Systems and methods for determining relative position and orientation of a vehicle with respect to a charging station

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-9862280-B2
Application number	US-201314759978-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Nov 28, 2013
Priority date	Jan 10, 2013
Publication date	Jan 9, 2018
Grant date	Jan 9, 2018

Abstract

A guidance system for a motor vehicle comprising: a controller, the controller being operable to determine whether a first length of cable is sufficiently long to allow a charging connection to be established between a motor vehicle and a charging station in dependence on data corresponding to a relative position and orientation of the vehicle with respect to the charging station; and output means for providing an output to a user indicating whether the cable is sufficiently long.

First claim

The invention claimed is:

1. A motor vehicle, comprising:
a controller configured to receive data indicative of a relative position or orientation of the vehicle with respect to a vehicle charging station and to determine in dependence on the received data whether a length of a cable is sufficiently long to allow a charging connection to be established between the vehicle and the charging station via the cable; and
wherein the controller is configured to provide output to a user indicating whether the length of the cable is sufficient to establish the charging connection.

2. The motor vehicle of claim 1 , wherein the controller is operable to determine a length of a cable route allowing a charging connection to be established that includes one or more predetermined route portions.

3. The motor vehicle of claim 1 , wherein the controller is operable to determine a length of a cable route allowing a charging connection to be established that excludes one or more predetermined cable route portions.

4. The motor vehicle of claim 1 , wherein the controller is operable to determine a length of a cable route such that the cable route is external to a predetermined peripheral boundary of the vehicle.

5. The motor vehicle of claim 4 , wherein the controller is configured such that the predetermined peripheral boundary encircles a wheelbase of the vehicle, optionally a footprint of the vehicle.

6. The motor vehicle of claim 1 , wherein the controller is operable to determine a shortest cable route between the vehicle and the charging station.

7. The motor vehicle of claim 1 , wherein the controller is operable to determine the relative position and orientation of the vehicle with respect to the charging station in dependence on position data received by the controller.

8. The motor vehicle of claim 7 , wherein the position data corresponds to:
a bearing of the charging station from the vehicle or a bearing of the vehicle from the charging station at at least two respective different bearings;
vehicle speed;
vehicle trajectory; and
whether the vehicle is moving in a forward or reverse direction.

9. The motor vehicle of claim 1 , operable to determine substantially continuously whether the cable is sufficiently long when it is determined that the charging station is within a first range of the vehicle.

10. The motor vehicle of claim 1 , operable to determine the relative position and orientation of the vehicle with respect to the charging station by reference to at least one of the following:
data in respect of a current location of the vehicle and a location of a charging station;
a wireless signal received from the charging station;
an image of an environment external to the vehicle; and
data corresponding to a distance of one or more objects from the vehicle that have been detected by an object distance measuring module, the object distance measuring module being a module operable to detect radiation emitted by the module and reflected back to the module by an object thereby to measure object distance.

11. The motor vehicle of claim 1 , operable to provide an indication to the user as to whether a length of cable required to establish a charging connection between the vehicle and the charging station is increasing or decreasing.

12. The motor vehicle of claim 1 , wherein the system is operable to receive data indicative of the relative position and orientation of the vehicle with respect to the charging station from an external source.

13. The motor vehicle of claim 1 , comprising one or more sensors or one or more detectors for generating the data indicative of the relative position and orientation of the vehicle with respect to the charging station.

14. The motor vehicle of claim 1 , wherein the controller is provided with data indicative of the length.

15. The motor vehicle of claim 1 , wherein the controller is configured to receive data representing one or more dimensions associated with the motor vehicle, and wherein the controller is further configured to determine whether the length of cable is sufficiently long based on the data representing one or more dimensions associated with the motor vehicle and the data indicative of the position or orientation of the vehicle with respect to the vehicle charging station.

16. A method, comprising:
determining, via a controller within a motor vehicle, whether a prescribed length of cable is sufficiently long to allow a charging connection to be established between the motor vehicle and a charging station in dependence on data indicative of a relative position or orientation of the motor vehicle with respect to the charging station;
providing, via the controller, an output to a user indicating whether the cable is sufficiently long; and
establishing a charging connection between the motor vehicle and the charging station via the cable in response to determining that the prescribed length of cable is sufficiently long.

17. The method of claim 16 , further comprising generating the data indicative of the relative position or orientation of the motor vehicle with respect to the charging station from one or more sensors or one or more detectors.

Assignees

• Jaguar Land Rover Ltd

Inventors

• Mcnally Mark

Classifications

• B60L53/31

  Charging columns specially adapted for electric vehicles · CPC title

• Y02T90/14

  Plug-in electric vehicles · CPC title

• B60L2250/16

  by display · CPC title

• B60L53/36

  by positioning the vehicle · CPC title

• B62D15/028

  Guided parking by providing commands to the driver, e.g. acoustically or optically · CPC title