An electrically powered, self-propelled cart for safely delivering heavy loads, such as concrete, within job sites with unlevel, irregular, or sloped terrain. A cargo bucket is tiltable over front drive wheels for transporting and dumping cargo. Electric drive motors associated with a transaxle propel wheels at a selectable speed in response to an electric control module. A steering column rotates in response to manually operated handle bars and activates a sensor to generate signals delivered to the control module for throttle adjustments. The sensor may be a linear potentiometer, a rotary differential transformer or a rotary encoder or shaft encoder measuring angular displacement. Extreme steering displacements will electrically reduce cart speed notwithstanding the previous speed setting chosen by the operator through the steering column.

The invention relates to a motor vehicle and to a method for operating a motor vehicle for carrying out a parking procedure, wherein the motor vehicle comprises at least a first parking assistance function and a second parking assistance function, which may be selected as desired, and wherein the method comprises: detecting a gripping status of a steering handle of the motor vehicle by a driver; and automatically selecting the first or the second parking assistance function depending on the gripping status.

An embodiment method includes segmenting at least one electrophysiological signal and producing a set of sampled waveforms, applying artificial neural network processing to the set of sampled waveforms and a set of randomly generated noise samples and producing at least one altered data pattern, the altered data pattern comprising the set of filtered waveforms altered as a function of the randomly generated noise samples, providing calibration data comprising expected waveforms for filtered waveforms in the set of filtered waveforms, applying classifier processing to the produced at least one altered data pattern to detect a degree of resemblance between the produced at least one altered data pattern and the calibration data patterns, the classifier processing producing classification signals having values above or below at least one threshold value as a function of the detected degree of resemblance, and triggering a user circuit as a function of the classification signal.

An electrically powered, self-propelled cart for safely delivering heavy loads, such as concrete, within job sites with unlevel, irregular, or sloped terrain. A cargo bucket is tiltable over front drive wheels for transporting and dumping cargo. Electric drive motors associated with a transaxle propel wheels at a selectable speed in response to an electric control module. A steering column rotates in response to manually operated handle bars and activates a sensor to generate signals delivered to the control module for throttle adjustments. The sensor may be a linear potentiometer, a rotary differential transformer or a rotary encoder or shaft encoder measuring angular displacement. Extreme steering displacements will electrically reduce cart speed notwithstanding the previous speed setting chosen by the operator through the steering column.

Various implementations relate to an operator monitoring system (OMS). Certain implementations include an OMS coupled to a rotatable portion of a steering wheel assembly of a vehicle. For example, the OMS may include an imaging unit, such as a camera, that is coupled to a central hub portion of the steering wheel assembly. The imaging unit has a field of view directed toward one or more occupants in the vehicle and is configured to capture an image signal corresponding to an imaging area in the field of view. The imaging area can be configured to encapsulate an expected position of one or more vehicle occupants. The OMS also includes one or more processing units in electrical communication with the imaging unit that receives and processes the image signal from the imaging unit to determine an occupant state and, in some implementations, provide feedback based on the determined occupant state.

To inhibit clutch engagement during an engine restart from affecting cooperative regenerative braking control and switching of braking in a hybrid vehicle having a P2 module onboard, a control system for the hybrid vehicle includes an engine, a motor, a K0 clutch, drive shafts, a hydraulic friction brake system, and a controller capable of performing cooperative regenerative braking control. When start of the engine is requested during the cooperative regenerative braking control, the controller performs a first process of transitioning to braking only by the frictional brake system, a second process of raising an engine revolution speed while engagement of the K0 clutch is initiated after completion of transitioning to the braking, and a third process of controlling the engine to resume operating at a timing after the engine revolution speed increases to match a motor revolution speed after the engagement of the K0 clutch is initiated.

Systems and methods discussed herein are directed to combining non-onboard diagnostic (OBD) codes with OBD codes to provide a list of codes that may be used to provide information to a user regarding a vehicle. For example, an auxiliary monitoring device may be included in a vehicle in the form of one or more sensors, e.g., cameras, image sensors, movement sensors, audio sensors, variable reluctance (VR) sensors, infrared (IR) sensors, odor sensors, etc., that may collect vehicle information that is not available through the vehicle's OBD port. The auxiliary monitoring device may obtain the information and convert the information into a corresponding non-OBD code. The auxiliary monitoring device thus complements an OBD monitoring device included in the vehicle that is coupled to the vehicle's OBD port to obtain OBD codes therefrom.

Various implementations relate to an operator monitoring system (OMS). Certain implementations include an OMS coupled to a rotatable portion of a steering wheel assembly of a vehicle. For example, the OMS may include an imaging unit, such as a camera, that is coupled to a central hub portion of the steering wheel assembly. The imaging unit has a field of view directed toward one or more occupants in the vehicle and is configured to capture an image signal corresponding to an imaging area in the field of view. The imaging area can be configured to encapsulate an expected position of one or more vehicle occupants. The OMS also includes one or more processing units in electrical communication with the imaging unit that receives and processes the image signal from the imaging unit to determine an occupant state and, in some implementations, provide feedback based on the determined occupant state.

A number of illustrative variations may include a method of communication between a driver and an autonomous steering system.

In a steer by wire and idle stop vehicle, idle stop conditions for invoking an idle stop operation include that the traveling speed of the vehicle has fallen below a first value (10 km/h). When the vehicle speed is lower than the first value but higher than a second value (5 km/h), a steering actuator control unit 44 executes a position keep control whereby a steering motor 29 is electrically braked, and a reaction force actuator control unit 43 operates a reaction force motor 26 as a dynamic brake. When the vehicle speed has fallen below the second value in the idle stop operation, the steering motor control unit terminates the position keep control.