Patent ID: 8170740

Claim:
A method for identifying whether a vehicle maneuver is a vehicle launching maneuver, said method comprising: reading a vehicle speed signal from a vehicle sensor and determining a vehicle longitudinal acceleration signal; determining whether the vehicle speed signal during a predetermined time window is greater than a predetermined speed threshold; determining whether the vehicle speed signal before the predetermined time window is less than the predetermined speed threshold; determining whether the average of the vehicle longitudinal acceleration during the predetermined time window is greater than a first longitudinal acceleration threshold; determining, using a processor, that the vehicle is in a vehicle launching maneuver if the vehicle speed during the predetermined time window is greater than the speed threshold, the vehicle speed before the time window is less than the speed threshold and the average of the vehicle longitudinal acceleration during the time window is greater than the first longitudinal acceleration threshold; and determining that the vehicle launching maneuver has ended if the average of the vehicle longitudinal acceleration during a second time window is less than a second longitudinal acceleration threshold.