Vehicular navigation apparatus

Claim 1

A vehicular navigation apparatus for guidance along a preset route, comprising: a current position detecting device for detecting a current position of a vehicle in which the device is installed; an information storing device for storing map information and other route information for route search and route guidance; an input device for inputting at least one of a destination and a passing point and for inputting an instruction to search for a route to said at least one of the destination and the passing point on the basis of the current position detected by the current position detecting device; an output device for outputting information for route guidance; and a central processing device having route searching means for searching for a route from the current position to said at least one of the destination and the passing point on the basis of the map information, route storing means for temporarily storing the route found by the route searching means, and route guidance control means for outputting to the output device a signal for executing route guidance based on the route, the route searching means determining as a route search starting location a location on a road that is stored in the information storing device and that is located a predetermined distance ahead in a travel direction from the current position, and searching for a route from said location.

Claim 6

An apparatus according to any of claims 1 to 5, wherein if the vehicle is not traveling on a guidance possible road, the route searching means waits until the vehicle comes to travel on a guidance possible road, and then searches for a route.