Abstract:
A human-transporting vehicle has a chamber, a gas collector, a detection circuit and a determination circuit for improving driving safety. The gas collector collects a gas sampling and the determination circuit determines whether a concentration of a certain composition in the gas sampling exceeds a predetermined value. If the determination result is positive, the determination circuit disables the vehicle so that the vehicle cannot start. An audio device and a display are utilized for providing the driver with information to know whether it is safe to drive the vehicle.

Description:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION  
       [0001]     1. Field of Invention  
         [0002]     The present invention relates to vehicles, particularly to vehicles having auxiliary devices for improving driving safety.  
         [0003]     2. Description of Related Art  
         [0004]     On Oct. 2, 2003, the Century Council released a nationwide survey, which revealed 66% of federal and state opinion leaders believe that fighting against hardcore drunk driving is an overwhelming priority. Hardcore drunk drivers are those who drive with a high blood alcohol concentration (BAC) of 0.15 or above, who do so repeatedly, as demonstrated by having more than one drunk driving arrest, and who are highly resistant to changing their behavior despite previous sanctions, treatment, or education efforts.  
         [0005]     According to NATIONAL HARDCORE DRUNK DRIVER PROJECT, hardcore drunk drivers are responsible for 58% of alcohol-related traffic fatalities and are 380 times more likely to be involved in a crash. Drivers with BAC levels in excess of 0.15 are only one percent of all drivers on weekend nights; however, they are involved in nearly 50% of all fatal crashes during that time.  
         [0006]     Nowadays, policemen and policewomen have to expose themselves in front of these drunk drivers on highways or country roads to find out the BAC level of these drunk drivers. However, this means policemen and policewomen endanger themselves when enforcing the law to prevent accidents that may be caused by these drunk drivers.  
         [0007]     If drunk driving is so dangerous for drunk drivers, innocent public and even policemen and policewomen, it would be beneficial to bring a new design to prevent any automobile accident in advance.  
       SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION  
       [0008]     An objective of the present invention is to provide a car and an auxiliary device therein that prevent drunk driving in advance.  
         [0009]     According to an embodiment of the present invention applied in a car, the car includes a chamber, a gas collector, a detection circuit and a determination circuit. The chamber is used for containing a driver to sit inside to drive the car. The gas collector is used for extracting a gas sampling in the chamber. The detection circuit is used for detecting a concentration of a certain composition in the gas sampling. The determination circuit is coupled to the detection circuit to prevent the car from being started if the concentration of the certain composition in the gas sampling exceeds a predetermined value.  
         [0010]     With such mechanism, drunk driving is prevented in advance by locking the car when the blood alcohol concentration of the driver exceeds a predetermined value. 
     
    
     BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS  
       [0011]     The accompanying drawings are included to provide further understanding of the invention, and constitute a part of this specification. The drawings illustrate the embodiments of the invention and, together with the description, serve to explain the principles of the invention. In the drawings,  
         [0012]      FIG. 1  illustrates a car embodiment according to the present invention;  
         [0013]      FIG. 2  illustrates a method for installing an auxiliary device in the car of  FIG. 1 ;  
         [0014]      FIG. 3  illustrates a front view of the auxiliary device;  
         [0015]      FIG. 4  illustrates a back view of the auxiliary device; and  
         [0016]      FIG. 5  illustrates a systematic diagram of the auxiliary device. 
     
    
     DESCRIPTION OF PREFERRED EMBODIMENT  
       [0017]      FIG. 1  illustrates a preferred embodiment according to the present invention, which includes a vehicle, i.e. a car  20 , and an auxiliary device  10  thereon. The term vehicle includes all mechanical apparatuses that transport humans, e.g. cars, airplanes, and ships.  
         [0018]     The car  20  has a chamber  201 , starter device  203 , a steering wheel  205 , a safety belt device  207 , a window  208  and a seat  209 . In addition, the auxiliary device is disposed on the steering wheel  205 .  
         [0019]      FIG. 2  is a part-enlarged figure of  FIG. 1 , illustrating a method for installing the auxiliary device  10 . In an example of implementing the auxiliary device  10 , a housing is used for containing the elements of the auxiliary device  10  to make the auxiliary device  10  a module. With such implementation, the cost and complexity of re-engineering the car  20  can be decreased significantly.  
         [0020]      FIG. 3  and  FIG. 4  separately illustrate a front view and a back view of the auxiliary device  10 . In  FIG. 3 , the auxiliary device  10  has a blow entrance  101 , an alarm indicator  102 , a blow indicator  103  and a concentration indicator  104 . In  FIG. 4 , the auxiliary device  10  has a power supply end  105  and a control output end  106 .  
         [0021]      FIG. 5  illustrates a systematic diagram of the auxiliary device  10 . In the illustrated example, the auxiliary device  10  has a gas collector  107 , a detection circuit  108  and a determination circuit  109 . Components of the gas collector  107  include a gas entrance  1071 , a control valve  1072 , a filter  1073 , a reset gas entrance  1074  and an exhaust fan  1075 . The filter  1073  is used for filtering reset gas for comparison. The control valve  1072  is used for controlling when a gas sampling is sent to the detection circuit  108 .  
         [0022]     With the control valve  1072  and the exhaust fan  1075 , the gas sampling is transmitted via the gas entrance  1071  to the detection circuit  108 . The detection circuit  108  has an alcohol sensor  1081 , an amplifier  108  and an analog-to-digital (A/D) converter  1083 . The alcohol sensor  1081  detects a concentration of alcohol composition in the gas sampling, and the detected result, e.g. a voltage or current value, is amplified by the amplifier  1082  and then transformed to a corresponding value by the A/D converter  1083 .  
         [0023]     The detected value is transmitted to the determination circuit  109 . The determination circuit  109  has a controller  1091 , a starter control device  1092 , an audio device  1093  and a display device  1094 . The controller  1091  receives the detected value from the detection circuit  108 , and determines whether the detected value exceeds a predetermined value, e.g. 0.25 mg/l alcohol gas concentration. When an alcohol concentration of the driver is determined over the legal value, the controller  1091  sends a command to the starter switch  2032  to prevent the car from being started.  
         [0024]     Besides, the controller  1091  also shows the detection result through the display device  1094 . An example of the display device  1094  is the indicator  102  and the concentration indicator  104  in  FIG. 3 .  
         [0025]     With the above device, drunk driving can be prevented in advance without exposing policemen or policewomen to danger as safe driving is ensured.  
         [0026]     Moreover, to make the auxiliary device  10  more convenient, an additional sensor can be incorporated. For example, the safety belt sensor  2071  that is coupled to the safety belt device  207  can be used for determining whether the driver has used the safety belt device  207 , and can be used for deciding when to start the alcohol detection mechanism as described above. Another approach to activate the alcohol detection mechanism is to couple a driver switch  2031  to the controller  1091 . When the driver uses the driver switch  2031 , the alcohol detection mechanism is activated. Also, the seat  209  in  FIG. 1  can be equipped with a sensor to detect the pressure when the driver sits on the seat  209  for activating the alcohol detection mechanism.  
         [0027]     To make the detection more precise, the window  208  in  FIG. 1  or the door switch  2033  in  FIG. 5  can be equipped with sensors coupled to the controller  1091 . Such mechanism ensures the correctness of the detection result. Further, the window  208  can be closed until the detection procedure has finished.  
         [0028]     Also, the gas collector  107  can be implemented to suck the gas sampling directly from the chamber  201  for detection. Alternatively, the gas collector  107  can be equipped with a blow entrance so that the driver blows into the gas entrance directly as the gas sampling.  
         [0029]     To assist the driver to operate the above auxiliary device  10 , an audio device  1093  can be used for providing the driver with corresponding messages via audio. For example, the audio device  1093  guides the driver to blow to the blow entrance or inform the driver that the detection result shows that the driver should not drive at that moment.  
         [0030]     In addition to the alcohol detection, the system architecture described above can be used for detecting whether there is gas that may harm human health, e.g. CO 2  concentration. Even though a car is used for explaining the present invention, it is to be noted that such embodiment can be applied in other vehicles, like ships or airplanes.  
         [0031]     Although the present invention is described using the above embodiments, it does not mean that the scope of the present invention is limited to the above description. Persons skilled in the art can make all kinds of modifications, for example, changing the selected polymeric material, introducing different conductive particles, changing electroplating conditions, changing constituent weight ratio, to achieve the same effects. However, these modifications shall not deviate from the spirit of the present invention, and they shall fall within the scope of protection of the present invention. The scope of protection of the present invention shall not be limited to the description of the claims.