Patent ID: 11866005
Assignee: HONDA MOTOR CO., LTD.
Field: Control (Instruments)
Classification: CPC B  G  H | IPC B  E  G  H

Claim 7:
8. A vehicle control apparatus comprising a CPU (central processing unit) that includes:
a vehicle communication control unit performing communication by a first communication specification with a mobile terminal used by a user of a vehicle when the mobile terminal positions within an out-vehicle communication area within a predetermined distance from the vehicle;
a first distance measuring unit measuring a vehicle-terminal distance with first precision, the vehicle-terminal distance being a distance between the vehicle and the mobile terminal;
a vehicle position information obtaining unit obtaining vehicle position information including current position information on the vehicle;
a terminal position information obtaining unit obtaining terminal position information including current position information on the mobile terminal transmitted from the mobile terminal by the first communication specification by receiving the terminal position information from the mobile terminal through the vehicle communication control unit;
a second distance measuring unit measuring the vehicle-terminal distance with second precision based on the vehicle position information and the terminal position information, the second precision being measurement precision lower than the first precision;
a high-precision distance measurement determining unit determining whether the first distance measuring unit is caused to measure the vehicle-terminal distance or not based on the vehicle-terminal distance measured by the second distance measuring unit, and determining to cause the first distance measuring unit to measure the vehicle-terminal distance when the vehicle-terminal distance decreases by a predetermined distance or larger in a plurality of the vehicle-terminal distances measured at different points in time by the second distance measuring unit; and
a battery remaining-amount recognizing unit recognizing a remaining amount of a battery included in the vehicle,
wherein the high-precision distance measurement determining unit determines not to cause the first distance measuring unit to measure the vehicle-terminal distance when the remaining amount of the battery recognized by the battery remaining-amount recognizing unit is equal to or lower than a predetermined remaining amount even though the vehicle-terminal distance decreases by a predetermined distance or larger in a plurality of the vehicle-terminal distances measured at different points in time by the second distance measuring unit.