the early morning. It is also possible to control the time difference. Since the time when the light should be turned on or off differs depending on the season, the clock means 33 is also used with a calendar.

When the vehicle is stopped, this is detected by the running detector 3
4 turns off the start switch 35. In response to the OFF signal, the illumination lamp control unit 32 controls to turn off the headlight 36 and the small light 37, if they are on, and then ends the operation. This prevents waste of the battery due to forgetting to turn off the light.

Further, in this embodiment, the operation of the wiper 38 in rainy weather is controlled in association with the lighting and extinguishing control of the illumination lamp. That is, in the case of rain, the driver operates the wiper by inputting the wiper operation switch, but in a lighting area such as a tunnel or an underground parking lot, it is unnecessary to operate the wiper even in the case of rain. Conventionally, the driver has to repeat ON / OFF of the wiper operation switch every time he / she enters or passes through the area, which is not only troublesome but also distracted by the ON / OFF operation of the wiper operation switch. Safe driving tended to be neglected. According to the present embodiment, since the lighting control unit 32 determines whether the vehicle enters or passes through the area, the result of the determination is used to automatically turn the lighting ON / OFF and simultaneously turn the wiper operation ON / OFF. Automatic control can be performed.

[0031]

As described above, according to the present invention, the automatic control of the vehicular illumination lamp can be performed with a simple structure, and the driver does not need to perform the lighting / extinguishing operation by judging the surrounding brightness.
It greatly contributes to the improvement of driving safety.

Further, by controlling the lighting so that it is turned on before entering an area where lighting is required, the driver can be warned and information for road prediction can be given. Further, the safety is improved.

In particular, the present invention, when incorporated in a navigation device, can utilize road information data stored in the navigation device and current position data detected by GPS or the like, which is efficient. System construction is possible.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing an example in which a vehicle lighting control device according to the present invention is incorporated into a navigation device.

[Explanation of symbols]

 15 Lighting control data storage section 16 Area data 17 Lighting ON / OFF point data 20 Current position detection section 32 Lighting control section 33 Clock means 34 Running detection section 35 Start switch 36 Headlight 37 Small light 38 Wiper

 ─────────────────────────────────────────────────── ─── Continued Front Page (72) Inventor Hideki Nakajima 2-19-12 Sotokanda, Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo Equus Research Co., Ltd.

Claims (5)

[Claims] 1. A storage unit for storing road information, a current position detection unit for detecting a current position of a vehicle, road information stored in the storage unit, and a current position of a vehicle detected by the current position detection unit. A lighting control device for a vehicle, comprising: a judgment means for judging whether or not the lighting for the vehicle should be turned on or off based on the information. 2. The vehicle lighting control device according to claim 1, wherein the road information stored in the storage means includes data on points near both ends of a road area where the lighting is to be turned on. 3. Clock means is further provided, and in addition to the road information and the current position information, current time information from the clock means is input to the judging means, and the judging means is based on each of these information. The necessity of turning on or off the vehicle lighting is determined based on the above-mentioned information.
Vehicle lighting control device, 4. The vehicle lighting control device according to claim 1, further comprising: controlling the operation of the wiper in the rain on the basis of the result of the determination by the determining means. 5. A road information storage means for storing road information, a current position detection means for detecting a current position of a vehicle, the road information stored in the road information storage means and the current position detection means. In a navigation device having a route determination means for determining the route of the vehicle from the current position information of the vehicle, the road area in which the illumination lamp should be turned on is created from the road information, and data relating to points near both ends of each road area is stored. Lighting control data storage means, clock means, and lighting control means for controlling turning on and off of the vehicular lighting based on the lighting control data, the current position information and the current time information from the clock. When,
An illumination control device for a vehicle, comprising: