Wireless sensors for a tire and sensing methods thereof

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-2025093236-A1
Application number	US-202418888603-A
Country	US
Kind code	A1
Filing date	Sep 18, 2024
Priority date	Sep 18, 2023
Publication date	Mar 20, 2025
Grant date	—

Abstract

A system for monitoring the condition of vehicle tires is disclosed. A method for monitoring the state of vehicle tires is also disclosed. The system includes a sensor unit, a sensor hub connected to the sensor unit, a processing unit and a power management unit. The sensor unit further includes plurality of sensors, an analog front end for processing and converting the analog signals to digital data, and a communication unit. A signal thresholding circuit is part of the analog front end. The condition of vehicular tires are monitored by determining the revolutions per minute (RPM) as well as the absolute number of revolutions of the tires. This facilitates in detecting bad road conditions, air leakage from tire, temperature and pressure of the tire and issue warnings to the user.

First claim

We claim:

1 . A system for monitoring condition of vehicle tires, the system comprising:
a sensor unit placed within a tire, wherein the sensor unit includes:
a plurality of sensors;
an analog front end to receive analog signals from the plurality of sensors and convert the analog signals to digital data;
a processing unit for receiving the digital data from the plurality of sensors and to determine the revolutions per minute (RPM) of the tire using data pulses characteristic of a revolution count or a road condition or a vehicle safety condition with reference to a predetermined threshold;
a communication unit for facilitating communication between the sensor unit and a sensor hub; and
a power management unit for providing power to the sensor unit;
a sensor hub configured to receive sensor data from a plurality of tires and to wirelessly communicate the data to a network, wherein the sensor hub is configured to receive and process the sensor data from the plurality of tires and provide one or more of a tire revolution count, a condition of road, or a condition of a tire; and generate a warning to a user in case of unsafe tire or road condition.

2 . The system as claimed in claim 1 , wherein the plurality of sensors in the sensor unit include a piezoelectric transducer, a pressure sensor, an angle sensor, a force sensor, an accelerometer, a gyroscope, a temperature sensor or a combination thereof.

3 . The system as claimed in claim 1 , wherein the analog front end includes one or more of a filter, a comparator, a limiter, an analog to digital converter, or a multiplexer.

4 . The system as claimed in claim 3 , wherein the analog front end includes an adaptive threshold generation circuit to generate the predetermined threshold as a percentage of a peak signal.

5 . The system as claimed in claim 1 , wherein the power management unit includes a battery, a vibration energy harvester or a combination thereof, for powering the sensor unit, and a processor for optimizing power supply to the sensor unit using maximum power point tracking or other criteria.

6 . The system as claimed in claim 1 , including a server to store and analyze historical data of one or more vehicles and generate an alert relating to tire life, replacement schedule thereof, or road conditions to a user.

7 . A method for monitoring the condition of vehicle tires, the method comprising:
receiving sensor data from a plurality of sensors of a sensor unit at an analog front end as analog signals; converting the analog signals to digital data at the analog front end; receiving and processing the digital data at a processing unit to generate time-stamped data pulses characteristic of a revolution count or a road condition or a tire safety condition; eliminating errors in RPM count; determining a road condition and a vehicle speed or both; communicating the digital data from the sensing unit to a sensor hub; generating a warning to the user in case of unsafe tire or road condition; and providing digital data from the sensor hub to a computing device over a network.

8 . The method as claimed in claim 7 , wherein the pulses characteristic of a revolution count or a road condition are determined with reference to an adaptively generated signal threshold.

9 . The method as claimed in claim 8 , wherein the threshold is dynamically set to a percentage of the peak sensor signal amplitude.

10 . The method as claimed in claim 7 , wherein the sensor data includes one or more of a piezoelectric sensor signal, a pressure sensor signal, an angle sensor signal, a force sensor signal, an accelerometer sensor signal, a gyroscope sensor signal and a temperature sensor signal.

11 . The method as claimed in claim 10 , wherein the eliminating errors includes using a second sensor signal to correct RPM count obtained using a first sensor signal, wherein the first or the second sensor signal is a piezoelectric sensor signal, a pressure sensor signal, an angle sensor signal, a force sensor signal, an accelerometer sensor signal, or a gyroscope sensor signal.

12 . The method as claimed in claim 7 , wherein estimating the eliminating errors includes:
determining a sudden change in time between two revolutions; determining if time between two revolutions is greater than maximum speed of the vehicle; or determining random time difference between two adjacent revolutions; and discarding the RPM count if above is true; else incrementing the RPM count.

13 . The method as claimed in claim 7 , comprising transmitting anomalies such as potholes, bumps, or rough road, to the sensor hub.

14 . The method as claimed in claim 7 , wherein eliminating errors in RPM includes determining a derivative of a sensor signal.

15 . The method as claimed in claim 7 , wherein generating a warning to the user in case of unsafe vehicle or road condition comprises:
determining the tire pressure or temperature or both; comparing the tire pressure or temperature with predefined threshold values; and generating a warning to the user indicating unsafe tire conditions.

16 . The method as claimed in claim 7 , wherein the sensor unit enters stand-by mode when the vehicle is stationary and resumes active mode on movement of the vehicle.

17 . The method as claimed in claim 7 , further comprising tracking any or all of:
a physical condition of a tire including tread depth or load; an environmental condition including operating temperature; or an operating condition selected from one or more of: torque, rolling resistance, braking distance, operational hours, dry or wet road condition associated with each tire's location, thereby providing enhanced predictive analytics for tire performance and maintenance.

Assignees

• Indian Inst Tech Madras
• Smartwheels Llc

Inventors

• Khan Qadeer Ahmad
• Saxena Saurabh
• Saxena Vaibhav
• Deshpande Amit

Classifications

• B60C23/20

  Devices for measuring or signalling tyre temperature {only} · CPC title

• B60C23/0488

  Movement sensor, e.g. for sensing angular speed, acceleration or centripetal force · CPC title

• G07C5/0816

  Indicating performance data, e.g. occurrence of a malfunction · CPC title

• G01M17/02 Primary

  Tyres · CPC title

• B60C11/246

  Tread wear monitoring systems · CPC title