Automotive Touch Surface Haptic Feedback Control
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Solution Overview
Problem
The increasing complexity of automotive vehicle controls due to new technologies leads to driver confusion and attentional overload, as traditional buttons are replaced by touch surfaces lacking direct feedback, potentially causing ambiguity and safety issues.
Innovation Solution
A control device featuring a touch surface with a haptic feedback module that generates repetitive haptic patterns and periods without feedback to provide tactile feedback, simulating button presses and graphical interactions, thereby reducing ambiguity and enhancing user experience without visual or auditory distractions.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Device complexity
If conventional mechanical buttons are replaced with touch surfaces to reduce physical complexity, then the number of controls can be reduced and space saved, but direct tactile feedback is lost creating user ambiguity
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements haptic feedback mechanisms that generate tactile sensations in response to user touches on the touch surface. When a user touches a specific area, the system produces vibrations or resistance forces through actuators, providing direct tactile confirmation that the touch was registered. This feedback loop resolves the information loss by giving users sensory confirmation equivalent to mechanical button feedback.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent replaces mechanical button structures with touch surface technology while substituting the mechanical feedback mechanism with haptic feedback systems. Instead of physical button presses and mechanical returns, the system uses electronic touch detection combined with controlled vibrations and resistance generation to simulate tactile interaction, maintaining the sensory experience without the physical complexity.
2Loss of information
If haptic feedback is continuously provided during finger contact to enhance interaction clarity, then user feedback is improved, but driver distraction and sensory overload may increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent employs periodic haptic feedback patterns rather than continuous vibration during finger contact. The system delivers tactile feedback in rhythmic sequences or at specific intervals during the interaction, providing sufficient sensory information to confirm registration while allowing sensory processing gaps that prevent overload and maintain driver attention.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent applies haptic feedback selectively rather than uniformly across all touches. The system adjusts the intensity, duration, and pattern of haptic responses based on the specific interaction context, providing just enough feedback to confirm registration without excessive stimulation that would cause distraction or sensory overload.
Applied Scientific Principles
This section explains which scientific principles are used to turn an abstract innovation direction into a practical engineering solution.
Function Achieved in This Case
The solution effectively provides clear tactile feedback to users, reducing confusion and improving interaction safety by simulating button presses and graphical interactions, thus enhancing the usability of touch surfaces in automotive environments without overwhelming the driver's senses.
Implementation Method 1
a haptic feedback module configured to vibrate the touch surface; the repetition of at least two identical individual haptic patterns, generated in succession
Data Source
AI summary
A control device for an automotive vehicle has a touch surface with a plate bearing a contact sensor that detects contact of a finger of a user, a haptic feedback module that vibrates the touch surface, which includes actuators positioned below the touch surface and linked to the plate of the touch surface, and a driver unit configured to drive the haptic feedback module to generate haptic feedback in response to a press on the touch surface. The haptic feedback is composed of a vibratory signal produced by control signals including one or more succession of pulses sent to the actuators, wherein each of the plurality of control signals generates one individual haptic pattern, a repetition of at least two identical individual haptic patterns, generated successively, and a period with no haptic feedback between two successive individual haptic patterns. A method of control of such a device is also disclosed.