JP2010025475A - Failure diagnostic device used for refrigerating cycle equipment - Google Patents

Abstract

<P>PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide a failure diagnostic device in which setting is easy while using a plurality of cycle parameters and capable of accurately diagnosing failure of refrigerating cycle equipment. <P>SOLUTION: The range in which a value of a cycle parameter can be obtained is divided into a plurality, a prescribed level value is given for each division, and a weight coefficient indicating relative size of load given by each cycle parameter with respect to a component is set. Further, a measured value of each cycle parameter is obtained, a level value corresponding to the measured value is specified based on setting in a level setting step, each of the level value of each cycle parameter specified in the level specifying step and the weight coefficient are multiplied, and the multiplied results of all cycle parameters are added to thereby calculate a point state quantity which is a component state quantity at the measured point of the cycle parameters. Then, the point state quantity is time integrated, and a failure possibility value of the component is calculated. <P>COPYRIGHT: (C)2010,JPO&INPIT

Description

  The present invention relates to a failure diagnosis device for predicting and diagnosing a failure in a refrigeration cycle from a value of a cycle parameter indicating a state of the refrigeration cycle.

Patent Document 1 discloses a failure diagnosis method that measures the current state of an air conditioner and predicts a failure of the air conditioner from that state. In this document, the possibility of failure is estimated using the following method.
(1) Select an air-conditioning cycle parameter that physically damages a part and divide it into a plurality of abnormal levels.
(2) A level value a (described as a weighting factor in Patent Document 1 and different from the weighting factor in the present application) is set for each abnormal level.
(3) The time t during which each abnormal level is continued is measured, and when a × t is equal to or greater than a predetermined value, it is determined that a failure has occurred in that part.

Moreover, this patent document 1 also describes that an abnormality level is set by a combination of a plurality of air conditioning cycle parameters to improve detection accuracy. In this case, the condition of the air conditioner is considered to be expressed in an n-dimensional space with n air-conditioning cycle parameters as variables, and the n-dimensional space is divided into a plurality of areas, and an abnormal level value is set in each divided area. (See FIG. 8).
JP 2004-85088 A

  However, in the above-described configuration, when setting abnormal level values in a plurality of air conditioning cycle parameters, the number of divided regions increases exponentially as the number of air conditioning cycle parameters increases, so a huge number of abnormal level values are set. There are cases where it must be set. It is almost impossible to optimally set such a large number of abnormal level values, and there is a possibility that the setting of each abnormal level value will be inaccurate and the fault diagnosis accuracy will be lowered.

  The present invention has been made in view of such problems, and it is possible to easily and accurately set the abnormal level value (corresponding to the time state quantity in the present application) while using a large number of cycle parameters. The main objective of the present invention is to provide a failure diagnosis device that can accurately perform failure diagnosis of refrigeration cycle equipment based on the state quantity at that time.

That is, the failure diagnosis apparatus according to the present invention is used for a refrigeration cycle device in which a plurality of cycle parameters indicating the state of the refrigeration cycle and a component failure in the refrigeration cycle are correlated with each other.
A level storage unit that divides a possible range of the value of the cycle parameter into a plurality of levels and stores the level value when a predetermined level value is given to each category in association with the category A weighting factor storage unit that stores a weighting factor indicating a relative load of each cycle parameter applied to the component, and obtains a measurement value of each cycle parameter and refers to the level storage unit And a level specifying unit for specifying the level to which the measurement value belongs, a level value corresponding to the level, and multiplying the level value of each cycle parameter specified by the level specifying unit by the weighting factor, By adding the multiplication results for the cycle parameter, a time state quantity that is a part state quantity at the time of the cycle parameter measurement is calculated. And when the state quantity calculation unit, by integrating the time state amount time, characterized in that it comprises the possibility of failure calculation unit that calculates a possibility of failure value of the component.

  It should be noted that the above-described range and level value can be determined in advance by appropriate adjustment experiments or empirical rules. For example, the level value can be determined by the operable time until the refrigeration cycle equipment breaks down due to abnormal progress.

  Thus, according to such a configuration, a level value is set independently for each cycle parameter, and a weighting factor that represents the relative contribution of each cycle parameter to the failure of one part is set. If this is the case, an appropriate time state quantity is calculated, and the possibility of failure is calculated based on the calculated time-point state quantity. Thus, the level value setting and weighting factor setting increase in proportion to the number of cycle parameters, but do not increase exponentially, and these values are considerably accurate from experiments and empirical rules. Therefore, according to the present invention, by increasing the number of cycle parameters, a highly accurate failure diagnosis can be realized without much effort.

  In order to not only calculate the failure probability value, but also automatically determine the failure of a component so that the operator or user can grasp the failure occurrence without overlooking it, the failure probability of the component When the value exceeds a predetermined limit value, it is preferable to further include a failure notification unit that outputs that the component has failed.

  Further, in order to contribute to the visibility and convenience of the operator, it is preferable to further include a failure possibility value output unit that outputs the failure possibility values for each part by rearranging them in ascending or descending order.

In order to solve the above problems, the present invention provides a failure diagnosis method used for a refrigeration cycle apparatus in which a plurality of cycle parameters indicating the state of a refrigeration cycle and a component failure in the refrigeration cycle are correlated to each other. A level setting step for dividing the range of values of the cycle parameter into a plurality of ranges and giving a predetermined level value to each of the ranges;
A weighting factor setting step for setting a weighting factor indicating a relative load of each cycle parameter applied to the component; and obtaining a measured value of each cycle parameter and setting a level value corresponding to the measured value The level specifying step specified based on the setting in the level setting step, the level value of each cycle parameter specified in the level specifying step and the weighting factor are respectively multiplied, and the multiplication results for all the cycle parameters Is added, and a time point state quantity calculating step for calculating a time point state quantity that is a part state quantity at the time of measuring the cycle parameter and the time point state quantity are integrated over time to calculate a failure possibility value of the part. A failure possibility calculation step may be performed.

  Further, the present invention is a failure diagnosis program used for a refrigeration cycle device in which a plurality of cycle parameters indicating a state of a refrigeration cycle and a component failure in the refrigeration cycle are associated with each other. The range that the value can take is divided into a plurality of levels, and when a predetermined level value is given to each division, the level storage unit stores the level value corresponding to the division, and the component A weighting factor storage unit storing a weighting factor indicating the relative load of each cycle parameter, and obtaining a measurement value of each cycle parameter and referring to the level storage unit A level specifying unit that specifies a class to which the class belongs and a level value corresponding to the class, and a level value of each cycle parameter specified by the level specifying unit A time point state quantity calculating unit for calculating a time point state quantity that is a part state quantity at the time of measuring the cycle parameter by multiplying each weighting factor and adding the multiplication results for all the cycle parameters, and the time point state The amount of time may be integrated to cause a computer to function as a failure possibility calculation unit that calculates a failure possibility value of the part.

  According to the present invention configured as described above, failure diagnosis in a refrigeration cycle device can be easily realized with high accuracy by increasing the number of cycle parameters, and without much effort. .

Hereinafter, an embodiment of the present invention will be described with reference to the drawings.
FIG. 1 shows an air conditioner 100 that is a refrigeration cycle apparatus according to the present embodiment, and a failure diagnosis apparatus 200 used in the air conditioner.

  As shown in FIG. 1, the air conditioner 100 basically includes a compressor 11, a heat exchanger (condenser) 12, an expansion valve 13, and a heat exchanger (evaporator) 14 in this order. It is configured to operate a refrigeration cycle by connecting and circulating a refrigerant inside. In addition, the code | symbol 15 in FIG. 1 selectively switches the heat exchangers 13 and 14 each arrange | positioned in the indoor unit 101 and the outdoor unit 102 to either a condenser or an evaporator by changing the flow of a refrigerant | coolant, This is a four-way valve that switches between indoor heating and cooling.

  The air conditioner 100 also measures cycle parameters that can cause physical damage to refrigerant-related components (such as the compressor 11, the heat exchangers 12 and 14, the expansion valve 13, and the like described above) and induce failure. For this purpose, various sensors (not shown) are provided. Data from each sensor is transmitted to a failure diagnosis apparatus 200 described later and used for failure diagnosis. The cycle parameter is a parameter indicating the state of the refrigeration cycle, and is, for example, temperature, pressure, or the like at various points in the refrigerant.

  The failure diagnosis apparatus 200 is a so-called computer having a CPU, a memory, an I / O channel, an output device such as a display, an input device such as a keyboard, an AD converter, etc., and a CPU according to a failure diagnosis program stored in the memory. As shown in FIG. 2, the level storage unit D1, the weighting factor storage unit D2, the level specifying unit 21, the time point state quantity calculation unit 25, the failure possibility calculation unit 22, the failure notification unit, as shown in FIG. The function as 23 is demonstrated.

  In addition, the physical installation place of this failure diagnosis apparatus 200 does not ask | require. For example, it may be provided integrally with the air conditioner 100 or may be provided at another place through a communication line such as the Internet. In this embodiment, one failure diagnosis device 200 is provided for one air conditioner 100, but one failure diagnosis device is connected to a plurality of air conditioners. It doesn't matter. In that case, it is necessary to exchange identification data for identifying each air conditioner.

Next, the operation of the failure diagnosis apparatus 200 will be described in detail below in conjunction with the description of each functional unit.
First, an operator inputs, for example, to divide the range that the value of one cycle parameter can take into a plurality of levels, and set a level value that increases as the degree of abnormality increases in each division (step S11 in FIG. 6). Then, the division range and the level value set in this way are stored in the level storage unit D1 as a pair (see FIG. 3). This is performed for all cycle parameters related to failure diagnosis (step S12 in FIG. 6). The above is the level setting step.

  Note that the range of the level value is not particularly limited, but is set to a range of 0 to 1 as shown in FIG.

  Moreover, although it is the range of each said division, it is supposed that it determines here in consideration of the driving | operation possible time until the air conditioning apparatus 100 becomes a failure by failure reproduction experiment etc. For ease of understanding, taking the refrigerant discharge temperature from the compressor as an example of the cycle parameter as an example, as shown in FIG. 4, the temperature at which the air-conditioning apparatus 100 stops almost immediately as an abnormal error is set as the maximum parameter value. The temperature range above that is level 4, the temperature range below that temperature is 300 hours after which an abnormal error is stopped, and the temperature range is 3 hours below that temperature. The division range (level range) is set so that the temperature range from that temperature to the temperature at which the abnormal error stops after 30000 hours is level 1. Note that this division range may be determined from the cycle parameter measurement values at the time of failure accumulated in the past.

Next, the operator sets a weighting factor indicating the relative magnitude of the load given by each cycle parameter for a certain refrigerant-related component (step S13 in FIG. 6). Then, this weight coefficient setting step is performed for each refrigerant related part, and the weight coefficient f _ij (i is the cycle parameter number, j is the refrigerant related part number) associated with the cycle parameter and the refrigerant related part, And stored in the weighting coefficient storage unit D2 in association with the cycle parameter (step S14 in FIG. 6). The above is the weighting coefficient setting step.

  An example of the storage mode of the weight coefficient is shown in FIG. The weighting coefficient of each cycle parameter is determined from failure reproduction experiments, past actual machine data, or empirical rules. Further, the value of the weighting factor is not particularly limited, but here, due to the normalization relationship, as shown in FIG. 5, the integrated value Σ of the values of each cycle parameter for one refrigerant-related component is 1. It is set to be.

  When the air conditioner 100 is operated after such setting by the operator, the measured values of the cycle parameters are transmitted from the sensors provided in the air conditioner 100.

  The measurement value data is received and acquired by the level specifying unit 21 at each sampling timing set at a fixed minute period (steps S21 and S22 in FIG. 7). Then, with reference to the level storage unit D1, the section to which each cycle parameter belongs and the level value corresponding to the section are specified (step S23 in FIG. 7). The above is the level specifying step.

Next, the time point state quantity calculating unit 25 multiplies the level value of each cycle parameter specified by the level specifying unit 21 by the weight coefficient for one refrigerant related component, and for all the cycle parameters. By adding the multiplication results, a time point state quantity that is a part state quantity at the cycle parameter measurement time point, that is, the sampling timing is calculated (step S25 in FIG. 7). The above is the time state quantity calculation step. The calculation formula for the time state quantity is as follows.
Here, i is a number assigned to each of n cycle parameters, and takes a positive integer value from 1 to n. j is a number assigned to each of m refrigeration-related parts, and takes a positive integer value from 1 to m. h _j is the time state quantity of the j-th component. f _ij is a weighting factor set for the i-th cycle parameter in the j-th refrigerant related part. g _i is a level value specified from the measured value of the i-th cycle parameter.

Next, as shown in the equation (Equation 2), the failure possibility calculation unit 22 integrates, that is, time-integrates, the time state quantity obtained in this way at each sampling timing, and each refrigerant related component can fail. Each sex value is calculated (step S26 in FIG. 7). The above is the failure possibility calculation step.
Here, the left side Q _j is the latest failure possibility value in the j-th refrigerant related component calculated at the current sampling timing. The right side Q _j is a failure possibility value in the j-th refrigerant related component calculated at the previous sampling timing. h _j is the time state quantity of the j-th component calculated at the current sampling timing.

  The time state quantity calculation step and the failure possible value calculation step are performed for all the refrigerant related parts (steps S24 to S28 in FIG. 7), and the time point state quantity and the failure possibility value of each refrigerant related part are calculated.

  The failure possibility value of each refrigerant-related part is constantly monitored by the failure notification unit 23, and the failure possibility value of any refrigerant-related part exceeds a predetermined limit value (step S29 in FIG. 7). ), The failure notification unit 23 detects this and displays a display indicating that the component has failed (step S30 in FIG. 7).

  Therefore, according to the present embodiment configured as described above, the level value is set independently for each cycle parameter, and the weighting coefficient representing the relative contribution of each cycle parameter for the failure of one component is set. As long as the setting is made, an appropriate time state quantity is calculated, and the possibility of failure is calculated based on the calculated time-point state quantity. Thus, the level value setting and the weighting factor setting increase in proportion to the number of cycle parameters, but do not increase exponentially. Therefore, by increasing the number of cycle parameters, the accuracy can be improved. High failure diagnosis can be realized without much effort.

The present invention is not limited to the above embodiment.
For example, if a failure possibility value output unit for rearranging and displaying the failure possibility values for each part in ascending or descending order is provided, the operator or user can determine which part will have a future failure. Can be recognized. Further, the predicted failure occurrence time for each component may be calculated and output from the degree of increase in failure possibility value over time and the margin to the limit value.

Further, the final output may be output not only to the screen but also to the printer, or may be output in the form of file output or transmission to another computer.
In addition, in the above embodiment, the failure diagnosis target is an air conditioner. However, the present invention is not limited to the air conditioner, and the present invention is similarly applied to any device that operates a refrigeration cycle (or heat pump action). Obtainable.

  In addition, it goes without saying that the present invention is not limited to the above-described embodiment, and various modifications can be made without departing from the spirit of the present invention.

The schematic diagram which shows the whole air conditioning system containing the failure diagnosis apparatus in one Embodiment of this invention. The functional block diagram of the failure diagnosis apparatus in the embodiment. FIG. 5 is an exemplary diagram showing a setting example of level values and classifications in the embodiment. FIG. 4 is an exemplary diagram showing a setting method of level values and divisions in the embodiment. FIG. 5 is an exemplary diagram showing an example of setting weighting factors in the embodiment. The flowchart which shows the failure diagnosis method in the embodiment. The flowchart which shows the failure diagnosis method in the embodiment. The example figure which shows the setting method of the conventional abnormal level value and division.

Explanation of symbols

100: Refrigeration cycle equipment (air conditioner)
200 ... failure diagnosis device D1 ... level storage unit D2 ... weight coefficient storage unit 21 ... level specifying unit 22 ... failure possibility calculation unit 23 ... failure notification unit 25 ... time point State quantity calculator

Claims (5)

A failure diagnosis device used in a refrigeration cycle apparatus in which a plurality of cycle parameters indicating a state of a refrigeration cycle and a component failure in the refrigeration cycle are related,
A level storage unit that divides the range that the value of the cycle parameter can take into a plurality of levels, and stores the level value when a predetermined level value is given to each category, corresponding to the category;
A weighting factor storage unit that stores a weighting factor indicating the relative magnitude of the load that each cycle parameter gives to the component;
A level specifying unit for acquiring a measurement value of each cycle parameter and specifying a level to which the measurement value belongs and a level value corresponding to the division with reference to the level storage unit;
This is a component state quantity at the time of measuring the cycle parameters by multiplying the level value of each cycle parameter specified by the level specifying unit by the weighting factor and adding the multiplication results for all the cycle parameters. A time point state quantity calculation unit for calculating a time point state quantity;
A failure diagnosis apparatus comprising: a failure possibility calculation unit that calculates the failure possibility value of the component by integrating the time state quantity over time.   The failure diagnosis device according to claim 1, further comprising a failure notification unit that outputs that the component has failed when the failure possibility value exceeds a predetermined limit value.   The failure diagnosis apparatus according to claim 1, further comprising a failure possibility value output unit that outputs the failure possibility values for each component by rearranging the outputs in ascending order or descending order. A failure diagnosis method used for a refrigeration cycle device in which a plurality of cycle parameters indicating a state of a refrigeration cycle and a component failure in the refrigeration cycle are related,
A level setting step that divides the possible range of the value of the cycle parameter into a plurality of levels and gives a predetermined level value to each of the ranges,
A weighting factor setting step for setting a weighting factor indicating a relative magnitude of a load given by each cycle parameter to the component;
A level specifying step of acquiring a measured value of each cycle parameter and specifying a level value corresponding to the measured value based on the setting in the level setting step;
By multiplying the level value of each cycle parameter specified in the level specifying step by the weighting factor, and adding the multiplication results for all the cycle parameters, the component state quantity at the time of measuring the cycle parameters is obtained. A time point state quantity calculating step for calculating a certain time point state quantity;
A failure diagnosis method characterized by performing a failure possibility calculation step of calculating a failure possibility value of the component by integrating the time state quantity over time. A failure diagnosis program used for a refrigeration cycle device in which a plurality of cycle parameters indicating a state of a refrigeration cycle and a component failure in the refrigeration cycle are related,
A level storage unit that divides the range that the value of the cycle parameter can take into a plurality of levels, and stores the level value when a predetermined level value is given to each category, corresponding to the category;
A weighting factor storage unit that stores a weighting factor indicating a relative magnitude of a load given by each cycle parameter to the component;
A level specifying unit for acquiring a measurement value of each cycle parameter and specifying a level value corresponding to the category to which the measurement value belongs with reference to the level storage unit;
This is a component state quantity at the time of measuring the cycle parameters by multiplying the level value of each cycle parameter specified by the level specifying unit by the weighting factor and adding the multiplication results for all the cycle parameters. A time point state quantity calculation unit for calculating a time point state quantity;
A failure diagnosis program for causing a computer to exhibit a function as a failure possibility calculation unit that calculates a failure possibility value of the component by integrating the time state quantity over time.