The techniques of this disclosure relate to a vehicle occupancy-monitoring system. The system includes a controller circuit that receives occupant data from an occupancy-monitoring sensor of a vehicle. The controller circuit determines an occupancy status of respective seats in a cabin of the vehicle based on the occupancy-monitoring sensor. The controller circuit indicates the occupancy status of the respective seats on a display located in a field of view of occupants of the vehicle. The display is integral to one of a roof light module, a door panel, or a headliner of the cabin. The system can improve passenger safety by alerting the operator and other occupants about the occupancy status of the passengers.

A method for manufacturing a vehicle, in which, on a production line of a vehicle-manufacturing plant, attachments are mounted on a vehicle body, to each of which an attachment transponder is fastened, which, after the particular attachment is installed in the vehicle, is detected with the aid of an RFID reading device for the purpose of a construction state documentation, a belt retractor of a safety belt assembly being installed as an attachment in a cavity of a vehicle body column formed as a hollow girder on the production line. A belt retractor transponder is assigned to the belt retractor. The belt retractor transponder is not fastened directly to the belt retractor but rather to a belt strap of the belt retractor outside the body column cavity.

A system includes an in-cabin sensor, a seatbelt routing zone module, and a seatbelt routing classification module. The in-cabin sensor is operable to generate an image of an occupant in a vehicle seat. The seatbelt routing zone module is configured to generate a seatbelt routing zone based on at least one of a size of the occupant in the image and a shape of the occupant. The seatbelt routing classification module is configured to determine whether a seatbelt is routed properly around the occupant based on whether the seatbelt is at least partially within the seatbelt routing zone.

The methods and systems herein enable relative movement-based seatbelt use detection. Image data of an occupant of a vehicle is received over time. The image data is then input into a machine-learned model or other module that determines whether relative movement between one or more portions of the occupant and corresponding portions of a seatbelt are less than a threshold amount. If the relative movement is less than the threshold amount, an indication of seatbelt misuse (e.g., a fake seatbelt) is output to a vehicle component. By basing the indication of seatbelt misuse on relative movement between the occupant and the seatbelt, seatbelt use detection may be improved.

A system and method for detecting seatbelt positioning includes capturing, by a camera, a near infrared (NIR) image of an occupant, applying a median filter to the NIR image to remove glints; converting the NIR image to a black-and-white image, scanning across the black-and-white (B/W) image to detect a plurality of transitions between black and white segments corresponding to stripes extending lengthwise along a length of the seatbelt, and using detections of the plurality of transitions to indicate a detection of the seatbelt. Converting the NIR image to the black-and-white image may include using a localized binary threshold to determine whether a given pixel in the B/W image should be black or white based on whether a corresponding source pixel within the NIR image is brighter than an average of nearby pixels within a predetermined distance of the corresponding source pixel.

A method for manufacturing a webbing (20) for a seat belt system in a vehicle comprises the following steps of: weaving the webbing (20) using a first yarn (30) and a second yarn (32), the first yarn (30) and the second yarn (32) reflecting light in the spectrum invisible to humans with different intensity, wherein the first and second yarns (30, 32) form a pattern (36), and overdying the webbing (20) so that the webbing (20) reflects light in the spectral range visible to humans in such a way that it has a homogenous appearance for humans. Moreover, such a webbing (20) and a vehicle comprising such a webbing (20) are provided.

The techniques of this disclosure relate to a vehicle occupancy-monitoring system. The system includes a controller circuit that receives occupant data from an occupancy-monitoring sensor of a vehicle. The controller circuit determines an occupancy status of respective seats in a cabin of the vehicle based on the occupancy-monitoring sensor. The controller circuit indicates the occupancy status of the respective seats on a display located in a field of view of occupants of the vehicle. The display is integral to one of a roof light module, a door panel, or a headliner of the cabin. The system can improve passenger safety by alerting the operator and other occupants about the occupancy status of the passengers.

It is provided a method for determining information with respect to an occupant and/or a seat belt of a motor vehicle, wherein the seat belt includes a plurality of sensors. The method comprises the following steps: determining a force acting on each of the sensors in a sensor coordinate system associated with each of the sensors; generating a numerical model of the seat belt and the sensors in an initial state; generating a final state of the model by varying positions and/or orientations of portions of the modeled seat belt, which are in a fixed geometrical relationship with the represented positions and/or orientations of at least some of the sensors; and determining the information with respect to the occupant and/or the seat belt based on the course of the modeled seat belt in the final state.

A computer implemented method for detecting whether a seat belt is used in a vehicle comprises the following steps carried out by computer hardware components: acquiring an image of an interior of the vehicle; determining a plurality of sub-images based on the image; detecting, for at least one of the sub-images, whether a portion of the seat belt is present in the respective sub-image; and determining whether the seat belt is used based on the detecting.

A vehicle seat connector assembly comprising a first connector coupled to the seat of the vehicle and including a first inductive coil. A second connector is coupled to the vehicle and includes a second inductive coil. The first and second connectors are positioned relative to each other into a first relationship with the first and second connectors coupled to each other and the first and second inductive coils positioned opposite each other to define a closed inductive coil circuit and a second relationship with the first and second connectors and the first and second inductive coils separated from each other to define an open inductive coil circuit. A third inductive coil is located on the vehicle seat belt buckle and a coil cable extends between the first inductive coil of the first connector and the third inductive coil.