A brake cooling period prediction system for predicting a brake cooling period following a braking event, comprising a sensor apparatus in communication with a prediction apparatus. The sensor apparatus includes a torque sensor for measuring the torque reacted by a brake during a braking event; a wear sensor for measuring a wear state of the brake; and an environmental sensor for measuring at least one ambient condition of the environment of the brake. The prediction apparatus includes a memory storing information relating to the thermal behaviour of the brake; and a controller configured to receive a torque measurement, a wear measurement and an ambient condition measurement from the sensor apparatus; and predict a cooling period based on the received torque, wear and ambient condition measurements, and the information relating to the thermal behaviour of the brake.

A collision avoidance apparatus includes a travelling state calculation section, a target detection section, a target state calculation section, a lateral moving object determination section, a collision determination section, and a collision avoidance control section. The collision avoidance control section calculates, based on (i) a passing-through period of the lateral moving object in which the lateral moving object passes through an own vehicle course that is a moving course of the own vehicle and (ii) a reaching time of the own vehicle that is a period remaining before the own vehicle reaching a lateral moving object course that is a moving course of the lateral moving object, an operation timing of the brakes for the lateral moving object passing through the own vehicle course before the own vehicle reaches the lateral moving object course, and operates the brakes at the calculated operation timing of the brakes.

In various examples, activation criteria and/or braking profiles corresponding to automatic emergency braking (AEB) systems and/or collision mitigation warning (CMW) systems may be determined using sensor data representative of an environment to a front, side, and/or rear of a vehicle. For example, activation criteria for triggering an AEB system and/or CMW system may be adjusted by leveraging the availability of additional information with regards to the surrounding environment of a vehiclesuch as the presence of a trailing vehicle. In addition, the braking profile for the AEB activation may be adjusted based on information about the presence of and/or location of vehicles to the front, rear, and/or side of the vehicle. By adjusting the activation criteria and/or braking profiles of an AEB system, the potential for collisions with dynamic objects in the environment is reduced and the overall safety of the vehicle and its passengers is increased.

Managing a brake system of a vehicle includes collecting sensor data from one or more sensors in or around the vehicle, calculating brake effectiveness values based on the sensor data, calibrating the brake effectiveness values based on environmental context data associated with the vehicle, accumulating the calibrated brake effectiveness values as a dataset, generating a prediction curve or formula based the dataset, and scheduling a maintenance alarm for the brake system based on the brake effectiveness values.

A system and method are provided for estimating and applying vehicle tire traction. Vehicle data (e.g., movement and location-based data) and tire sensor data are collected at a vehicle and transmitted to a remote computing system (e.g., cloud server). A wear status is determined, and traction characteristics determined for at least one tire, based at least on the vehicle data and the determined tire wear status. The predicted tire traction characteristics are transmitted from the remote computing system to an active safety unit associated with the vehicle, or a fleet management system, wherein the recipient is configured to modify vehicle operation settings based on at least the predicted tire traction characteristics. A maximum speed for the vehicle may be defined by the recipient, or a minimum following distance where, e.g., the vehicle is one of multiple vehicles in a defined platoon.

A method for operating a motor vehicle having a braking device for braking the motor vehicle, including the steps: forecasting an anticipated time period until a reduction in speed or braking of the motor vehicle, triggered by a driver assistance system or by the driver of the motor vehicle, depending on vehicle data relating to the motor vehicle and/or environmental data relating to the motor vehicle environment, and triggering a respective function of the braking device when a triggering condition assigned to the respective function is satisfied, wherein a respective triggering condition is satisfied or can be satisfied only when the anticipated time period falls below the limiting time value assigned to the respective function, wherein at least two of the functions are assigned limiting time values that differ from each other.

The present disclosure relates to an automotive braking control apparatus and method. The automotive braking control apparatus includes: a weather condition determiner determining weather conditions on the basis of image information received from a camera; a collision determiner determining possibility of a collision with a forward object on the basis of the image information received from the camera and object sensing information received from a radar; and an automotive braking controller controlling emergency braking of a vehicle when it is determined that there is possibility of a collision with the forward object, in which the collision determiner changes weight for the image information and weight for the object sensing information on the basis of the weather conditions.

Systems, methods, tangible non-transitory computer-readable media, and devices for operating an autonomous vehicle are provided. For example, the disclosed technology can include receiving state data that includes information associated with states of an autonomous vehicle and an environment external to the autonomous vehicle. Responsive to the state data satisfying vehicle stoppage criteria, vehicle stoppage conditions can be determined to have occurred. A severity level of the vehicle stoppage conditions can be selected from a plurality of available severity levels respectively associated with a plurality of different sets of constraints. A motion plan can be generated based on the state data. The motion plan can include information associated with locations for the autonomous vehicle to traverse at time intervals corresponding to the locations. Further, the locations can include a current location of the autonomous vehicle and a destination location at which the autonomous vehicle stops traveling.

Longitudinal acceleration, intended travel angle, wheel speed, and requested drive torque signals are measured for a vehicle. The longitudinal acceleration, intended travel angle, wheel speed, and requested drive torque signals are then evaluated. A brake torque is calculated as a function of a propulsive torque, wherein the propulsive torque is produced by a power source for the vehicle. The brake torque is applied when the longitudinal acceleration signal exceeds a longitudinal acceleration threshold, the intended travel angle signal is between intended travel angle limits, the wheel speed signal is less than a minimum speed threshold, the requested drive torque signal exceeds a requested drive torque threshold, and a torque threshold is exceeded.

Methods, apparatus, systems and articles of manufacture are disclosed for automatically calibrating electronic trailer brake gain. An example apparatus includes a trailer brake gain calibrator programmed to modulate a trailer brake gain value based upon a derivative of a trailer hitch force and apply a pressure to a brake of a trailer based on the gain value.