Patent ID: 7671726

Claim:
An apparatus for detecting positions of a plurality of wheels of a vehicle, comprising: transmitters attached respectively to the plurality of wheels, each of the transmitters comprising a receiving antenna, a transmitting antenna, a receiving unit receiving a triggering signal via the receiving antenna, a first processing unit receiving the triggering signal received by the receiving unit, calculating a reception intensity of the triggering signal, and storing data indicative of the reception intensity into a frame to be transmitted, and a transmitting unit transmitting the frame processed by the first processing unit via the transmitting antenna; a triggering device disposed in a body of the vehicle and formed to output the triggering signal toward the transmitters attached to the plurality of wheels, the triggering device being positioned nearest to a specified wheel among the plurality of wheels to which the triggering signal is outputted, the specified wheel being influenced most heavily by noise generated in the vehicle; and a receiver disposed to the body and formed to comprise a receiving unit receiving the frame transmitted from the transmitters and a second processing unit processing the received frame to read out the data indicative of the reception intensity from the frame and use the read-out data to detect the positions of the wheels by determining which transmitter is attached to which wheel.