JPH06257106A - Road heating device - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To save the energy for heating by operating a road heater only for a parking section wherein a vehicle is not present in the case where snowfall is detected and ambient temperature lower than a threshold value is detected. CONSTITUTION:Road heaters 7 for individually heating a road surface are provided far respective parking sections P1a-P1e each for one vehicle on a road surface. When snowfall is detected by snowfall sensors 5, 5 and ambient temperature lower than a specific threshold value is detected by temperature sensors 3, 4, the road heaters 7 are operated for heating the road surface. In this case, however, the road heaters 7 are operated only for the parking sections P1a-P1e wherein presence of vehicle is not detected by vehicle sensors 6a-6e. Accordingly, wastful heating is not applied to the road surface wherein a vehicle is parking.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a road heating device capable of efficiently melting snow in a parking area for parking a vehicle without using unnecessary energy.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art In a parking lot in a snowy area, a heater such as a heating wire or a hot water pipe is buried to heat a road surface in order to avoid inconvenience of passage due to snowfall and deterioration of safety. ing. With this heating,
The road surface temperature rises, and snow on the road surface can be melted. The device for melting snow by increasing the road surface temperature is called a road heating device.

FIG. 3 shows a principle of operation of the load heating device. The road heating device monitors the presence or absence of snowfall (step S1), and when snowfall is detected, determines whether or not the road surface temperature is lower than a target value that is a preset threshold value (step S2). . If the road surface temperature is lower than the target value, the switch is turned on to perform heating (step S3). If no snowfall is detected, or if road surface temperature is above the target value even if snowfall is detected, turn the switch on.
FF is performed and heating is not executed (step S
4). In addition to the road surface temperature, the outside air temperature may be used as a parameter.

In order to maintain the road surface temperature which is necessary and sufficient for realizing snow melting, the electric power is controlled in the case of a heating wire and the temperature is adjusted in the case of a hot water pipe by controlling the flow rate of hot water. This temperature adjustment is uniformly carried out for all the embedded heaters. That is, control is performed to uniformly heat the entire road surface of the parking lot.

[0005]

Generally, when there is a parked vehicle in the parking lot, snow does not accumulate on the road surface below the vehicle (hereinafter referred to as the parking section). However, heating for snow melting is uniformly performed even for a parking section that is originally not necessary, and there has been a problem that excessive energy is consumed.

The present invention has been made by paying attention to the above points, and it is possible to accurately grasp a portion requiring heating for snow melting and to keep the energy required for heating to a necessary minimum. It is an object of the present invention to provide a load heating device that can be used.

[0007]

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION A road heating apparatus according to the present invention heats a road surface individually for each parking section for one vehicle, a snowfall sensor for detecting snowfall, a temperature sensor for measuring an environmental temperature. When the road heater to perform, a vehicle sensor for detecting a vehicle on the road surface, the snowfall sensor detects the snowfall, and the temperature sensor detects an environmental temperature equal to or lower than a preset threshold value, the vehicle sensor detects Drive control means for performing drive control to operate the road heater is provided for a parking section in which the vehicle is not detected.

[0008]

This device analyzes the output of the vehicle sensor when the condition for driving the road heater is detected based on the outputs of the snowfall sensor and the temperature sensor. Then, on the road surface where the vehicle is parked, the road heater is not operated, and the snow is melted only in the other parking sections.

[0009]

DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS FIG. 1 shows an explanatory view of a load heating device of the present invention. In the figure, a load heating device 1 and
A parking lot P, which is a control target of the road heating device 1, is shown. The parking lot P is composed of a parking section P1 (P1a to P1e) formed by a road surface on which the vehicle is parked and a traffic section P2 in which the vehicle moves. The road heating device 1 includes a control device 2, an outside air temperature sensor 3,
A road surface temperature sensor 4, a snowfall sensor 5, a vehicle sensor 6, a road heater 7, and a snowfall sensor heater 8 are provided.

The outside temperature sensor 3 is a temperature sensor including a thermistor or the like for detecting the temperature of the parking lot P to be controlled by the road heating device 1. Road temperature sensor 4
Detects the road surface temperature of the parking lot P, so
A temperature sensor including a thermistor embedded in the.
The snowfall sensor 5 is a sensor embedded in the passage section P2 in pair with a snowfall sensor heater 8 to be described later in order to detect snowfall in the parking lot P. It has a well-known structure including an electrode plate or the like that is detected as a change in electrical characteristics.

The vehicle sensor 6 is composed of an ultrasonic sensor or the like installed in each parking section in order to detect a parked vehicle. The road heater 7 is embedded independently in each of the passage section P2 and each of the parking sections P1a to P1e, and is composed of a heating wire that can be individually drive-controlled. The snowfall sensor heater 8 is composed of a heating wire for heating the surrounding (road surface) in which the snowfall sensor 5 is embedded.

Now, the control unit 2 includes a processor (CP
U) 9, memory 10, input interface circuit 11, output interface circuit 12, load heater control unit 13,
A heater controller 14 for the sensor is provided. The processor 9 analyzes the outputs of various sensors and the load heater 7
And for controlling the drive of the snowfall sensor heater 8,
The drive control means 9a is provided here. The drive control means 9a analyzes the outputs of various sensors, and the load heater 7
Drive control of the vehicle, specifically, the passage section P2 and the parking section P
It is composed of a program for controlling selection of 1a to P1e.

The memory 10 is composed of a ROM, a RAM and the like for storing programs and data which the processor 9 refers to. The input interface circuit 11 is
This is for performing signal matching such as converting analog signals output from various sensors into digital signals recognized by the processor 9.

Like the input interface circuit 11, the output interface circuit 12 is for performing signal matching between the load heater controller 13, the sensor heater controller 14, and the processor 9. The load heater control unit 13 controls the amount of power supplied to the load heater 7 by, for example, PWM.
(Pulse width modulation) method is used for proportional control.
The sensor heater control unit 14 controls ON / OFF of energization of the snowfall sensor heater 8.

The operation of the load heating device 1 having the above configuration will be described with reference to FIG. In this example, the vehicle C is parked only on the parking section P1a. FIG. 2 is an operational flowchart of the device according to the present invention. The processor (CPU) 9 of the control device 2 is
Outputs of various sensors are received via the input interface circuit 11 and analysis is performed at any time.

Specifically, the processor 9 detects the output of the snowfall sensor 5 (step S1) and determines whether there is snowfall (step S2). When the result of step S2 is YES, the output of the outside air temperature sensor 3 is detected (step S3), and the outside air temperature is set to a preset reference value (for example, 0 degrees Celsius).
(Step S4).

If the result of step S4 is YES, that is, if the outside air temperature is low, the output of the road surface temperature sensor 4 is detected (step S5), and whether the road surface temperature is lower than a preset reference value (for example, 0 degrees Celsius) is determined. It is determined (step S6).
If the result of step S6 is YES, that is, if the road surface temperature is low, the heater embedded in the passage section P2 of the road heater 7 is turned on (step S7).

After that, in order to specify the parking sections P1a to P1e, the parameter I referred to by the processor 9 is set to the numerical value "1" for specifying the parking section P1a (step S).
8). When the content of the parameter I is "2" to "5", the parking sections P1b to P1e are respectively specified.

The drive control means 9a detects the output of the vehicle sensor 6 (vehicle sensors 6a to 6e) in the parking section specified according to the content of the parameter I and determines whether or not there is a parked vehicle (step S10). ). Since the vehicle C is parked in the parking section P1a, the result of step S10 is YES.
Then, of the road heater 7, the OFF state is set to stop the driving of the heater embedded in the parking section P1a (step S11).

Thereafter, the processor 9 updates the parameter I (step S12), and further determines whether or not the value of the parameter I exceeds the number MAX (numerical value "5") of parking sections. If the result of step S13 is YES, the process proceeds to step S1.

If the result of step S13 is NO, the process proceeds to step S9. When the process proceeds to step S9, since the parameter I has been updated, the process for the parking section P1b after the parking section P1a is performed. Since the vehicle is not parked in the parking section P1b, the result of step S10 is NO, and step S14 is executed.

In step S14, the parking section in which the vehicle has just moved is heated for a little longer after the movement so as to raise the road surface temperature to the same level as the passage section. Therefore, in this step S14, it is determined whether or not there is a parked vehicle in the previous process. When the result of step S14 is YES, the driving of the heater embedded in the parking section P1b designated by the parameter I in the road heater 7 is driven by the heater embedded in the passing section P2.
That is, when the passage section P2 is in the ON state, the parking section P1b
Is ON and the traffic section P2 is OFF, the parking section P1b is also set OFF (step S15), and the process proceeds to step S12. In this way, the heater is controlled to be turned off where there is a vehicle and the heater is turned on where there is no vehicle.

On the other hand, if the decision result in the step S14 is NO, the state of the parking section specified by the parameter I, in this case, the parking section P1b is stored (step S1).
6). The stored content depends on whether or not there is a parked vehicle. Next, the load heater corresponding to this parking section, in this case, the heater embedded in the parking section P1b is set to the ON state (step S17), and the process proceeds to step S12. The content stored in step S16 is read out in step S14, and the state of pre-detection is recognized. As a result, this series of processing is performed for example 10
If done every minute, the heater will be turned on for at least 10 minutes after the vehicle is moved.

If the results of steps S2 and S4 are NO, the load heater 7 (all heaters) is set to the OFF state (step S18), and the process proceeds to step S1. Also,
If the result of step S6 is NO, the heater embedded in the passage section P2 of the road heater 7 is set to the OFF state, and the process proceeds to step S8.

As described above, in the above embodiment, the road heater is individually turned on / off for each parking section for one vehicle.
F work. Then, even if the conditions for starting snow melting are satisfied by the snowfall sensor and the outside air temperature sensor, no power is supplied to the road heater of the parking section in which the parked vehicle is detected by the vehicle sensor. Therefore, it is possible to prevent unnecessary heating of the snow-free parking section and save electric power.

The present invention is not limited to the above embodiments.
In the embodiment, the heating wire has been described as an example of the heater, but the same processing can be realized even in the case of using a hot water pipe or the like. In this case, the load heater 7 is composed of a mechanism such as a hot water pipe and a pump or a valve for flowing the hot water, and the load heater control unit 13 is composed of one having a control function for controlling the pump and the valve of the hot water. Become. The temperature sensor for the ON / OFF control may be one that detects the outside air temperature or one that detects the road surface temperature, or either one or both may be used.

[0027]

As described above, according to the road heating apparatus of the present invention, even if the snowfall is detected and the heating is started in another portion, only the parking section where the parked vehicle exists is in principle provided. As described above, since heating is not performed, it is possible to surely realize snow melting only in a portion where snow melting is necessary with the minimum required energy.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is an explanatory diagram of a load heating device of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is an operation flowchart of the device according to the present invention.

FIG. 3 is a diagram illustrating an operation principle of the load heating device.

[Explanation of symbols]

 3 Outdoor Air Temperature Sensor 4 Road Surface Temperature Sensor 5 Snowfall Sensor 6 Vehicle Sensor 7 Road Heater 8 Snowfall Sensor Heater 9 Processor (CPU) 9a Drive Control Means

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. A snowfall sensor for detecting snowfall, a temperature sensor for measuring an environmental temperature, a road heater for individually heating the road surface for each parking section for one vehicle, and a vehicle for detecting the vehicle on the road surface. When the vehicle sensor and the snowfall sensor detect the snowfall, and the temperature sensor detects an environmental temperature of a preset threshold or less, for the parking section in which the vehicle sensor does not detect the vehicle, the load heater, A load heating device, comprising: a drive control means for performing drive control so as to operate.