Patent ID: 7248011

Claim:
A drive unit for automatically actuating a vehicle door, it being possible to connect the drive unit to the vehicle door or to a transmission device by means of an output shaft, said transmission device executing a pivoting movement which corresponds to the pivoting movement of the vehicle door, and the drive unit comprising at least one first sensor device which can be connected to an electronic evaluation device and serves to detect the respective angular position of the vehicle door, having the following features: (a) the first sensor device comprises a rotation angle measuring device for detecting the absolute value of at least three mutually adjacent pivot angle ranges ( a 1 - a 4 of the vehicle door, these pivot angle ranges covering the entire pivot angle between the closed position of the vehicle door and the opened position of the vehicle door, and (b) the drive unit comprises at least one second sensor device which has at least one incremental measured value detector for measuring the relative position of the output shaft of the drive unit in relation to the start or the end of the respective pivot angle range.