JP7515874B2 - Air-conditioned cableway carriage - Google Patents

Description

The present invention relates to an air-conditioned cableway carriage.

A cableway system is a transportation facility that suspends vehicles from cables stretched in the air to transport people and goods, and is often used to transport people on mountain slopes and for skiers and snowboarders at ski resorts. In addition, cableways do not require rails to be laid on the ground as is the case with railways, and therefore require less land for the tracks, and therefore are increasingly being used as a form of public transportation in urban areas, particularly overseas.

Thus, when operating cableway facilities that operate closed carriages such as gondola lifts and ropeways in urban areas, it is desirable to provide air conditioning units in each carriage to improve passenger comfort. However, as has been well known in the past, in cableway facilities, it is difficult to supply power to carriages moving along the tracks, and it has been difficult to provide air conditioning units that consume large amounts of power in each carriage.

For this reason, the following technologies have been proposed and implemented in the past. One example of this technology is to form a group of carriages consisting of multiple carriages, and to provide multiple carriage groups to operate with the circular movement of cables. One carriage in the group is a power carriage equipped with power equipment, and the other carriages are passenger carriages for passengers to ride in. Each passenger carriage is equipped with air conditioning equipment, and power is supplied from the power carriage to each passenger carriage via a power supply cable to air-condition the passenger carriage (see, for example, Patent Document 1). Another example is to form an equipment space separated from the passenger space above the passenger car, and provide the passenger space with air conditioning by providing a gas turbine engine and generator and an air-conditioning device driven by them (see, for example, Patent Document 2).

When an air conditioner is installed in the carriage like this, there is a problem of how to dispose of the condensed water that is generated when the air conditioner is in operation. That is, when a ropeway facility is operated in urban areas, the carriage passes above roads, etc., and if the condensed water generated by the air conditioner is simply discharged, it will cause inconvenience to people and cars below. To address this problem, the ropeway facility described in Patent Document 2 directs the condensed water into the exhaust pipe or intake pipe of the gas turbine engine, and the wastewater is dispersed into the air.

Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 7-257363 Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 9-24823

However, while a vehicle equipped with an internal combustion engine as described above can disperse wastewater, a configuration that runs the air conditioning system on a battery requires a separate device for dispersing wastewater, which is not economical. The present invention was made in consideration of these circumstances, and aims to provide a vehicle equipped with an air conditioning system for a ropeway that can process condensed water generated by the air conditioning system with a simple configuration.

The present invention is characterized in that it comprises an air conditioning unit provided on top of a passenger car of a carrier for conditioning the air inside the passenger car, a water receiving tank provided on the bottom of the passenger car for storing condensed water discharged from the air conditioning unit, piping connected to the water receiving tank and a drain outlet of the air conditioning unit, an solenoid valve provided at the drain outlet of the water receiving tank, and a door opening/closing detector for detecting the open/closed state of the door of the passenger car, wherein a drain groove is formed in the floor surface of the carrier's station along a path along which the solenoid valve passes, and the door opening/closing detector detects that the door is open and causes the solenoid valve to open, and detects that the door is closed and causes the solenoid valve to close, and the solenoid valve performs the opening operation while the carrier moves within the station with the door open, thereby draining the condensed water in the water receiving tank into the drain groove .

According to the present invention, condensed water generated in the air conditioning system is stored in a water receiving tank on the tracks, and the stored condensed water is discharged within the station, so it does not cause any inconvenience to those under the tracks.

Schematic diagram of an automatic circulating ropeway Front view of the carriage Side view of the carriage

Specific embodiments of the present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings. In this embodiment, a single-wire automatic circulating cableway will be described as a representative example of cableway facilities. FIG. 1 is a schematic diagram of a single-wire automatic circulating cableway. A single-wire automatic circulating cableway 10 has stations 11 and 12 at the ends of the track, and each station 11, 12 is equipped with a driving pulley 13 and a driven pulley 14 that can rotate freely. A cable 15 is endlessly wound around the driving pulley 13 and the driven pulley 14, and by rotating the driving pulley 13, the cable 15 moves in a circulating manner between the stations 11, 12. A plurality of carriages 18 are suspended from the cable 15 at predetermined intervals along the track.

The carriage 18 can be attached to and detached from the cable 15. When on the tracks, it is attached to the cable 15 and moves together with the cable 15, and is detached from the cable 15 within the bus stops 11 and 12. At the bus stops 11 and 12, U-shaped running rails 16 and 17 are laid, respectively, and the carriage 18 detached from the cable 15 moves along the running rails 16 and 17 as follows. First, when the carriage 18 arrives at the bus stops 11 and 12, it is detached from the cable 15 and transferred to the running rails 16 and 17, and is decelerated by a transfer device provided along the running rails 16 and 17. When the carriage 18 decelerates to a speed at which passengers can board and disembark, it maintains that speed and turns around within the bus stops 11 and 12 toward the departure side, during which passengers board and disembark. After the carriage 18 turns back to the departure side, it is accelerated to the same speed as the cable 15, and then attached to the cable 15 and detached from the running rails 16, 17 to depart onto the track.

Figure 2 is a front view of the carriage 18, Figure 3 is a side view of the carriage 18, and Figure 4 is a view taken along the line A-A in Figure 3. The carriage 18 is broadly composed of a gripping machine 19, a suspension machine 20, and a passenger car 21. The gripping machine 19 is configured to be able to grip and release the cable 15, and grips the cable 15 and moves with the cable 15 on the track, and releases the cable 15 within the stations 11 and 12, while the running rollers 22 roll and move on the running rails 16 and 17. The gripping machine 19 is pivotally attached to the suspension machine 20 so that it can swing back and forth relative to the direction of travel, and the passenger car 21 carrying passengers is attached to the bottom of this suspension machine 20. The passenger car 21 is equipped with an automatic door 31 on the outer side, which automatically opens in the passenger boarding and disembarking sections and closes in other sections. Inside the passenger car 21, there is a door opening/closing detector 32 that detects the opening/closing mechanism of the door 31 and the operation of the door 31 to detect the open/closed state of the door 31.

The upper part of the passenger car 21 is provided with an air conditioning unit 24 at a slight distance above the upper surface 23. The air conditioning unit 24 is an integrated air conditioning unit with an internal compressor, evaporator, condenser, etc., and is powered by electricity supplied from a battery 25 provided at the bottom of the passenger car 21, supplying hot or cold air into the passenger car 21 from an air vent provided at the top of the passenger car 21. The battery 25 is a battery that can be rapidly charged, and is rapidly charged by receiving electricity from a current collector (not shown) such as a pantograph provided on the carriage 18 when the carriage 18 moves through the stations 11 and 12.

A drain outlet 26 is formed at the bottom of the air conditioning unit 24, and condensed water generated within the air conditioning unit 24 is discharged from the drain outlet 26. Inside the passenger car 21, a pipe 27 is arranged extending in the vertical direction, and one end of this pipe 27 is connected to the drain outlet 26 of the air conditioning unit 24. A water receiving tank 28 capable of storing water is provided at the bottom of the passenger car 21, and the other end of the pipe 27 is connected to this tank. As a result, condensed water generated within the air conditioning unit 24 is guided through the pipe 27 to the water receiving tank 28 and stored there. A solenoid valve 29 is provided at the drain outlet at the bottom of the water receiving tank 28, and when this solenoid valve 29 is opened, the condensed water within the water receiving tank 28 is discharged.

With the above configuration, the carriage 18 is operated as follows. While on the tracks, power is supplied from the battery 25 to operate the air conditioning unit 24, and the air inside the passenger car 21 is regulated. While on the tracks, the solenoid valve 29 is not energized and is in a closed state, and condensed water discharged from the air conditioning unit 24 is stored in the water receiving tank 28. When the carriage 18 arrives at the station 11, 12 and reaches the passenger boarding and disembarking section, the door 31 of the passenger car 21 opens, and this is detected by the door opening/closing detector 32, which sends out a signal.

When a signal is sent from the door open/close detector 32, electricity is applied to the solenoid valve 29, which opens and drains the condensed water from the water receiving tank 28. A drain 30 is formed in the floor of the stations 11 and 12 below the path of the solenoid valve 29, and the condensed water in the water receiving tank 28 is drained into this drain 30 while the carriage 18 moves through the stations 11 and 12. When the carriage 18 passes the boarding and disembarking section, the door 31 of the passenger car 21 closes, which is detected by the door open/close detector 32 and a signal is sent. This closes the solenoid valve 29, and the condensed water is stored in the water receiving tank 28 again.

According to the above configuration, the open/closed state of the door 31 of the passenger car 21 is detected by a door open/close detector 32 provided inside the passenger car 21, and the solenoid valve 29 is opened and closed based on this signal, so that condensed water can be reliably drained and stored, and there is no need to provide any equipment outside the carrier 18, making the configuration simple.

10 Single-line automatic circulating cableway 11 Station 12 Station 13 Driving pulley 14 Driven pulley 15 Cable 16 Running rail 17 Running rail 18 Carrier 19 Rope gripping machine 20 Suspension machine 21 Passenger car 22 Running roller 23 Top surface 24 Air conditioning unit 25 Battery 26 Drain 27 Pipe 28 Water receiving tank 29 Solenoid valve 30 Drain 31 Door 32 Door opening/closing detector

Claims (1)

an air conditioning unit provided at an upper portion of a passenger car of a carriage for adjusting the air inside the passenger car, a water receiving tank provided at a lower portion of the passenger car for storing condensed water discharged from the air conditioning unit, piping connected to the water receiving tank and a drain outlet of the air conditioning unit, an electromagnetic valve provided at the drain outlet of the water receiving tank, and a door opening/closing detector for detecting the open/closed state of a door of the passenger car ,
At the carriage stop, a drainage groove is formed on the floor surface along the path of the solenoid valve;
The door opening/closing detector is configured to detect when the door is open and to open the solenoid valve, and to detect when the door is closed and to close the solenoid valve, so that the solenoid valve performs the opening operation while the carrier is moving within the station with the door open, thereby draining the condensed water in the water receiving tank into the drainage ditch.

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