JPH01269200A - Automatic meter reading system - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To collect metered values from plural meters at an arbitrary coincident time point and to execute the statistics and analysis, etc., of consumption at high accuracy by respectively equipping memory means to store the metered values with the respective meters at the plural meters at the time of a request when metered value holding is required from an external device to the respective meters. CONSTITUTION:When an external device 22 requires the holding of the metered values to plural meters 21, the metered values of the respective meters at such a time point are stored and held in respective memory means 15. Thereafter, the external device 22 successively requires the output of the stored metered values to the respective memory means 15, and the metered values are collected. Thus, the metered values can be obtain at the arbitrarily coincident time point from the plural meters, when the statistic processing of the consumption is executed or the analysis of load curves is executed, the error of the metered values due to a time lapse is not generated, and the statistics and analysis due to the extremely accurate metered values are attained.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION [Field of Industrial Application] The present invention relates to an automatic meter reading system for automatically reading the amount of electricity, gas, water, etc. used.

[Prior Art] Fig. 2 is a block diagram showing a measuring instrument used in a conventional automatic meter reading system.
A detection unit detects the usage amount of gas, water, etc. and outputs it as a transmitted pulse signal S1, 2 is a counter that counts the transmitted pulse signal S from the detection unit 1, and 3 is a measurement signal that outputs the value counted by the counter 2. An output terminal 4 is used to output the weighing signal S2 to the outside, and an input terminal 4 is used to input a command signal S3 to the counter 2, which causes the counter 2 to output the weighing signal S2.

Next, the operation will be explained. The usage amount of gas, water, etc. detected by the detection unit 1 is outputted to the counter 2 as a transmitted pulse signal S, and is measured by counting the number of pulses.

When visually checking the measured usage amount, by inputting a command signal S to the counter 2 from the input terminal 4, the count value by the counter 2 is outputted from the output terminal 3 as a measurement signal S2, The measured value can be confirmed by displaying it on a display or the like (not shown).

In addition, in order to install a calculator etc. externally and automatically collect the weighing values, connect terminals 3 and 4 to the computer and use counter 2.
In response to the command signal S, input to the command signal S,
The count value at the time of input can also be automatically output from the counter 2 to the computer as a measured value.

[Problem to be solved by the invention] In the conventional automatic meter reading system, a plurality of measuring instruments each consisting of a detection unit 1 and a counter 2 are provided, and a single computer collects the measured values from each measuring instrument as described above. When performing the collection process, it is not possible to perform the collection process at the same time, and it is necessary to read each meter sequentially. Therefore, the difference in meter reading time between the first meter and the last meter is calculated as follows, where N is the number of meters. , [
The time required for meter reading per vehicle is x(N-1).

In other words, for example, when collecting the measured values of 10,000 measuring instruments, if it takes 2 seconds to collect the measured values of 1 measuring instrument, it takes 2 seconds to collect the measured values of all the measuring instruments once. The time is 2 seconds x 9,999 units 20,000 seconds 5.
It will take 6 hours.

If the metered values collected by a calculator are simply used to calculate regular charges, there is no particular problem with the time difference mentioned above, but if the metered values are used for statistical analysis of usage. In this case, the time difference between meter readings becomes an error in the data.

If the data accuracy deteriorates significantly and the amount of usage fluctuates drastically, there is even a possibility that the measured values are completely useless as data.

Furthermore, when tolls are collected based on the collected measured values, there is a problem in that when the tolls are revised, for meters with time differences, calculations must be made using the tolls before the revision.

This invention was made to solve the above-mentioned problems, and by making it possible to collect measured values from multiple measuring instruments at any given point in time, it is possible to perform statistical analysis of usage with high accuracy. The purpose is to obtain an automatic meter reading system that can perform the following tasks.

[Means for solving the problem] The automatic meter reading system according to the present invention includes a plurality of measuring instruments,
Each of the storage means is provided with a storage means for storing the measured value of each measuring instrument at the time of the request when a measurement value retention request is made to each measuring instrument from an external device, and when the storage means receives an output request from the external device. The measured value stored in the external device is outputted to the external device.

[Function] In the automatic meter reading system of this invention, when an external device requests a plurality of measuring instruments to hold measured values, the measured values of each measuring instrument at that time are stored in the respective storage means.
Retained. Thereafter, the external device sequentially requests the output of the stored weight values from each storage means and collects the weight values, thereby making it possible to obtain weight values from multiple measuring instruments at the same arbitrary point in time. Become.

[Embodiment of the Invention] Hereinafter, an embodiment of the present invention will be described with reference to the drawings. 1st
Figure (a) is a block diagram showing a measuring instrument used in an automatic meter reading system according to an embodiment of the present invention;
b) is a block diagram showing the overall structure of the automatic meter reading system of this embodiment.6 In Fig. 1(a), 11 is an electric;
A detection unit detects the usage amount of gas, water, etc. and outputs it as a transmission pulse signal S4; 12 is a counter that counts the transmission pulse signal S4 from the detection unit 1-1; 13 is a counter 12;
The output terminal 514 is an input terminal for inputting an output command signal S, which causes the counter 12 to output the weighing signal S, to the counter 12. be.

In addition, 15 is a holding counter memory (memory) that stores and holds the measured value by the counter 12 at that time as the measured value S when the measured value holding command signal S7 is input from the input terminal 16 to the counter 12. 17 is an output terminal for taking out the weighing value held in the counter memory 15 as a weighing signal Sg, and 18 is an output terminal for outputting the weighing signal S from the counter memory 15. This is an input terminal for inputting to the memory 15, and the detection unit 11° counter 12 described above.
The counter memory 15 constitutes a meter 21 that measures the amount of electricity, gas, water, etc. used.

As shown in FIG. 1(b), the measuring instrument 21 is connected to a computer 22 as an external device that collects and processes the measured values of the measuring instrument 21.

The calculator 22 has input terminals 1.4, 16°1 of the measuring instrument 21.
8 to the respective output command signals S6.8. Weight value hold command signal S
7 T measurement value output command signal S8. , while sending out
The weighing signal S from the output terminal 13.17 of the weighing instrument 21, .
It is subject to Sg.

In addition, in FIG. 1(b), for calculation fi22.

Although only one measuring instrument 21 is connected, in reality,
A plurality of measuring meters 21 having the same configuration as that shown in FIG. 1(a) are connected to form an automatic meter reading system.

Next, the operation of the automatic meter reading system of this embodiment will be explained.

The usage amount of gas, water, etc. detected by the detection unit 11 is output to the counter 12 as a transmission pulse signal S4, and is measured by counting the number of pulses.

Then, when collecting the usage amount measured by each measuring device 21 individually at an arbitrary time, an output command signal S5 is inputted from the calculator 22 to the counter 12 through the input terminal 14, and the count value by the counter 12 (measured value) is outputted from the output terminal ]3 to the calculator 22 as a measurement signal S.

On the other hand, when collecting measured values from a plurality of measuring instruments 21 at arbitrary simultaneous times, a measured value holding command signal S7 is inputted from the calculator 22 to the counters 12 of all the measuring instruments 21 through the input terminals 16. When this command signal S7 is input, in each measuring instrument 21, the measured value by the counter 12 at that time is stored in the counter memory 13 as the measuring signal Sa.
sent to.

It is stored and held in this counter memory 13.

Thereafter, the counter 12 continues to count (measure) the number of pulses, while the measured value held in the counter memory 13 is sent from the calculator 22 to the counter memory 13 via the input terminal 18 by a measured value output command signal S. At the time when is input, the weighing signal S9 is sent from the output terminal 17 to the calculator 22.
Output to.

That is, in the automatic meter reading system of this embodiment, first, the measured value holding command signal S7 is sent to the counters 12 of all the measuring instruments 21.
By giving , each counter memory 15 holds the measured value at the same moment, and then the computer 22 sequentially reads the held measured value, so that all the measuring instruments 21 The computer 22 collects the measured values at the same arbitrary point in time without any time lag, making it possible to perform statistics 2 analysis of the usage amount with high accuracy.

Incidentally, in the above embodiment, the case where the counter memory 15 was used as the storage means was explained.

When a microprocessor or the like is used, an IC memory may be used in place of the counter memory, and the same effects as in the above embodiment can be obtained in this case as well.

Further, in the above embodiment, the output line from the counter memory 15 and each command input line are separated individually, but the function of attaching some kind of code to the content of the input/output signal for each function to distinguish it is also possible. 21 and computer 22, the input and output lines can be used in common.

[Effects of the Invention] As described above, according to the present invention, after the measured values of a plurality of measuring instruments are once stored and retained in the storage means, the external device sequentially stores and stores the measured values in the storage means. Since the configuration is configured to collect the measured values by requesting the output of the memorized measured values, it is possible to obtain measured values from multiple measuring instruments at the same time without any time lag, making it possible to perform statistical processing of usage. When performing measurements or analyzing load curves, there are no errors in meter readings due to time lag, and statistics are based on highly accurate measured values.

In addition to making analysis possible, when tolls are collected based on the collected metered values, there is no need to take into account time difference meters when revising tolls, and calculations are forced to be made using the unrevised tolls. It has the effect of resolving problems 6

[Brief explanation of the drawing]

FIG. 1(a) is a block diagram showing a measuring instrument used in an automatic meter reading system according to an embodiment of the present invention.
FIG. 2B is a block diagram showing the overall configuration of the automatic meter reading system of this embodiment, and FIG. 2 is a block diagram showing a measuring instrument used in the conventional automatic meter reading system. In the figure, 11--detection unit, 12--counter, 15--holding counter memory (storage means), 21--
-Measuring instrument, 22-.-Calculator (external device). In addition, in the figures, the same reference numerals indicate the same or corresponding parts.

Claims (1)

[Claims] In an automatic meter reading system consisting of a plurality of measuring instruments that measure the amount used and an external device that collects and processes the measured values from each of the measuring instruments, the external device sends a measurement to each of the measuring instruments. Storage means is provided for storing the measured values of each measuring instrument at the time of the request when a value retention request is made, and the storage means stores the stored measured values when receiving an output request from the external device. An automatic meter reading system characterized by output to a device.