JP2002001294A - Communication system for garbage disposer - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide a communication system for garbage disposer, by which the trouble and abnormality of the garbage disposer can be detected at an early stage, and which allows a serviceman to properly cope with the trouble and the abnormality, according to their type. SOLUTION: When a sensor installed in a garbage disposer 1 detects a first predetermined trouble or abnormality which occurs in the garbage disposer 1 and can be coped with at an early stage, a transmission unit sends first communication and information to at least a portable reception unit 3. When the sensor detects a second trouble or abnormality which occurs in the garbage disposer 1 and differs from the first trouble or abnormality, the transmission unit sends second communication and information to at least receiving station 2.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a communication system for a food waste disposer. More specifically, the present invention relates to a communication system for a garbage disposer that can detect a failure or an abnormality of the garbage disposer at an early stage, and can take appropriate measures by a service person according to the type of the failure or the abnormality.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art Conventionally, when a failure or abnormality occurs in a garbage disposal, a user notices the failure or abnormality of the garbage disposal, and then contacts a maintenance company. Was. Then, the maintenance company contacted the service technician, and the service technician who had received the notification went to the place where the garbage disposer was installed and repaired it.

[0003] In this case, however, the serviceman knows the cause of the failure only after going to the place where the garbage disposal machine is installed. Therefore, the serviceman again carries the repair parts at a later date for repair. Needed a long time to work properly.

For example, in the case of a commercial garbage processing machine, if it breaks down and stops, a large amount of garbage is generated, which also causes a problem of odor. In addition, there is a problem that it is expensive to collect a large amount of garbage from a trader.

On the other hand, failures or abnormalities that can be dealt with promptly due to clogging of a filter of a garbage disposer can be repaired by the user himself if proper instructions can be obtained from a service person. .
However, even in such a case, since the user, the maintenance company, and the service person are contacted in this order, there is a problem that the repair is delayed.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION The present invention has been made to solve such a problem, and it is possible to detect a failure or abnormality of a garbage disposer at an early stage, and a service technician can appropriately detect a failure or abnormality according to the type of failure or abnormality. An object of the present invention is to provide a communication system for a garbage disposer capable of taking measures.

[0007]

According to the present invention, there is provided a communication system for a food waste disposer, comprising: (a) a sensor for detecting a failure or abnormality of the food waste disposer; and (b) an input obtained by the sensor. A first transmitting unit for transmitting a signal based on the information;
(C) a receiving station for receiving a signal transmitted from the first transmitting unit; and (d) a portable portable receiving unit for receiving a signal transmitted from the first transmitting unit; When the sensor detects a predetermined first failure or abnormality that can be dealt with early in the garbage disposer, the transmitting unit performs at least a first communication notification to the portable receiving unit, and the sensor However, when detecting a second failure or abnormality different from the first failure or abnormality, which has occurred in the garbage disposer, the transmitting unit performs at least a second communication notification to the receiving station. Features.

When the receiving station receives the second communication notification, a second communication notification including the content of the second failure or abnormality is sent from the receiving station to the portable receiving unit. Preferably, it comprises a transmitting unit.

It is preferable that the receiving station includes a display unit for displaying the content of the first or second failure or abnormality.

When the receiving station receives the second communication notification, the receiving station includes an ordering unit for automatically ordering a repair station required for repairing the garbage disposal machine to a supply station. preferable.

[0011] Preferably, the first transmitting unit comprises a PHS or a mobile phone.

[0012] It is preferable that at least the first and second transmission notifications are transmitted in the form of e-mail via the Internet.

It is preferable that the first transmitting unit transmits data obtained from the sensor to the receiving station at least every predetermined period.

A receiving means for predicting the occurrence of a failure or abnormality of the garbage disposer by using data from the sensor received from the first transmitting unit; and It is preferable to make a fourth transmission notification to the portable receiving unit when an abnormality is predicted.

It is preferable that the data is transmitted from the first transmitting unit to the receiving station at predetermined intervals during the night.

[0016]

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing a communication system for a garbage disposer according to the present invention. FIG. 1 is a schematic explanatory view showing a basic configuration of one embodiment of a communication system for a food waste disposal machine according to the present invention, and FIG.
FIG. 3 is a schematic explanatory view of a circuit network applied to the communication of the garbage processing system of FIG. 1, FIG. 3 is a block diagram showing a basic configuration of an electric circuit provided in the garbage processor of FIG. 1, and FIG. FIG. 5 is an explanatory plan view showing an example of information displayed on a display unit provided in the receiving station of FIG. 1. FIG. 5 is a flowchart showing an example of repair work of a garbage processing machine using the garbage processing machine communication system of FIG. FIG. 6 is a flowchart showing a repair operation based on a failure prediction which is another example of a repair operation of the garbage disposal machine using the communication system for the garbage disposal device of FIG. 1, and FIG. 7 shows a failure prediction process of FIG. FIG. 8 is an explanatory plan view showing an example of information displayed on the display unit of the portable receiving unit in FIG. 1, and FIG. 9 is another explanatory diagram of the information displayed on the display unit provided in the receiving station in FIG. Plane explanation of warning screen based on failure prediction showing an example It is.

The communication system for garbage disposers shown in FIG. 1 has a service company for maintenance automatically using a transmission unit when a failure or abnormality occurs in the garbage disposer 1 for business use. This is for notifying a serviceman of a failure or abnormality, and is roughly divided into a garbage disposal machine 1 owned by a user, a receiving station 2 of a service company, and a portable receiving unit 3 carried by the serviceman. ing. Further, the garbage disposer 1 is provided with a sensor for detecting a failure or abnormality of the garbage disposer 1, and a transmission unit.

It should be noted that the communication system of the present invention is not limited to a commercial garbage disposal machine for business use, and it is needless to say that the communication system of the present invention can be applied to other household garbage disposal machines.

For example, the garbage processing machine 1 of the present embodiment
Includes various sensors (not shown) such as the air flow rate sensor.
An input unit 8 for inputting data from a computer, a control unit 9 for controlling the operation of the garbage processor 1, an interface unit 10, a transmission unit 11 serving as a modem and a mobile phone,
An electric circuit including the storage unit 12 is provided. The interface unit 10 is connected to the control unit 9, the transmission unit 11, and the storage unit 12, respectively. The interface unit 10 issues a dial command to the transmission unit 11 and sequentially transmits data in the control unit 9 and the storage unit 12 via the transmission unit 11. The storage unit 12 stores data from the sensor, and sends the data to the interface unit 10 as needed. Further, the data stored in the storage unit 12 can be used when a failure or abnormality occurs in the garbage disposer 1 to search for the cause.

In the communication system for garbage disposal shown in FIG. 1, for example, in the garbage disposal 1, when the sensor detects that a first failure or abnormality that can be dealt with promptly occurs, the transmission is performed. The unit directly performs the first communication notification to the portable receiving unit 3 such as the PHS or the portable telephone carried by the service person as indicated by the arrow 4. The first communication notification is displayed on the display of the portable receiving unit 3 (see FIG. 8) as data including the address of the garbage disposer 1, the telephone number, the details of the failure, and the like. The serviceman can then either take action to contact the user for improvement or repair the garbage processor directly. In addition, the first communication notification is transmitted to the portable receiving unit 3.
Alternatively, the call may be transmitted to the receiving station 2.

The first failure or abnormality which can be quickly dealt with in the present invention can be repaired by a user according to a serviceman's instruction or easily repaired even if the serviceman does not prepare repair parts. Failures or abnormalities that can occur. For example, there are the following three failures and abnormalities, and the following sensors are provided for each of the failures and abnormalities.

In the case of failure or abnormality due to forgetting to clean the filter of the garbage disposer or clogging of the filter, the switch operates when the filter is set, counts the time, and sends the air volume sensor or pressure sensor about once a week. To detect clogging.

Failures or abnormalities due to poor treatment due to an increase in the water content of the processed material. In this case, the water content is detected by a water content sensor. A large amount of garbage containing a large amount of water is thrown in, and if it exceeds a certain water content, it will not be possible to treat it. Therefore, it will be repaired by replacing the chips in the treatment tank. On the other hand, even if the water content is low, it becomes impossible to process,
Add water to restore.

Failure or abnormality due to the fullness of the processed material inside the processing tank In this case, recovery is performed by detecting the processed material inside the processing layer to a prescribed amount or less by detecting with a known bulk sensor.

On the other hand, when the sensor detects that a second failure or abnormality requiring repair parts other than the first failure or abnormality has occurred, the transmitting unit, as indicated by arrow 5, transmits a signal to the personal computer of the service company. , Etc. to the receiving station 2. At this time, the data sent from the food waste disposer 1 is processed and processed, and displayed on the display 7 of the personal computer. In addition, the first sent to the portable receiving unit 3
May be received by the receiving station 2 such as a personal computer and displayed on the display 7.

The second failure or abnormality requiring repair parts according to the present invention is, for example, the following two failures or abnormalities:
The following sensors are provided for each failure or abnormality.

The operation of the thermal relay of the motor system is considered to be caused by a spoon getting stuck or a gear failure. In this case, the thermal relay returns immediately when the reset switch is pressed, but it is necessary for a service person to pursue the cause.

In this case, the temperature is monitored by a temperature sensor.

Further, in the present embodiment, as indicated by an arrow 6, a third transmitting unit (not shown) provided in the receiving station 2 is used to send a third signal to the portable receiving unit 3 of the serviceman.
Is transmitted to the portable receiving unit 3 of the service person, and at the same time, the stock status of repair parts is also notified. Thus, the service person can notify the user of the garbage disposal machine that a failure or abnormality has occurred, and can start repairing the garbage disposal machine as soon as a repair part is inserted.

In order to promptly order repair parts, the receiving station 2 supplies repair parts necessary for repairing the garbage disposer 1 when receiving the second communication notification. It is preferable to include an ordering unit (not shown) that automatically places an order.

In the communication system for the garbage disposer shown in FIG.
The service person receives the data from the garbage disposal machine 1 or the receiving station 2 of the service company by the portable receiving unit 3 and immediately goes to repair or use the garbage disposal machine 1 according to the content of the received data. And promptly and accurately respond to them.

An example of the repair work of the garbage processing machine 1 using the communication system for the garbage processing machine of the present embodiment is as follows.
This is shown in the flowchart of FIG.

As shown in FIG. 2, in the communication system for a garbage disposer according to the present embodiment, a general telephone line network, a PHS network, a portable telephone network,
A packet communication network, the Internet, an ISDN line network, an in-house LAN, or the like can be adopted.

In particular, the first transmitting unit of the garbage disposer 1 is a portable telephone which does not require a telephone cable and has a low equipment cost, considering that the garbage disposer 1 is usually installed alone outdoors. Preferably, PHS is used.

Further, by transmitting the first communication notification 4, the second communication notification 5, and possibly the third communication notification 6 shown in FIG. 1 in the form of e-mail via the Internet, the cost can be reduced. Communication costs.

Further, in the communication system for garbage disposal according to the present invention, the first transmission unit of the garbage disposal 1 transmits to the receiving station 2 such as a personal computer of a service company at least every predetermined period (for example, one day). Once)
If the data obtained from the sensor in the garbage disposer 1 is collected and accumulated in the receiving station 2, it becomes easy for the service company to pursue the cause of the abnormality.

Further, even when a failure or abnormality occurs in the food waste disposer 1, communication may be performed irregularly. In addition, the receiving station 2 such as a personal computer predicts a failure or an abnormality from the collected data by a predicting means (not shown) provided in the receiving station 2, and further notifies the notifying means (the first The second transmission unit may be used to notify that a failure or abnormality may occur. In this case, before the garbage disposer 1 breaks down, it is possible to predict whether the garbage disposer 1 is being used abnormally or whether a foreign substance such as a spoon is inside the treatment tank. Therefore, it is possible to repair them before major damage and failure occur. An example of a series of operations for such repair based on the failure prediction is shown in the flowchart of FIG. Further, as a specific example of the failure prediction step A in FIG. 6, for example, the failure prediction step in the case of monitoring the current value of the stirring motor and the bulk sensor for detecting the bulk of the processed material inside the processing tank is shown in the flowchart of FIG. In more detail.

In the failure prediction shown in FIGS. 6 and 7, when there is a possibility of occurrence of a failure, the portable receiving unit 3 of the service person shown in FIG.
As shown in (a), an address, a telephone number, a model number, a serial number, and a person in charge are displayed. In the next display, FIG.
As shown in (b), detailed prediction contents are displayed. On the other hand, as shown in FIG. 9, the display 7 of the receiving station 2 such as a personal computer shows an example of the expected result based on the time series change of the motor current value and the measurement value of the bulk sensor.

It is preferable to transmit the data from the first transmitting unit to the receiving station 2 at predetermined intervals at night, since the communication cost can be reduced.

[0040]

According to the present invention, a failure or abnormality of the garbage disposer can be detected at an early stage, and a service person can take appropriate measures according to the type of the failure or abnormality.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a schematic explanatory view showing a basic configuration which is an embodiment of a communication system for a food waste disposal machine of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a schematic explanatory diagram of a line network applied to communication of the communication system for the food waste disposer of FIG. 1;

FIG. 3 is a block diagram showing a basic configuration of an electric circuit provided in the garbage disposer of FIG. 1;

FIG. 4 is an explanatory plan view illustrating an example of information displayed on a display unit provided in the receiving station in FIG. 1;

FIG. 5 is a flowchart illustrating an example of a repair work of the garbage processing machine using the communication system for the garbage processing machine of FIG. 1;

FIG. 6 is a flowchart showing a repair operation based on a failure prediction, which is another example of a repair operation of the food waste disposer using the communication system for the food waste disposer of FIG. 1;

FIG. 7 is a flowchart showing a failure prediction step of FIG. 6;

FIG. 8 is an explanatory plan view illustrating an example of information displayed on a display unit of the portable receiving unit in FIG. 1;

9 is an explanatory plan view of a warning screen based on a failure prediction showing another example of the information displayed on the display unit provided in the receiving station in FIG. 1;

[Explanation of symbols]

 1 Garbage disposal 2 Receiving station 3 Portable receiving unit

──────────────────────────────────────────────────の Continued on the front page (51) Int.Cl. ⁷ Identification symbol FI Theme coat ゛ (Reference) B09B 5/00 ZABP (72) Inventor Yasuhiro Ishida 2-5-5 Keihanhondori, Moriguchi City, Osaka Sanyo Inside Electric Machinery Co., Ltd. (72) Norimasa Sakamoto 2-5-5 Keihanhondori, Moriguchi-shi, Osaka Sanyo Electric Co., Ltd. (72) Torahiko Nonogami 2-5-2-5 Keihanhondori, Moriguchi-shi, Osaka F-term (reference) in Sanyo Electric Co., Ltd. 4D004 AA03 AC07 CA15 CB13 CB32 DA01 DA04 DA07 DA09 DA12 DA16 5B049 AA04 BB00 FF04 GG02 GG03 GG06 5C087 AA02 AA03 AA10 AA24 AA25 BB12 BB18 FF74 FF20 FF17 FF17 FF17 GG23 GG66 GG67 GG70 GG83 5K101 KK14 LL12 MM07 RR12

Claims (9)

[Claims] 1. A sensor for detecting a failure or abnormality of a garbage disposer, and (b) a first transmitting unit for transmitting a signal based on input information obtained by the sensor.
(C) a receiving station for receiving a signal transmitted from the first transmitting unit; and (d) a portable portable receiving unit for receiving a signal transmitted from the first transmitting unit; When the sensor detects a predetermined first failure or abnormality that can be dealt with early in the garbage disposer, the transmitting unit performs at least a first communication notification to the portable receiving unit, and the sensor However, when detecting a second failure or abnormality different from the first failure or abnormality, which has occurred in the garbage processor, the transmitting unit performs at least a second communication notification to the receiving station. Communication system for processor. 2. When the receiving station receives the second communication notification, a third communication notification including the content of the second failure or abnormality is sent from the receiving station to the portable receiving unit. The communication system for a garbage disposal according to claim 1, further comprising two transmission units. 3. The receiver according to claim 1, wherein the receiving station includes a display unit for displaying the content of the first or second failure or abnormality.
A communication system for a garbage disposer according to the above. 4. An ordering unit for automatically ordering repair parts required for repairing the garbage disposal to a supply station when the receiving station receives the second communication notification. The communication system for a garbage processor according to claim 1. 5. The communication system for a garbage disposal according to claim 1, wherein the first transmitting unit is a PHS or a mobile phone. 6. The communication system for a garbage processor according to claim 1, wherein at least the first and second transmission notifications are transmitted in the form of e-mail via the Internet. 7. The communication system for a garbage processor according to claim 1, wherein the first transmitting unit transmits the data obtained from the sensor to the receiving station at least every predetermined period. 8. A predicting means, wherein the receiving station predicts the occurrence of a failure or abnormality of the garbage disposer using data from the sensor received from the first transmitting unit,
The communication system for a garbage disposer according to claim 7, wherein a fourth transmission notification is issued to the portable receiving unit when the prediction means predicts a failure or abnormality. 9. The communication system for a garbage disposer according to claim 7, wherein the transmission of the data from the first transmission unit to the reception station at predetermined intervals is performed at night.