US-20260125105-A1 - CONTROL UNIT FOR A MONITORING SYSTEM OF A MOTOR VEHICLE, MONITORING SYSTEM FOR A MOTOR VEHICLE, AND METHOD FOR OPERATING A MONITORING SYSTEM

US20260125105A1US 20260125105 A1US20260125105 A1US 20260125105A1US-20260125105-A1

Abstract

A control unit for a monitoring system of a motor vehicle is provided. The control unit includes at least one computing unit for evaluating output signals of a sensor and for actuating an electronic power system of an actuator. The at least one computing unit includes three computing units, such that the output signals of the sensor are evaluated in parallel by the three computing units. The electronic power system of the actuator is actuated via actuation signals from each of the computing units. If at least two actuation signals match each other, the electronic power system is actuated by the actuation signals of the corresponding computing units.

Inventors

Sergey Orlov
Hüseyin Demir
Olaf Husberg
Christian Iseke
Christoph Wostmann

Assignees

HELLA GmbH & Co. KGaA

Dates

Publication Date: 20260507
Application Date: 20260105
Priority Date: 20230706

Claims (13)

1 . A control unit for a monitoring system for controlling a vehicle function, the monitoring system including a sensor and an actuator, the control unit comprising: at least one computing unit for evaluating output signals of the sensor and for actuating an electronic power system of the actuator via actuation signals for the vehicle function; wherein the at least one computing unit comprises three computing units, wherein the output signals of the sensor are evaluated in parallel in each of the three computing units, and wherein the electronic power system of the actuator is actuated via the actuation signals from each of the three computing units; and wherein, if at least two corresponding actuation signals of two of the three computing units match, the electronic power system of the actuator is actuated in response to the actuation signals of at least one of the at least two corresponding actuation signals.
2 . The control unit of claim 1 , wherein: the three computing units includes a first computing unit, a second computing unit, and a third computing unit; the first computing unit is connectable to a first voltage source of the monitoring system for supplying the actuator with electrical power for operating the actuator; the second computing unit is connectable to a second voltage source of the monitoring system for supplying the actuator with the electrical power for operating the actuator; and the third computing unit is connectable to the first voltage source or the second voltage source for supplying the actuator with the electrical power for operating the actuator.
3 . The control unit of claim 1 , further comprising only a single signal interface for transmitting sensor signals from the three computing units to a bus system which is superior to the control unit, wherein the sensor signals are based on the output signals of the sensor.
4 . The control unit of claim 1 , further comprising only a single signal interface for transmitting the output signals of the sensor to the three computing units.
5 . The control unit of claim 1 , further comprising only a single actuating interface for transmitting the actuation signals from each of the three computing units to the electronic power system of the actuator.
6 . The control unit of claim 1 , wherein the control unit is configured as a single structural unit, and wherein each of the three computing units are functionally identical to each other.
7 . A monitoring system for controlling a vehicle function of a motor vehicle, the monitoring system comprising: a sensor; an actuator; and the control unit of claim 1 .
8 . The monitoring system of claim 7 , wherein the control unit is configured as a single structural unit.
9 . The monitoring system of claim 7 , wherein: the motor vehicle includes a steering wheel and a traction wheel; the vehicle function is a steering function of a steer-by-wire system; the sensor is configured to determine a steering position of the steering wheel; and the actuator imparts a steering position on the traction wheel of the motor vehicle.
10 . The monitoring system of claim 7 , wherein the control unit comprises: a first signal interface between the at least one computing unit and a bus system of the motor vehicle, a second signal interface between the at least one computing unit and the sensor of the monitoring system, an actuation interface between the at least one computing unit and the electronic power system of the actuator, and a voltage source switch for connecting at least one of two voltage sources to the actuator for providing power to the actuator.
11 . A method for operating the monitoring system of claim 7 , the method comprising: evaluating, in parallel, the output signals of the sensor at each of the three computing units; generating actuation signals from each of the three computing units based on the evaluation of the output signals of the sensor; and actuating the electronic power system of the actuator in response to a match of at least two actuation signals generated by the three computing units.
12 . The method of claim 11 , wherein actuating the electronic power system of the actuator includes connecting the electronic power system to at least one voltage source.
13 . The method of claim 11 , wherein: the vehicle function is a steering function of a steer-by-wire system of the motor vehicle, the motor vehicle including a steering wheel and a traction wheel; evaluating the output signals of the sensor includes determining a steering position of a steering wheel of the motor vehicle; and actuating the electronic power system of the actuator includes imparting a steering position on the traction wheel of the motor vehicle.

Description

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS The present application is a continuation of PCT/EP2024/067047, filed Jun. 19, 2024, which claims the benefit of German Patent Application 10-2023-117-791.5, filed Jul. 6, 2023, the disclosures of which are incorporated by reference in their entirety. BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION The present invention relates to a control unit for a monitoring system of a motor vehicle, a monitoring system for a motor vehicle, and a method for operating a monitoring system for a motor vehicle. Such control units for a monitoring system of a motor vehicle, monitoring systems for motor vehicles, and methods for their operation are already known from the prior art in numerous embodiments. The known monitoring systems for motor vehicles for controlling a function of the motor vehicle are designed in such a way that at least one control unit of the monitoring system has at least one computing unit for evaluating output signals of at least one sensor of the monitoring system and for actuating electronic power system of an actuator of the monitoring system by means of actuation signals in a manner which is dependent on these output signals for executing this function of the motor vehicle. SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION This is where the present invention comes in. The object of the present invention is to improve a control unit for a monitoring system of a motor vehicle for controlling a function of the motor vehicle, a monitoring system for a motor vehicle, and a method for operating a monitoring system for a motor vehicle. This object is achieved by a control unit having the features of the current embodiments. The control unit has three computing units, and the control unit is designed and configured in such a way that the output signals of the at least one sensor can be evaluated in parallel in all computing units. The electronic power system of the actuator can be actuated by means of actuation signals of each of the computing units. If at least two corresponding actuation signals from two of the three computing units match, the electronic power system of the actuator can be actuated by means of the actuation signals of at least one computing unit of these two computing units. Furthermore, this object is achieved by a monitoring system for a motor vehicle and by a method for operating a monitoring system for a motor vehicle. A significant advantage of the invention lies, in particular, in the fact that a control unit for a monitoring system of a motor vehicle for controlling a function of the motor vehicle, a monitoring system for a motor vehicle, and a method for operating a monitoring system for a motor vehicle are improved. Due to the design of the control unit, of the monitoring system and of the method for operating the monitoring system according to the invention, sufficient redundancy for a so-called X-by-wire system or the like can be realized in a simple and thus cost-effective manner. Ensuring sufficient redundancy is particularly important for such systems and motor vehicles equipped with them because the mechanical couplings that exist in conventional motor vehicles and are relevant for redundancy considerations are eliminated in such vehicles. For example, this is easy to understand using the example of the steering of a motor vehicle having a steer-by-wire system, in which a so-called steer-by-wire system is used instead of the known mechanical connection between a steering wheel of the motor vehicle and the wheels of the motor vehicle to be steered. The aforementioned mechanical connection is no longer required. However, the field of application of the steering of motor vehicles using steer-by-wire systems is mentioned here only as an example. The invention can also be used advantageously for other functions of motor vehicles. For example, reference is made here to other by-wire systems that are generally referred to as X-by-wire systems. The basic design of such X-by-wire systems is well known to persons skilled in the art. According to the invention, it is not necessary to provide a plurality of control units in order to achieve the aforementioned redundancy, for example. Instead, it is possible to use just a single control unit to execute the respective function of the motor vehicle. This means that only the number of computing units is tripled; the number of other components of the control unit remains the same. In principle, the monitoring system according to the invention for motor vehicles with the control unit according to the invention is freely selectable in terms of type, mode of operation, material and dimensioning within wide, suitable limits. Reference may be made here to the plurality of different functions in modern motor vehicles, for example, the comments above on the challenges of X-by-wire systems in general. The same applies to the method according to the invention for operating a monitoring system for a motor vehicle. An advantageous further development of