Patent ID: 9266534
Filing Date: 2016-02-23
CPC Classification: B60W,G01S

Claim Text:
1. A vehicle control apparatus for implementing inter-vehicle distance control of a vehicle carrying the apparatus behind a preceding vehicle based on reflected waves from a target that is a reflecting portion of the preceding vehicle, the vehicle carrying the apparatus being referred to as a subject vehicle, the reflected waves being radar waves transmitted to a front of the subject vehicle and then reflected from the target, the apparatus comprising: a target information acquirer configured to acquire target information about the target from the reflected waves, the target information including a detected distance from the subject vehicle to the target of the preceding vehicle; a target-pair distance recognizer configured to, in the presence of a target pair that is a pair of the target and a non-target reflection point that is closer to the subject vehicle than the target and belongs to the same preceding vehicle as the target, calculate and recognize a separation distance between the target and the non-target reflection point of the target pair as a target-pair distance; an offset setter configured to, when the target-pair distance is recognized by the target-pair distance recognizer for a predetermined period of time or more, set the target-pair distance as an offset; a corrected distance calculator configured to, when the target-pair distance is recognized by the target-pair distance recognizer for the predetermined period of time or more, calculate a first corrected distance as an inter-vehicle distance between a rear end of the preceding vehicle and the subject vehicle by subtracting the target-pair distance from the detected distance, and when the target-pair distance is recognized by the target-pair distance recognizer for less than the predetermined period of time, calculate a second corrected distance as an inter-vehicle distance between the rear end of the preceding vehicle and the subject vehicle by subtracting the offset set by the offset setter from the detected distance; and a controller configured to, when the target-pair distance is recognized by the target-pair distance recognizer for the predetermined period of time or more, implement the inter-vehicle distance control based on the first corrected distance calculated by the corrected distance calculator, and when the target-pair distance is recognized by the target-pair distance recognizer for less than the predetermined period of time, implement the inter-vehicle distance control based on the second corrected distance calculated by the corrected distance calculator.