Inter-vehicle distance measurement device and vehicle equipped with the same

摘要

PURPOSE:To measure the inter-vehicle distance with a preceding car on the self-line by judging whether an object to be detected is the preceding vehicle on the self-line or not on the basis of the respective distances from the self-vehicle and the object to a road side represented by a road side form. CONSTITUTION:A laser beam for sweeping in a prescribed measuring angle range is emitted to the front of a self-vehicle, and a road side reflector R and vehicle reflectors of preceding vehicles 2, 3 are detected as objects to be detected from the reflected lights by the reflector R and the vehicle reflectors. The relative positions with the vehicle 1 are calculated, and moving vectors are determined from the relative positions in different points of time. The vehicles 2, 3 are identified by the relative vectors and the moving vectors, and the reflector R by the moving vector. The road side form is identified from the relative position of the reflector R. The distances between the road side based on the road side form and all the objects to be detected are calculated, and the traveling lines of the vehicles 2, 3 are judged from the distances, relative positions, and moving vectors. When the preceding vehicle on the self-line is judged to be the vehicle 2, the distance between this vehicle 2 and the vehicle 1 is the vehicle-to-vehicle distance.