Apparatus and method for data communication between a vehicle and a remote terminal

摘要

This invention provides an apparatus for data communications associated with a vehicle (10,20), the apparatus including a plurality of electrical conductors (38) associated with the vehicle and being characterised by having: vehicle data communications protocol converting means (37,39) connected to said plurality of electrical conductors (38) for converting a first local data communications protocol associated with data communications along the plurality of electrical conductors (38) of the vehicle to a second local data communications protocol; and a transceiver (35) connected to said vehicle data communications protocol converting means (37,39) for transmitting the second local data communications protocol from the vehicle and receiving the second local data communications protocol from a remote data communications terminal (63) either connected to or not associated with the vehicle. Also provided is a method of data communications.