Patent ID: 7496439

Claim:
An exterior vehicle rearview mirror and display assembly for a heavy duty vehicle having a vehicle cab from which the vehicle is operated, said assembly comprising: a mirror housing carried on an exterior of the vehicle cab; a mirror glass carried by said mirror housing having a reflective coating; a display window included in said reflective coating; vehicle sensors for generating vehicle status information and object avoidance information; an exterior display unit carried in said mirror housing having a lightable display viewable by an operator through said display window for selectively displaying one of said vehicle status information and object avoidance information; an interior control unit disposed interiorly of said cab remote from said mirror housing in communication with said exterior display unit and said vehicle sensors, said interior control unit having a computer readable medium; a set of computer readable display instructions embodied in said computer readable medium which provide a dual mode operation for selectively displaying one of said vehicle status information and said object avoidance information on said display unit; said display instructions including instructions for receiving said vehicle status information and said object avoidance information at said control unit, detecting whether said vehicle is placed in a reverse drive, automatically transmitting said vehicle status display information to said display unit in response to detecting the vehicle is not in reverse drive, and automatically transmitting said object avoidance display information to said display unit in response to detecting said vehicle is in reverse drive.