System for managing a seat occupancy status by a passenger and a method for controlling the same

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-11975684-B2
Application number	US-202217890665-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Aug 18, 2022
Priority date	Jan 19, 2022
Publication date	May 7, 2024
Grant date	May 7, 2024

Abstract

A system for managing a seat occupancy status by a passenger and a control method of the system includes a seat belt sensor provided for each seat to detect a fastening or unfastening of the seat belt, a pressure detection unit provided for each seat to detect occupancy or non-occupancy of a seat by a passenger and pressure of the seated passenger, a secondary control unit provided for each seat and woken up by radio communication with a vehicle to alert to an unfastened state of the seat belt when the seat belt is unfastened upon determining, by a seat belt sensor, whether the seat belt is fastened, and a primary control unit provided in the vehicle to perform radio communications with each secondary control unit and check an abnormality based on reception or non-reception of the system data transmitted from the secondary control unit.

First claim

The invention claimed is:

1. A system for managing a seat occupancy status by a passenger, comprising:
a seat belt sensor provided for each of a plurality of seats to detect a fastened or an unfastened state of a seat belt;
a pressure detection unit provided for each of the plurality of seats to detect occupancy or non-occupancy of the seat by a passenger and a pressure of a seated passenger;
a secondary control unit provided for each of the plurality of seats and woken up through radio communication with a vehicle to alert to an unfastened state of the seat belt when the seat belt is unfastened upon determining, by the seat belt sensor, whether the seat belt is fastened, wherein the secondary control unit is configured to harvest electric energy to which the pressure of the seated passenger detected by the pressure detection unit is converted, to transmit system data of the secondary control unit through radio communication, and to switch to a sleep state after transmitting the system data; and
a primary control unit provided in the vehicle configured to perform the radio communication with each secondary control unit, and to check an abnormality based on reception or non-reception of the system data transmitted by radio from the secondary control unit, wherein the secondary control unit switches to the sleep state when the primary control unit normally receives the system data.

2. The system of claim 1 , wherein a warning light is operated in a buckle or an alarm is operated to alert when the seat belt is unfastened.

3. The system of claim 2 , wherein an alert is turned on when the seat belt remains unfastened and the alert is turned off when the seat belt is fastened while a door is closed, and the alert is turned off whether or not the seat belt is fastened while the door is open.

4. The system of claim 2 , wherein the warning light blinks when an ignition is turned on, and the seat belt remains unfastened while a passenger is seated.

5. The system of claim 1 , wherein the pressure detection unit includes:
a detection switch configured to detect occupancy or non-occupancy of a seat by a passenger using the pressure of the passenger seated in the seat; and
a piezoelectric element configured to convert the pressure of the passenger seated in the seat into electric energy; wherein
the electric energy converted through the piezoelectric element is stored in a battery through a harvesting circuit.

6. The system of claim 5 , wherein the piezoelectric element and the detection switch are arranged adjacent to each other in a region in which a load of the passenger is concentrated.

7. The system of claim 5 , wherein the piezoelectric element and the detection switch vertically overlap each other in the region in which a load of a passenger is concentrated.

8. The system of claim 1 , wherein the secondary control unit switches to the wake-up state upon receiving a wake-up signal in the sleep state of the secondary control unit.

9. The system of claim 8 , wherein the wake-up signal is one or more signals reflecting an ignition of the vehicle, a seat occupancy status, a fastening status of the seat belt, and a preset timer cycle.

10. The system of claim 1 , wherein the secondary control unit is initialized immediately after the secondary control unit wakes up, and each secondary control unit transmits the system data when the initialization is successful.

11. The system of claim 1 , wherein the system data is data relating to a seat belt fastening status, an alerting status to an unfastened seat belt, a seat occupancy status, a battery state, and a failure status of the secondary control unit.

12. The system of claim 1 , wherein when the primary control unit normally receives the status information data transmitted by radio from the secondary control unit and the wake-up signal that wakes up the secondary control unit is a wake-up signal reflecting the ignition status of the vehicle or fastening status of the seat belt, the secondary control unit switches to the sleep state after a predetermined period after the system data is received.

13. A system for managing a seat occupancy status by a passenger, comprising:
a seat belt sensor provided for each of a plurality of seats to detect a fastened or an unfastened state of a seat belt;
a pressure detection unit provided for each of the plurality of seats to detect occupancy or non-occupancy of the seat by a passenger and a pressure of a seated passenger;
a secondary control unit provided for each of the plurality of seats and woken up through radio communication with a vehicle to alert to an unfastened state of the seat belt when the seat belt is unfastened upon determining, by the seat belt sensor, whether the seat belt is fastened, wherein the secondary control unit is configured to harvest electric energy to which the pressure of the seated passenger detected by the pressure detection unit is converted, to transmit system data of the secondary control unit through radio communication, and to switch to a sleep state after transmitting the system data; and
a primary control unit provided in the vehicle configured to perform the radio communication with each secondary control unit, and to check an abnormality based on reception or non-reception of the system data transmitted by radio from the secondary control unit, wherein the secondary control unit re-transmits status information data when the primary control unit does not receive the system data normally, and the secondary control unit switches to the sleep state when a number of retransmissions exceeds a predetermined number.

14. A control method of a system for managing a seat occupancy status by a passenger, the control method comprising:
waking up a secondary control unit through radio communication of a vehicle in a sleep state of the secondary control unit;
alerting, by the secondary control unit, to an unfastened state of a seat belt when the seat belt is unfastened upon determining, by a seat belt sensor provided for each seat, whether the seat belt is fastened and harvesting electric energy to which pressure of a seated passenger detected by a pressure detection unit provided for each seat of a plurality of seats is converted;
transmitting, by each secondary control unit, system data of the secondary control unit through radio communication;
receiving, by a primary control unit, the system data transmitted from each secondary control unit and checking an abnormality based on reception and non-reception of the system data; and
switching the secondary control unit to the sleep state after transmitting the system data, wherein the secondary control unit switches to the sleep state when the primary control unit normally receives the system data.

Assignees

• Hyundai Motor Co Ltd
• Kia Corp
• Samsong Ind Ltd

Inventors

• Bok Chang Kyu
• Shin Dong Ryul
• Kim Su Cheon
• Yoon Yong Chan
• Kim Man Seok

Classifications

• B60R2021/01088

  wireless · CPC title

• B60R2022/4858

  for sensing pressure on seat · CPC title

• B60R2022/4816

  for sensing locking of buckle · CPC title

• B60R21/01546

  using belt buckle sensors · CPC title

• B60R16/033

  characterised by the use of electrical cells or batteries (for propulsion puposes B60K1/04; supplying batteries to, or removing batteries from, vehicles B60S5/06; testing of charge state G01R31/36) · CPC title