Patent ID: 8244425

Claim:
An in-vehicle apparatus, which carries out a vehicle control process based on vehicle acceleration in a horizontal direction, comprising: a first acceleration defining portion for defining a first vehicle acceleration in a horizontal direction based on an output from an acceleration sensor mounted in a vehicle; a vehicle speed defining portion for defining a first vehicle speed; a vehicle angular speed defining portion for defining a vehicle angular speed; a second acceleration defining portion for defining a second vehicle acceleration in a horizontal direction based on the vehicle speed defined by vehicle speed defining portion and the vehicle angular speed defined by the vehicle angular speed defining portion; a determining portion for determining whether the first acceleration defining portion is in a condition for accurately defining the first vehicle acceleration in the horizontal direction by use of the output from the acceleration sensor, based on the first vehicle acceleration defined by the first acceleration defining portion and the second vehicle acceleration defined by the second acceleration defining portion; and a control portion for carrying out the vehicle control process based on the first vehicle acceleration in the horizontal direction, which is defined by the output from the acceleration sensor, wherein the control portion carries out the vehicle control process based on not the first vehicle acceleration in the horizontal direction but the second vehicle acceleration in the horizontal direction, when a predetermined vehicle operating condition for the first and second vehicle accelerations is satisfied, wherein the control portion determines that the predetermined vehicle operating condition for the first and second vehicle accelerations is satisfied, when the first acceleration defining portion is not in a condition for accurately defining the first vehicle acceleration in the horizontal direction based on the output from the acceleration sensor, and the control portion carries out the vehicle control process based on not the first vehicle acceleration in the horizontal direction but the second vehicle acceleration in the horizontal direction.