Granted Patent B2

US 12,283,135 · App. 17/162,575 · Granted Apr 22, 2025

Inventor: Shaun M. Howard (Irvine, CA)

Assignee: RM ACQUISITION, LLC

G07C5/006G06N20/00G07C5/008G07C5/0808

Abstract

Claims (84)

1. A method of detecting vehicle safety system issues, comprising:

receiving a plurality of diagnostic trouble codes (DTCs) collected or generated by an onboard computing system of a vehicle via a network;

determining, using one or more computing devices communicably coupled to the network, a set of two or more of the plurality of DTCs that occurred within a predetermined threshold time or distance;

determining, using the one or more computing devices communicably coupled to the network, if source identifiers (ID) corresponding to and identifying sources for at least two of the set of two or more of the plurality of DTCs are different;

decoding the plurality of DTCs by joining the set of the two or more of the plurality of DTCs with a database comprising associated descriptions for each of the plurality of DTCs;

determining, using the one or more computing devices communicably coupled to the network, if a common vehicle component is used by the sources of each of the set of two or more of the plurality of DTCs having different source IDs by comparing the associated descriptions of each DTC;

aggregating two or more DTCs into a DTC cluster, wherein each DTC in the DTC cluster is:

determined to occur within the predetermined threshold,

identified by a different source ID, and

determined to have a common vehicle component used by the source of the DTC;

correlating the DTC cluster with a vehicle safety system issue stored in an issue database; and

transmitting an alert based on the correlated vehicle safety system issue to a recipient via the network.

2. The method of claim 1 , further including determining, using the one or more computing devices communicably coupled to the network, if a quantity of the plurality of diagnostic trouble codes collected or generated by the onboard computing system of the vehicle is greater than a specified percentile of other vehicles within a vehicle fleet.

3. The method of claim 1 , wherein

the DTCs collected or generated by the onboard computing system are based on vehicle safety subsystem or component sources.

4. The method of claim 1 , wherein

at least two of the DTCs received are of different types.

5. The method of claim 1 , wherein

the vehicle is a first vehicle; and

the method further comprises:

receiving a second plurality of DTCs collected or generated by an onboard computing system of a second vehicle via a network,

further including determining, using the one or more computing devices communicably coupled to the network, if the DTCs collected or generated by the first and second vehicles are unusual or disparate when compared with a third plurality of historically aggregated DTCs generated by a remaining plurality of vehicles of a vehicle fleet.

6. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:

transmitting a suggested course of action to the recipient, the suggested course of action comprising at least one of:

a vehicle diagnostic test;

a vehicle inspection;

a vehicle maintenance procedure; or

a vehicle repair procedure.

7. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:

correlating the two or more DTCs that occurred within the predetermined threshold with a vehicle safety system issue stored in a maintenance history database storing previous actions carried out on the vehicle.

8. The method of claim 1 , wherein

the issue database is populated based on feedback provided by a user; and

the feedback identifies a vehicle issue based on a plurality of DTCs that occurred within a predetermined threshold time or distance.

9. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:

receiving additional vehicle data from the onboard computing system of the vehicle; and

determining, based on the additional vehicle data, if an absence of expected data or abundance of abnormal data exists, wherein

the correlating of the two or more DTCs that occurred within the predetermined threshold with the vehicle safety system issue is further correlated with the absence of expected data or the abundance of abnormal data.

10. The method of claim 1 , wherein:

the aggregating of the two or more DTCs into a DTC cluster is performed using a machine learning algorithm; and further including

assigning the DTC cluster an issue name; and

populating the issue database based on the assigned issue name and DTC cluster.

11. A system for detecting vehicle safety system issues, comprising:

a processor;

a memory in communication with the processor, the memory storing a plurality of instructions executable by the processor to cause the system to:

receive a plurality of diagnostic trouble codes (DTCs) collected or generated by an onboard computing system of a vehicle via a network;

determine if a set of two or more of the plurality of DTCs occurred within a predetermined threshold time or distance;

determine if the source identifiers (ID) corresponding to and identifying sources for at least two DTCs within the set of two or more of the plurality of DTCs are different;

decode the set of two or more of the plurality of DTCs based on a join of the set of two or more of the plurality of DTCs with a database comprising associated descriptions for each of the plurality of DTCs;

determine if a common vehicle component is used by the sources of each of the set of two or more of the plurality of DTCs having different source IDs based on a comparison of the associated descriptions of each DTC;

aggregate two or more DTCs into a DTC cluster, wherein each DTC in the DTC cluster is:

determined to occur within the predetermined threshold,

identified by a different source ID, and

determined to have a common vehicle component used by the source of the DTC;

correlate the DTC cluster with a vehicle safety system issue stored in an issue database; and

transmit an alert based on the correlated vehicle safety system issue to a recipient via the network.

12. The system of claim 11 , wherein the plurality of instructions executable by the processor further cause the system to determine if a quantity of the plurality of diagnostic trouble codes collected or generated by the onboard computing system of the vehicle is greater than a specified percentile of other vehicles within a vehicle fleet.

13. The system of claim 11 , wherein

the DTCs collected or generated by the onboard computing system are based on vehicle safety subsystem or component sources.

14. The system of claim 11 , wherein

at least two of the DTCs received are of different types.

15. The system of claim 11 , wherein

the vehicle is a first vehicle; and

the memory further comprises instructions to cause the system to:

receive a second plurality of DTCs collected or generated by an onboard computing system of a second vehicle via a network, and

determine if the DTCs collected or generated by the first and second vehicles are unusual or disparate when compared with a third plurality of historically aggregated DTCs collected or generated by a remaining plurality of vehicles of a vehicle fleet.

16. The system of claim 11 , wherein the memory further comprises instructions to cause the system to:

transmit a suggested course of action to the recipient, the suggested course of action comprising at least one of:

a vehicle diagnostic test;

a vehicle inspection;

a vehicle maintenance procedure; or

a vehicle repair procedure.

17. The system of claim 11 , wherein the memory further comprises instructions to cause the system to:

correlate the two or more DTCs that occurred within the predetermined threshold with a vehicle safety system issue stored in a maintenance history database storing previous actions carried out on the vehicle.

18. The system of claim 11 , wherein

the issue database is populated based on feedback provided by a user; and

the feedback identifies a vehicle issue based on a plurality of DTCs that occurred within a predetermined threshold time or distance.

19. The system of claim 11 , wherein the memory further comprises instructions to cause the system to:

receive additional vehicle data from the onboard computing system of the vehicle;

and determine, based on the additional vehicle data, that an absence of expected data or abundance of abnormal data exists, wherein

threshold with the vehicle safety system issue is further correlated with the absence of expected data or the abundance of abnormal data.

20. The system of claim 11 , wherein the aggregation of the two or more DTCs into a DTC cluster is performed using a machine learning algorithm;

wherein the plurality of instructions executable by the processor further cause the system to

assign the DTC cluster an issue name; and

populate the issue database based on the assigned issue name and DTC cluster.

Assignments (2)

Continuity (1)

References Cited (24)