Directional climate control system with infrared targeting

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-10369865-B2
Application number	US-201715831486-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Dec 5, 2017
Priority date	Sep 22, 2014
Publication date	Aug 6, 2019
Grant date	Aug 6, 2019

Abstract

A heating, ventilating, and air conditioning (HVAC) system has a steerable outlet for directing a stream of treated air into a passenger compartment of a vehicle. A thermographic imager is configured to capture thermographic images covering a fixed region within the passenger compartment in which an occupant is potentially located. The HVAC control circuit is configured to a) compress a thermographic image to a temperature map representing pixels of the thermographic image falling within a predetermined temperature range corresponding to the occupant, b) filter the temperature map according to a sliding window to coalesce continuous regions of pixels on average falling within the predetermined temperature range, c) quantify an area for each continuous region, d) locate a centroid of a continuous region having a largest area, and e) aim the steerable outlet toward the centroid.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. Apparatus comprising:
a steerable outlet delivering temperature-treated air in a passenger compartment;
a thermographic imager capturing thermographic images of the passenger compartment; and
a controller compressing a thermographic image to a temperature map representing pixels falling within predetermined temperature ranges, filtering the map according to a sliding window to coalesce continuous pixel regions, quantifying an area for each continuous region, and steering the outlet toward a centroid of the continuous region having a largest area.

2. The apparatus of claim 1 wherein the thermographic imager is configured to capture thermographic images covering a fixed region within the passenger compartment in which an occupant is potentially located.

3. The apparatus of claim 1 wherein the steerable outlet has a variable focus controllable by the controller in response to a magnitude of the largest area.

4. The apparatus of claim 1 further comprising:
an ambient temperature sensor measuring an external temperature outside the passenger compartment; and
a cabin temperature sensor measuring an internal temperature inside the passenger compartment;
wherein the controller selects the predetermined temperature range in response to the external and internal temperatures.

5. The apparatus of claim 4 wherein the steerable outlet has a variable flow rate controllable by the controller in response to the internal temperature.

6. The apparatus of claim 1 wherein the centroid of the continuous region is located in response to an average of orthogonal coordinates of the pixels of the region.

Assignees

• Ford Global Tech Llc

Inventors

• Perkins William Paul

Classifications

• G06F18/00 Primary

  Pattern recognition · CPC title

• B60H1/00742 Primary

  by detection of the vehicle occupants' presence; by detection of conditions relating to the body of occupants, e.g. using radiant heat detectors · CPC title

• B60H1/00871

  Air directing means, e.g. blades in an air outlet (construction of nozzles or air diffusers B60H1/34) · CPC title

• B60H1/00028 Primary

  Constructional lay-out of the devices in the vehicle · CPC title

• B60H1/00

  Heating, cooling or ventilating devices · CPC title