Patent ID: 8177043

Claim:
A steering damping method for a vehicle in which impact force applied to a steering member is damped by damping force, comprising: providing a steering damper which performs an expansion operation or a contraction operation cooperatively with a steering operation of the steering member and makes hydraulic oil flow to generate a first damping force according to a first damping force characteristic and to generate a second damping force larger than the first damping force, according to a second damping force characteristic; determining if an operational speed of the steering damper is equal to or higher than a predetermined value; determining if the vehicle is running below a predetermined speed and is not accelerating; and generating the first damping force according to the first damping force characteristic if the operational speed of the steering damper is smaller than the predetermined value and generating the second damping force according to the second damping force characteristic if the operational speed of the steering damper is equal to or higher than the predetermined value while the vehicle is running below the predetermined speed and is not accelerating; wherein the second damping force according to the second damping force characteristic is generated by the steering damper regardless of the operational speed of the steering damper while the vehicle is running at or above the predetermined speed or is accelerating.