JPH07215611A - Degree of car congestion detector for elevator - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To precisely detect a degree of congestion in an elevator car by detecting the number of passengers getting on/off the elevator car and their destinations by means of an area sensor and updown counting the number of passengers and their destinations by means of a counter on the basis of the detected signal. CONSTITUTION:An area sensor 13i detects the passage of passengers getting on/off an elevator car. The detected signal is image processed by a pattern recognizing device 15i, while pattern recognition of shoe backs is carried out, and the number of passengers and their destinations are detemtined. In addition, on the basis of the result of pattern recognition, passengers getting on/off are updown counted by a counter device 16i. The counted value is monitored by a group control controller 17, and the optimum elevator car is allocated. On the other hand, a correcting device 18i resets the counter device 16i to 0 so as to correct the count value while a load detecting device 14i detects a load, and on the basis of the detected load, finds the number of passengers getting on so as to correct the count value when the counter device 16i counts 0.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to an elevator car congestion degree detecting device.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art In recent years, a large number of constructions and plans for high-rise buildings have been developed, and along with this, there is an increasing demand for high-performance elevators as inter-floor transportation in the buildings. In such an elevator, not only the function as a transportation means but also the positioning as an important facility in a building has been established, and enhancement of a human interface function for users has been demanded.

Among such demands, in particular, a plurality of elevators are simultaneously activated in a plurality of floors, an elevator that can respond optimally to a hall call generated on any floor is determined, and the hall call is answered. In the group management control system, it is necessary to accurately grasp the degree of car congestion of each elevator. Because I assigned the elevator that could arrive first,
This is because when arriving at the hall call generation floor, the hall callers may not be able to get in, and the elevator may have to wait for the next elevator, which may cause discomfort to the user.

Therefore, as a conventional car congestion degree detecting device for detecting the car congestion degree and utilizing it for group management control, a device having a structure as shown in FIG. 6 has been used.

In this conventional elevator car congestion degree detection device, a load detector 4 for detecting the load of an occupant 3 is installed under the floor 2 of the elevator car 1 and the load detection signal is used to board the vehicle. The number of persons was determined. That is, when the load detection signal is Wkg, the number of occupants N is calculated by dividing the average load per person Akg (normally, this is set to 55 kg) by [W /
A] is calculated.

However, the car congestion degree detecting device using the load detector 4 as described above has a problem that sufficient accuracy cannot be obtained.

Therefore, conventionally, as shown in FIG. 7, an ITV camera 6 is installed on the ceiling 5 in the car 1 to photograph the inside of the elevator car 1, and the pattern is formed by utilizing the fact that the shape of a person's head is round. A car congestion degree detection device is also used, which recognizes a circular pattern from the signal of the ITV camera 6 by the recognition device 7 and counts the number to detect the car congestion degree.

However, in the car congestion detection device using the ITV camera 6, since the pattern recognition device 7 can only recognize a moving object which is round and round, there is an occupant in an extreme case. It is determined that the car congestion is low because it does not move at all, and conversely it is determined that the car congestion is high due to the lighting system and other factors, although the number of passengers is small. There was a problem that the degree of car congestion could not be detected with accuracy.

[0009]

As described above, the conventional car congestion degree detecting device for elevators has a problem that the car congestion degree cannot be detected sufficiently accurately.

The present invention has been made in view of such conventional problems, and an object thereof is to provide an elevator car congestion degree detecting device capable of accurately detecting the cage congestion degree.

[0011]

According to a first aspect of the present invention, there is provided an elevator car congestion degree detecting device which is installed in an entrance sill of an elevator car and detects an object passing above, including its moving direction. And a counter that counts up an object in the car entry direction and counts down an object in the car exit direction based on a signal detected by the area sensor.

According to a second aspect of the invention, in the elevator car congestion degree detecting device according to the first aspect, the area sensor has a pattern recognition device for recognizing a shoe shape pattern, and a detection signal is detected when the shoe shape pattern is recognized. It is characterized by outputting.

According to a third aspect of the present invention, in the elevator car congestion degree detecting device according to the first or second aspect, when the elevator car has a load detecting device and the load detecting device detects a load of 0, the counter counts. A correction device for resetting the value to the initial value is provided.

[0014]

In the elevator car congestion degree detecting device according to the first aspect of the invention, the area sensor installed at the entrance sill of the elevator car detects the user getting on and off, and the counter counts up for passengers. It counts down the number of passengers getting off and detects the number of passengers. In this way, the number of passengers is accurately detected by detecting and counting the number of passengers who actually get in and out of the elevator car.

According to the second aspect of the present invention, the pattern recognition device is further used to recognize the shoe-shaped pattern of the person who gets in or out of the elevator car, and the number of passengers in the elevator car is determined based on the number of persons who can recognize the pattern. To detect. This makes it possible to detect the number of passengers more accurately.

According to the third aspect of the present invention, the elevator car has a load detection device, and when the load detection device detects a load of 0, the correction device resets the count value of the counter to the initial value so that the counter is constantly operated. To eliminate the error of and to detect the number of passengers more accurately.

[0017]

Embodiments of the present invention will now be described in detail with reference to the drawings. 1 and 2 show an embodiment of the present invention. The elevator car congestion degree detection device of this embodiment is
One of the multiple elevators with group management control
It shows a single elevator car 11i (i = 1, 2, ...). This elevator car 11i has its entrance 12i
An area sensor 13i that detects a passing object by radiating infrared rays and receiving reflected light that is reflected by hitting an object is installed on the threshold. Another basket 1
A load detection device 14i similar to the conventional one is installed on the floor portion of 1i.

The area sensor 13i is subjected to image processing of its detection signal and compared with the pattern of the shape of the person's shoe sole stored by itself to perform pattern recognition and also recognize the moving direction thereof. Pattern recognition device 15i
Are connected, and the detection signal of the pattern recognition device 15i is input to the counter device 16i.

Load detecting device 14i and counter device 16i
The output of is input to the group management control device 17. This group management control device 17 includes a counter device 16i.
The count value of is input to determine the congestion degree of each car 11i, and is reflected in the group management control.

A correction device 18i is also connected to the group management control device 17, and this correction device 18i sets the counter device 16i to 0 when the load detection device 14i detects 0 load. If the load detector 14i is reset and the count value is corrected and the load detector 14i is not 0 load when the counter device 16i reaches 0 count, on the contrary, a calculation for calculating the number of passengers is executed from the detected load to execute the counter device 16i. Execute the function to correct the count value of.

The unit control device 19i connected to the group management control unit 17 is a unit for executing unit control such as car call control of the car 11i, door opening / closing control and speed control.

Next, the operation of the elevator car congestion degree detecting device having the above structure will be described. As shown in the flow chart of FIG. 3, when a car 11i stops at a certain floor, the door opens, and a customer gets on and off through the car entrance 12i, the area sensor 13i captures an infrared image of the passage of the customer and the pattern is obtained. Input to the recognition device 15i, and the pattern recognition device 15i executes the pattern recognition (step S1). That is, the input area sensor 13
The signal from i is subjected to image processing to perform pattern recognition including the directionality of the shape of the person's shoe sole (steps S2 and S3),
If the pattern recognition of the shoe sole shape in the boarding direction is performed for two times, it is considered that one passenger has boarded, and the counter device 16i is given a count-up command of +1 (step S4). If pattern recognition is performed for two pieces, it is assumed that there is a passenger who descends. Counter device 1
A countdown command of -1 is given to 6i (step S
5).

Therefore, the counter device 16i counts up and down based on the command from the pattern recognition device 15i, and periodically outputs the count value to the group management control device 17. The group management control device 17 uses the counter device 16
Although the count value from i is monitored and reflected in the group management control, for example, when a hall call is generated from any one, when the elevator car 11i is assigned as the optimum elevator, the elevator car 11i is almost full. If it is found from the count value of the counter device 16i that it is in the state, the control for changing the allocation to the next optimum elevator can be performed. Also already in the basket 1
Even if the unanswered hall call is assigned to 1i and it is moving to the floor where it is generated, if the count value of the counter device 16i reveals that it is full, the existing assignment is discarded and the elevator of another unit is assigned. It is also possible to perform control to change the allocation.

Next, the correction operation of the number of passengers by the correction device 18i will be described. The group management control device 17 periodically monitors the count value of the counter device 16i.
Along with this, the load detection signal of the load detection device 14i is also monitored periodically. Now, when the detected load of the load detection device 14i becomes 0, the correction device 18i is activated to execute the correction of the count value based on the flowchart shown in FIG. That is, when the load 0 is detected, the correction device 18i refers to the count value of the counter device 16i and determines whether it is 0 (step S11).

If the count value of the counter device 16i is 0, it is not necessary to correct it, and it is left as it is. If the count value is not 0, it is reset to 0 and the counter device 16i is corrected (step S12). .

As a result, the load detecting device 14i can react relatively correctly to no load, so that the count value of the counter device 16i can be corrected accurately.

On the contrary, even when the count value of the counter device 16i becomes 0, the group management control device 17 activates the correction device 18i to execute the correction based on the flowchart of FIG. That is, when the counter device 16i becomes 0, the correction device 18i refers to the detection signal of the load detection device 14i and determines whether or not the load is detected (step S21). If the load is detected, it is assumed that an error has occurred on the counter device 16i side, and the number of passengers when the average load Akg per person is calculated from the load detection signal Wkg detected by the load detection device 14i is calculated. , The number is set in the counter device 16i (step S22).

Thus, normally, the area sensor 13i
The pattern recognition device 15i recognizes the number of passengers getting on and off, the counter device 16i counts up and down to recognize the number of passengers, and moreover, the load detection device 14i makes an optimum correction, that is, the load. When the detected value becomes 0 or the count value becomes 0, the count value is reset to 0,
Alternatively, the number of passengers is always correctly recognized and corrected in the group management control by correcting the estimated number of people from the load detection value.

The present invention is not limited to the above embodiment, and in particular, the pattern recognition device 15i does not recognize the pattern of the shape of a person's shoe sole, and the object simply moves in the boarding direction or the descending direction. It is also possible to make it possible to recognize the movement direction as well. In this case, the pattern recognition processing of the pattern recognition device 15i can be simplified.

Further, the configuration for providing the correction device 18i to perform the correction based on the load detection signal of the load detection device 14i is not particularly limited, and when simplifying the system, this device is not added but simply necessary. Accordingly, the counter device 16i may be manually reset to zero.

Further, the area sensor 13i is the car entrance 1
Although it is installed over almost the entire length of the threshold of 2i, the effective range of the area sensor 13i may be changed according to the degree of opening / closing of the elevator door, whereby the number of passengers in the elevator car 11i can be detected. Can be done more accurately.

Further, in the above embodiment, a dark infrared sensor can be used instead of the infrared sensor as the area sensor 13i. As a result, if the infrared sensor can detect the detection operation to the user and may give discomfort depending on the case, if the dark infrared sensor which is not visible to the user gives such discomfort. It leads to improvement of service.

[0033]

As described above, according to the invention of claim 1,
An area sensor installed at the entrance sill of the elevator car detects the user getting on and off, and the counter counts up passengers and counts down passengers to detect the number of passengers. Therefore, the number of passengers can be accurately detected.

According to the invention of claim 2, in the elevator car congestion degree detecting device of claim 1, the pattern recognition device further recognizes a shoe-shaped pattern of a person who gets in and out of the elevator car, and a pattern is obtained. Since the number of passengers in the elevator car is detected based on the number of people who can be recognized, the number of passengers can be detected more accurately.

According to the third aspect of the invention, the elevator car has a load detecting device, and when the load detecting device detects a load of 0, the correcting device resets the count value of the counter to the initial value. Therefore, the number of passengers can be detected more accurately by eliminating the error of the counter at all times.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a functional block diagram of an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a circuit block diagram of the above embodiment.

FIG. 3 is a flowchart showing an occupant counting operation of the counter device in the above embodiment.

FIG. 4 is a flowchart showing a 0 reset operation of the counter device in the above embodiment.

FIG. 5 is a flowchart showing a passenger number correction operation of the counter device in the above embodiment.

FIG. 6 is a block diagram of a conventional example.

FIG. 7 is a block diagram of another conventional example.

[Explanation of symbols]

 11i elevator car 12i car entrance 13i area sensor 14i load detection device 15i pattern recognition device 16i counter device 17 group management control device 18i correction device 19i single control device

Claims (3)

[Claims] 1. An area sensor installed in an entrance sill part of an elevator car for detecting an object passing above including a moving direction thereof, and an object in a car boarding direction based on a signal detected by the area sensor. Elevator car congestion degree detecting device comprising a counter that counts up and counts down objects in the car descending direction. 2. The cage congestion degree of an elevator according to claim 1, wherein the area sensor has a pattern recognition device that recognizes a shoe shape pattern, and outputs a detection signal when the shoe shape pattern is recognized. Detection device. 3. The elevator car has a load detection device, and the correction device resets the count value of the counter to an initial value when the load detection device detects no load. 2. The elevator car congestion degree detection device according to 2.