Patent ID: 8165751

Claim:
A method of detecting rollover in a vehicle comprising: determining a lateral acceleration of said vehicle and accordingly generating a lateral acceleration signal in a control circuit; determining a roll rate of said vehicle and accordingly generating a roll rate signal in the control circuit; determining a roll angle of said vehicle and accordingly generating a roll angle signal in the control circuit; determining a trip point length related to a track width of said vehicle in the control circuit as a function of said lateral acceleration communicated via each said lateral acceleration signal so that said trip point length reflects any change in said track width resulting from deformation of a suspension system and wheels of said vehicle that is caused by a rollover initiation force applied to said vehicle from a lateral direction; determining a rollover threshold in the control circuit according to said roll rate communicated via said roll rate signal, said roll angle signal, said trip point length and a roll moment of inertia of said vehicle; and generating a control signal in the control circuit according to said rollover threshold thereby indicating detected rollover of said vehicle.