JP2008172806A - Sensor controller for human-sensible load control system - Google Patents

Abstract

<P>PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide a sensor controller for a human-sensible load control system in which a combination of a human-sensible sensor and a load circuit can be easily changed. <P>SOLUTION: The sensor controller for a human-sensible load control system is provided with: a plurality of pieces of sensor input units 11 to each of which detection information by a plurality of pieces of human-sensible sensors 2 is input individually; a load control unit 12 which instructs control states of a plurality of load circuits for each load circuit; a storage unit 13 storing a control table wherein combinations of detection information input to the sensor input units 11 are associated with the control states of the load circuits; a setting unit 14 that is an interface to which another device like a personal computer for setting/modifying contents of the control table can be connected; and an arithmetic processing unit 10 which determines the control state of each load circuit by the load control unit 12 by collating the detection information input to each sensor input unit 11 with the control table stored in the storage unit 13. <P>COPYRIGHT: (C)2008,JPO&INPIT

Description

  The present invention relates to a sensor controller of a human-type load control system used for associating presence / absence of a person in a detection area set by a human sensor with a load control state.

  Conventionally, human presence / absence (presence / absence) within a specified detection area is detected using human sensors, and lighting fixtures are turned on / off and air conditioners are operated according to the presence / absence of people within the detection area. -A load control system that controls stoppage is provided. When this type of load control system is used, it is possible to prevent the lighting apparatus from being turned on or the air conditioner to be operated in the absence of a person, and wasteful power consumption can be suppressed.

  By the way, many human sensors are provided with a switch element such as a relay and can be used in place of a switch such as a wall switch. In this type of human sensor, a load circuit is connected. The human sensor and the load circuit are associated one to one. In a normal human sensor, when a person is detected from a state where no person is detected, the load circuit is energized, and when no person is detected from a state where a person is detected, the load circuit is de-energized. To do.

  Therefore, when this type of human sensor is used to divide the space in the office into a plurality of sections by associating with the departments in the office and turn on / off the lighting fixtures in each section, each section A plurality of human sensors corresponding to the detection areas are arranged, and the lighting apparatus is connected to the human sensor for each section.

  If human sensors are placed in each section as described above and lighting fixtures in the sections are connected, the lighting fixtures can be turned on and off according to the presence or absence of people in each section, and wasteful power consumption Will be suppressed. However, the size of each section does not necessarily match the detection area of the human sensor, and a section wider than the detection area is often set. In order to cope with such a case, a slave unit that does not have a switch element and only detects humans is connected, and detection information from the slave unit is also included as detection information for controlling on / off of the load circuit. Some are also available. That is, by providing an appropriate number of slave units, it is possible to set the detection area so as to correspond to the illumination range of the luminaire connected to one load circuit.

  However, when it is necessary to change the relationship between the detection area and the luminaire due to the change in the arrangement of the departments, it is necessary to change the arrangement of the slave units and the connection relationship. For example, as shown in FIG. 9A, two human sensors 2 each having three sections A, B, and C each having a lighting device and having detection areas corresponding to the sections A and C, respectively. Is arranged, and the child device 2a having the detection area corresponding to the section B is disposed, and the child device 2a is connected to the human sensor 2 having the section C as the detection area. Here, the lighting fixtures of the sections B and C are connected to a load circuit controlled by the human sensor 2 arranged in the section C, and the load circuit controlled by the human sensor 2 arranged in the section A includes a section. A lighting fixture is connected. Therefore, if there is a person in the section A, the lighting apparatus in the section A is turned on, and if there is a person in either of the sections B and C, both the lighting apparatuses in the sections B and C are turned on.

  Now, it is necessary to change the lighting fixtures of the sections A and B together when a person is present in either of the sections A and B and to turn on the lighting equipment of the section C when a person exists in the section C. Suppose that occurs. In this case, as shown in FIG. 9B, the human sensor 2a arranged in the section B is connected to the human sensor 2 arranged in the section A, and the lighting equipment in the sections A and B is arranged in the section A. Connect to a load circuit controlled by sensor 2. In addition, the human sensor 2 arranged in the section C is made independent, and the lighting fixture in the section C is connected to a load circuit controlled by the human sensor 2 arranged in the section C. In order to make such a change, not only the connection destination of the child device 2a but also the connection relationship between the lighting device and the human sensor 2 must be changed, and a complicated work is required. It will be.

On the other hand, there is known a configuration in which a controller is provided with correspondence setting storage means for setting a correspondence relationship between a sensor and a load by touching a touch panel and storing it in a setting storage unit (see, for example, Patent Document 1).
JP-A-8-331659

  The present invention has been made in view of the above reasons, and an object of the present invention is to provide a sensor controller of a human-type load control system in which a combination of a human sensor and a load circuit can be easily changed.

  The invention of claim 1 includes a plurality of sensor input units to which detection information by a plurality of human sensors is input separately, a load control unit for instructing a control state of the plurality of load circuits for each load circuit, and a sensor A storage unit storing a control table in which an arbitrary number of human sensors and an arbitrary number of load circuits are associated by associating a combination of detection information input to the input unit with a control state of the load circuit, and the contents of the control table The setting unit, which is an interface that can be connected to other devices such as a personal computer for setting and correcting the load, and the load by comparing the detection information input to each sensor input unit with a control table stored in the storage unit And an arithmetic processing unit for determining a control state of each load circuit by the control unit.

  According to a second aspect of the present invention, in the first aspect of the present invention, the load control unit is provided with a load output unit to which the load circuit can be connected.

  According to a third aspect of the present invention, in the first aspect of the present invention, the load circuit is connected to each other, and a control unit to which each different address is set is connected to a load control unit via a transmission line. Is provided with a transmission unit that designates each address and sends out a transmission signal including control data indicating the control state of the load circuit corresponding to the address, and each control unit receives the transmission signal through the transmission line. And an output unit for controlling the control state of the load circuit according to the content of the control data when the address included in the transmission signal matches the set address.

  According to the configuration of the first aspect of the present invention, there is provided a control table for associating a combination of detection information input from the human sensor to the sensor input unit with the control state of the load circuit, and for setting and correcting the contents of the control table. Since it has a setting unit that is an interface that can be connected to other devices such as a personal computer, it is possible to arbitrarily change the combination of the human sensor and the load circuit, and the detection area and load of the human sensor. There are advantages that the degree of freedom of combination with the circuit is increased, and in many cases, the combination can be easily changed without changing the connection.

  According to a second aspect of the present invention, in the first aspect of the invention, since the load control unit is provided with a load output unit to which the load circuit can be connected, a load circuit is directly connected to each load output unit. Can be used instead of a general switch.

  According to a third aspect of the present invention, in the first aspect of the present invention, the load circuit is connected to each other, and a control unit to which a different address is set is connected to a load control unit via a transmission line. Is provided with a transmission unit that designates each address and sends out a transmission signal including control data indicating the control state of the load circuit corresponding to the address, and each control unit receives the transmission signal through the transmission line. And an output unit that controls the control state of the load circuit according to the contents of the control data when the address included in the transmission signal matches the set address, and specifies the address of the control unit Since the control state of the load circuit is changed by transmitting the transmission signal to be transmitted, even when using a wired transmission line, the number of connections is small and wiring construction is easy In addition, since the correspondence relationship between the human sensor 2 and the control state of the load circuit is set in the control table, it is only necessary to transmit the transmission signal from the transmission unit to the reception unit without using other devices, and traffic on the transmission path. There is an advantage that even when the number of load circuits to be controlled is large, the response speed is hardly lowered.

(First embodiment)
As shown in FIG. 1, the human load control system shown in this embodiment is configured by connecting a human sensor 2 to a sensor controller 1 and a load circuit including a load 3. The sensor controller 1 includes a plurality of sensor input units 11 each capable of connecting a human sensor 2 and a load control unit 12 including a plurality of load output units 12a each capable of connecting a load circuit. As the human sensor 2, a sensor that outputs one detection signal in a pulse form when a change exceeding the specified size in the heat dose occurs in the specified detection area. This type of human sensor 2 is well-known, detects a heat ray emitted from a human body by a pyroelectric infrared sensor, and outputs a detection signal when a change in heat dose is detected by the pyroelectric infrared sensor. Configured to output. The detection signal output from the human sensor 2 is given to the sensor input unit 11 as detection information.

  Since the human sensor 2 generates a detection signal only when the heat dose changes due to the movement of the person, the detection signal can be obtained when there is no movement of the person even though the person exists in the detection area. There may not be. Therefore, in each sensor input unit 11, when a detection signal is input, the holding time that is a fixed time (for example, 5 minutes) is timed, and when the detection signal is input again during the holding time, the holding time is further fixed. It is configured to extend the time and time limit. In other words, a retriggerable timer circuit is used for the sensor input unit 11, and there is a person in the detection area if the detection signal from the human sensor 2 is input during the holding time period. It is configured to be considered as such. By adopting this configuration, it is considered that a person is continuously present in the detection area even if the detection signal is not obtained until the holding time elapses from the generation of the detection signal, and the holding time is limited If the person moves even a little, the presence of the person in the detection area is reconfirmed by the generation of the detection signal, so that the holding time can be extended.

  On the other hand, each load output unit 12a constituting the load control unit 12 includes a switch element such as a relay that turns on and off a power supply path from the power source to the load 3 in the load circuit. The switch element is controlled to be turned on / off by an arithmetic processing unit 10 formed of a microcomputer. In other words, if the sensor input unit 11 and the load output unit 12a are described as one-to-one correspondence, when a person enters the detection area of the human sensor 2 as shown in FIG. As shown in b), a detection signal is input to the sensor input unit 11 from the human sensor 2, and the detection signal is appropriately generated while a person is present in the detection area. Accordingly, after the load circuit connected to the load output unit 12a is turned on by the detection signal as shown in FIG. 3C, the load circuit is in the load circuit while the next detection signal is obtained within the holding time Tc. The on state will continue. When the next detection signal is not generated before the holding time Tc elapses from the generation of the detection signal, it is assumed that there is no person in the detection area, and the load circuit is turned off after the holding time Tc elapses.

  Incidentally, the arithmetic processing unit 10 is connected to a storage unit 13 including a memory storing a control table. In the control table, the combination of the detection information input to the sensor input unit 11 is associated with the control state of the load circuit by the load output unit 12a. In other words, the combination of which load output unit 12a supplies power to the load 3 when the human sensor 2 connected to which sensor input unit 11 detects the presence of a person is set by the control table. The combination of the human sensor 2 and the load 3 based on the control table can be an arbitrary number and an arbitrary number of combinations including a one-to-one combination.

  The sensor controller 1 is also provided with a setting unit 14 for setting or correcting the contents of the control table. In the present embodiment, an interface that can be connected to another device such as a personal computer for inputting control table data is used as the setting unit 14.

  In order to describe an example of setting a control table, a case corresponding to an arrangement as shown in FIG. In the illustrated example, the office is divided into six regions (regions divided by broken lines), and lighting fixtures for illuminating each region are arranged. Six human sensors 2 each area corresponding to a detection area (in the following, human sensors 2a, 2-b,. ) Is placed. In the example shown in FIG. 2A, the detection areas of the two human sensors 2 are set as one section A to C. That is, the section A corresponds to a range in which the detection areas of the human sensors 2-a and 2-b are combined, and the section B corresponds to a range in which the detection areas of the human sensors 2-d and 2-e are combined. The section C corresponds to a range in which the detection areas of the human sensors 2-c and 2-f are combined. The sections A to C are set so that each department in the office is one section, for example.

  Now, control is performed so that lighting devices in a range corresponding to each of the sections A to C are lit during a period in which a person is present in each of the sections A to C. Since six human sensors 2 are provided as described above, six sensor input units 11 are used to connect each human sensor 2 to a different sensor input unit 11. On the other hand, since it is only necessary to correspond to the three sections A to C, the load circuit only needs to have three systems in the minimum configuration. Therefore, the sensor controller 1 has three load output units 12a (hereinafter, each load output unit 12a). Are used as load output units 12a-a, 12a-b,...). That is, load circuits including lighting fixtures arranged corresponding to the sections A to C are connected to different load output units 12a-a, 12a-b, and 12a-c, respectively.

  On the other hand, in the control table, the load control unit 12a-a is turned on during a period in which at least one of the sensor input units 11 connected to the human sensors 2-a and 2-b is in the holding time period, The load control unit 12a-b is turned on during a period in which at least one of the sensor input units 11 to which the sensors 2-d and 2-e are connected is in the holding time period, and the human sensors 2-c and 2-f Is set so that the load control units 12a-c are turned on during a period in which at least one of the sensor input units 11 connected to each other is in the holding time period. In short, the on / off state of each load control unit 12a is determined by the logical sum of whether or not each of the two sensor input units 11 is in the holding time period. For example, if a person enters the section A as shown in FIG. 4 (a), the sensor input unit 11 receives either the human sensor 2-a or 2-b as shown in FIGS. 4 (b) and 4 (c). A detection signal is input (in the illustrated example, a detection signal is input from the human sensor 2-a), and then a person is present in the detection area of one of the human sensors 2-a and 2-b. Since a detection signal is appropriately generated, while a detection signal is generated from one of the human sensors 2-a and 2-b at a time interval within the holding time Tc, a person is placed in the section A. The load circuit connected to the load output section 12a-a is turned on as shown in FIG. Similarly, the load circuit connected to the load output unit 12a-b is turned on while the person exists in the section B, and the load connected to the load output unit 12a-c while the person exists in the section C. Turn on the circuit. That is, even when one section A to C is relatively wide, it is possible to cope with the problem by arranging two human sensors 2 in each section A to C.

  By the way, it is assumed that the partition allocation is changed as shown in FIG. That is, the sections A and B in FIG. 2A are joined to form a new section A ′, and the section C in FIG. 2B is divided into two to form new sections B ′ and C ′. To do. The lighting fixtures arranged in the sections A ′ to C ′ are connected to the three load circuits in the above-described configuration example. Since the illumination range is different, the connection relationship of the luminaire to the load output unit 12a needs to be changed. In the illustrated example, a range corresponding to the human sensors 2-a, 2-b, 2-d, and 2-e is defined as a section A ', a range corresponding to the human sensor 2c is defined as a section B', and the human sensor 2f Each lighting fixture is connected to the load output unit 12a of the three load circuits so that the range corresponding to the section C ′ is set. Here, the section A ′ is associated with the load output unit 12a-a, the section B ′ is associated with the load output unit 12a-b, and the section C ′ is associated with the load output unit 12a-c.

  On the other hand, since each human sensor 2 is connected to a different sensor input unit 11, it is not necessary to change the connection. Regarding the control table, the human sensors 2-a, 2-b, 2-d, and 2-e are associated with the load output unit 12a-a, and the human sensor 2-c is used with the load output unit 12a-b. The association and the human sensor 2-f are set so as to be associated with the load output units 12a-c.

  As described above, while changing the connection relationship of the lighting fixtures to the load output unit 12a of the sensor controller 1, only by changing the correspondence relationship in the control table, it is possible to easily cope with the arrangement change in the office, After the change, it becomes possible to turn on the lighting fixtures corresponding to the sections A ′ to C ′ while a person is present in the sections A ′ to C ′.

  By the way, in this embodiment, the lighting fixture which makes the illumination range the range which respectively substantially corresponds to the detection area of each human sensor 2 is connected to each one load circuit, and each load circuit is each different load output part 12a. You may connect to. In short, lighting / extinguishing of the lighting fixture can be controlled for each detection area of the human sensor 2. For example, in the configuration example shown in FIG. 2, since six human sensors 2 are provided, six load circuits are required, and six load output units 12a are required. Thus, although the number of connection of the lighting fixtures with respect to the load output unit 12a is larger than the above-described configuration example, the detection area of the human sensor 2 and the lighting range of the lighting fixtures correspond to each other one by one. This makes it easier to deal with changes in the layout.

  For example, if lighting fixtures whose lighting ranges correspond to the detection areas of the human sensors 2-a to 2-f are respectively connected to the load output units 12a-a to 12a-f, the human sensor 2 is controlled by the control table. It is possible to easily cope with the change from the arrangement of FIG. 2A to the arrangement of FIG. 2B simply by changing the correspondence relationship between the lamp and the lighting fixture (that is, the load output unit 12a). That is, the control table corresponding to the arrangement shown in FIG. 2A turns on both the load output unit 12a-a and the load output unit 12a-b by the logical sum of the human sensors 2-a and 2-b. Both the load output unit 12a-d and the load output unit 12a-e are turned on by the logical sum of the sensory sensors 2-d and 2-e, and the load output unit 12a is calculated by the logical sum of the human sensor 2-c and 2-f. -C and load output units 12a-f are both set to be on. On the other hand, the control table corresponding to the arrangement of FIG. 2B is based on the logical sum of the human sensors 2-a, 2-b, 2-d, 2-e, and the load output units 12a-a, 12a-b, 12a. -D and 12a-e are all turned on, the load output unit 12a-c is turned on by the human sensor 2-c, and the load output unit 12a-f is turned on by the human sensor 2-f. In this way, it is possible to set various relationships between the human sensor 2 and the lighting fixture only by changing the control table.

  For example, if a single load circuit is controlled by combining the detection areas of a plurality of human sensors 2, a wide detection area can be set to control the single load circuit.

  In addition, as shown in FIG. 5, there is a section C between the two sections A and B, and the lighting equipment in the section C wants to be turned on at the same time when any of the lighting equipment in the sections A and B is turned on. In this case, a human sensor 2 having a detection area E1 straddling the sections A and C and a detection area E2 straddling the sections B and C is provided, and each of the lighting fixtures in the sections A, B, and C is loaded with one system. Each load circuit as a circuit is connected to a separate load output unit 12a, and the human sensor 2 having the detection area E1 is associated with the lighting fixtures in the sections A and C by the control table, and the human sensor 2 having the detection area E2 Can be associated with the lighting fixtures in sections B and C.

  Furthermore, as in the configuration example shown in FIG. 8, there are three sections A, B, and C that do not overlap, and when there is a person in the section A, the lighting fixture in the section A is turned on, From the state where the lighting fixtures of the sections B and C are turned on simultaneously when a person is present, the lighting fixtures of the sections A and B are turned on at the same time when a person is present in either of the sections A and B. In the case of changing to a state in which the lighting fixture of the section C is turned on when there is, there can be dealt with only by changing the control table.

  The above-described arrangement example is an example, and the human sensor 2 and the lighting fixture can be appropriately arranged, and the human sensor 2 and the lighting fixture to be related are arbitrarily set by a control table. Is possible.

(Second Embodiment)
In the embodiment described above, an example in which the load control unit 12 is provided with a plurality of load output units 12a for turning on and off the load circuit has been described. However, in the present embodiment, as shown in FIG. A communication processing unit 12b is provided. The communication processing unit 12b mainly functions as a transmission unit that transmits a transmission signal, but may have a reception function of receiving a signal as necessary. In this embodiment, a wired transmission path is exemplified as the transmission path 4 for transmitting a transmission signal, but this does not prevent the use of a wireless transmission path.

  A load circuit is not connected to the load control unit 12 of the sensor controller 1 of the present embodiment. As shown in FIG. 7, a load circuit including the load 3 is connected to the communication processing unit 12b via a transmission path. 5 is connected. The control unit 5 has an address set separately, receives a transmission signal including the address and control data from the transmission path, and receives the control data when the address received by the transmission signal matches a preset address; And an output unit 5b for controlling on / off (control state) of the load circuit according to the control data. That is, the control unit 5 has the function of the load output unit 12a in the first embodiment, and the transmission path 4 is used for data transmission from the arithmetic processing unit 10 to the control unit 5.

  Here, as shown in FIG. 8, the transmission signal transmitted through the transmission line 4 includes a source address SA indicating a transmission signal source, a destination address DA indicating a transmission signal destination, and a control state of the load circuit. And control data CD indicating (ON / OFF). An error check code for detecting a transmission error is added to the transmission signal. In the present embodiment, a transmission signal is basically transmitted from the sensor controller 1 to the control unit 5, but a configuration may be adopted in which retransmission is requested from the control unit 5 to the sensor controller 1 in response to a transmission error.

  Since the load circuit is provided corresponding to the control unit 5 as described above, the address of the control unit 5 may be specified to specify the load circuit. Therefore, the control table associates the sensor input unit 11 with the address. That is, when a person is detected by the human sensor 2, an address associated with the human sensor 2 is extracted from the control table, and the communication processing unit 12b uses the address to turn on / off the load circuit. A transmission signal including control data to be designated is sent to the transmission line 4. Since this control data is received by the control unit 5 in which an address matching the address included in the transmission signal is set, the control unit 5 controls on / off of the load circuit according to the control data. Other configurations and functions are the same as those in the first embodiment.

  In this embodiment, the address of the control unit 5 is set in the control table, and the communication processing unit 12b uses the address registered in the control table. However, the load control unit 2 has a plurality of communication processing units each having an address. It is also possible to provide 12b. In this case, an address is fixedly set for each communication processing unit 12b, and the sensor input unit 11 and the communication processing unit 12b are associated in the control table. That is, the load output unit 12a in the first embodiment is replaced with the communication processing unit 12b, and the control table can be set in the same manner as in the first embodiment.

  In each of the embodiments described above, the human sensor 2 is provided separately from the sensor unit 1, but the human sensor 2 may be incorporated in the body of the sensor unit 1. When a plurality of human sensors 1 are incorporated in the sensor unit 1, the direction and sensitivity of the human sensors 2 can be adjusted so that the detection area of each human sensor 2 can be arbitrarily set. Add configuration. Alternatively, one of the plurality of human sensors 2 may be incorporated into the body of the sensor unit 1, and the other human sensors 2 may be provided separately from the sensor unit 1. If this configuration is adopted, the sensor unit 1 is used in place of one human sensor 2 while the detection area of the human sensor 2 is set in the same manner as each of the configuration examples described above. The arrangement space of the sensor unit 1 that is necessary in the configuration example is not necessary.

It is a block diagram which shows the 1st Embodiment of this invention. It is explanatory drawing which shows the usage example same as the above. It is operation | movement explanatory drawing same as the above. It is operation | movement explanatory drawing same as the above. It is a figure which shows the usage example same as the above. It is a block diagram which shows the 2nd Embodiment of this invention. It is explanatory drawing which shows the usage example same as the above. It is explanatory drawing which shows the format of the transmission signal used for the same as the above. It is explanatory drawing which shows the usage example of a conventional structure.

Explanation of symbols

DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 Sensor controller 2 Human sensor 3 Load 4 Transmission path 5 Control unit 10 Arithmetic processing part 11 Sensor input part 12 Load control part 12a Load output part 12b Communication processing part 13 Memory | storage part 14 Setting part

Claims (3)

  A plurality of sensor input units to which detection information from a plurality of human sensors is input separately, a load control unit for instructing a control state of a plurality of load circuits for each load circuit, and a detection input to the sensor input unit A storage unit storing a control table in which an arbitrary number of human sensors and an arbitrary number of load circuits are associated by associating a combination of information with a control state of the load circuit, and for setting / correcting the contents of the control table A setting unit, which is an interface to which other devices such as a personal computer can be connected, and the detection information input to each sensor input unit are collated with a control table stored in the storage unit, whereby each load circuit by the load control unit A sensor controller of a human sensitive load control system, comprising: an arithmetic processing unit that determines a control state.   The sensor controller of the human-type load control system according to claim 1, wherein the load control unit is provided with a load output unit to which the load circuit can be connected.   A control unit to which each of the load circuits is connected and a different address is set is connected to a load control unit via a transmission line, and each load is designated to the load control unit and a load corresponding to the address is specified. A transmission unit for transmitting a transmission signal including control data for instructing the control state of the circuit is provided, and each control unit is set with a reception unit for receiving the transmission signal through the transmission path and an address included in the transmission signal. 2. The sensor controller of the human-type load control system according to claim 1, further comprising: an output unit that controls a control state of the load circuit according to the content of the control data when the address matches.

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