Apple receives 66 new patents covering vehicle steer-by-wire systems

According to foreign media reports, the US Patent and Trademark Office has granted Apple 66 new patents, including a patent for the Titan Project: Vehicle Steering System.

Project Titan concept art. Image source: patentlyapple.com

Steer-by-wire system with multiple steering actuators

Vehicle actuators are controllable systems that cause or affect the movement of a vehicle. Types include propulsion actuators, brake actuators, steering actuators, and suspension actuators. Steer-by-wire systems can avoid or disconnect the physical connection between the steering wheel (also known as handwheel) and the wheels.

Apple's latest patent is a system and method that can provide feedback to a vehicle operator based on the operating state of each wheel of the vehicle. For example, the feedback torque can be determined based on the component torque of each operating condition at each steering wheel.

The latest steer-by-wire system covers a method for controlling a vehicle, including operating the steering system in a manual steer-by-wire control state, determining that the steering system will perform a transition to an automatic steer-by-wire control state, obtaining a manual steering angle and an automatic steering angle, determining a hybrid steering angle using a hybrid function during the transition to the automatic steer-by-wire control state, and controlling a steering actuator using the hybrid steering angle during the transition to the automatic steer-by-wire control state.

A second method includes receiving a steering wheel angle value representing a manual steering input at a steering wheel and a steering wheel torque representing a manually applied steering torque at the steering wheel, and receiving steering actuator information describing an operating condition of a steering actuator.

The method also includes determining a component torque for each steering actuator using one or more feedback models based on the steering actuator information and the steering wheel angle value, determining a feedback torque based on the component torque and the steering wheel torque, and applying the feedback torque to the steering wheel using the feedback actuator.

Apple's patent FIG. 3 below illustrates an example configuration of a steering actuator module for a steering system; Apple's patent FIG. 4 below illustrates an example configuration of a steering column module for a steering system.

Image source: patentlyapple.com

The new patent description states that the steering system includes: an actuator configured to control the movement of a vehicle wheel; a steering wheel configured to generate input for the actuator in a manual wire-steer control state; a controller configured to: determine the operating conditions of the actuator, the steering wheel, or both; determine a hybrid steering angle, a manual wheel angle based on the manual steering angle, and an automatic steering angle based on an external wheel angle as an external part command, and an automatic steering angle wire-steer control state associated with the automatic steering angle according to the manual steering angle of the steering wheel; when all operating conditions are met and the hybrid function is used, the operation of the steering system is converted from the manual wire-steer control state to the automatic wire-steer control state, wherein the hybrid function applies a weighted value to the manual steering angle and the automatic steering angle to determine the hybrid steering angle, wherein the weighted value depends on the difference between the manual wheel angle and the external wheel angle; and control the actuator using the hybrid steering angle.