JPH08296841A - Troubleshooting system for gas apparatus - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE: To provide a troubleshooting system of a gas apparatus used to specify a trouble point without making a repair worker visit to a site involved when a request for repairing the gas apparatus is received. CONSTITUTION: A host computer 6 is allowed to make a communication with a gas apparatus 2 in a remote location and collects information pertaining to the gas apparatus 2 by this communication, thereby enabling troubleshooting of the gas apparatus 2.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a gas equipment failure diagnosis system, and more particularly, to a failure diagnosis system used to identify a failure location without the need for a repair worker to visit the site when the gas equipment fails.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art When a gas water heater, a gas fan heater, a gas room air conditioner, or other gas equipment has been used for many years, it may cause ignition failure due to aged deterioration of parts, change in usage condition, or electrical connection failure. It may cause various malfunctions such as a decrease in firepower or the disappearance of flames.

In such a case, the user of the gas appliance informs a service center in the area of the occurrence of the failure by telephone,
Request inspection and repair. Upon receipt of the call, the service center staff member asks the user for the model name of the gas equipment, the location of the failure, the status of the failure, etc., writes it on a work sheet prepared in advance, and specifies the date of repair.

Before going out to repair a gas appliance, a repair worker obtains technical information necessary for the work from an instruction manual and a construction manual, predicts a failure point based on the information heard from the user, and replaces the replacement part. Is prepared, and if there is a drawing that records the installation status of gas equipment at the site, copy it and then go to the site.

[0005] In the field, a place which is considered to be the cause of failure of the failed gas equipment is inspected, and if it is an electrical abnormality, it is inspected using a tester or the like and as a result, the cause of the failure is accurately grasped. Then estimate the repair cost,
Present it to the user and, after obtaining its consent, start full-scale repair work including parts replacement. Finally, a test run is performed to confirm normal operation of the gas equipment and complete a series of repairs. The repair worker returns to the service center and records the completion of the repair work.

[0006]

As described above, conventionally, the exact cause of the failure can be grasped only by visiting the site of the repair worker. Therefore, when a repair worker leaves the service center, he / she does not know the exact cause of the failure, and he / she does not know exactly the replacement parts required for repair, and the parts prepared may not be enough. In that case, although the repair worker went to the site, he could not repair the gas equipment.

On the other hand, when the user of the gas equipment has contacted for a repair request and a repair worker visits the site and inspects the gas equipment, it is not actually a failure but, for example, an error in the usage method of the user. In some cases. The burden on the service center for the repair worker's on-site repair is heavy, and it would be very costly if he went to the site even when the gas appliance was not a malfunction.

The present invention has been made in view of the above points, and when a repair request for a gas appliance is made, a repair diagnostic system for a gas appliance used for identifying a failure location without a repair worker going to the site. The purpose is to provide.

[0009]

In order to achieve the above-mentioned object, the present invention provides a communication means in a gas equipment, and a host computer communicates with the gas equipment in a remote place and is sent from the gas equipment. A failure diagnosis system for gas equipment is configured to perform failure diagnosis for gas equipment based on information.

Further, the failure diagnosis system of the gas equipment is configured so that the host computer receives information about the flow rate of the gas flowing inside the gas equipment from the gas equipment.

[0011]

With the above configuration, the present invention allows a host computer to communicate with a gas device at a location remote from the gas device, and the host computer collects information about the gas device by this communication, thereby causing a failure of the gas device. Diagnosis can be done.

[0012]

DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS The present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings.

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of a first embodiment of a failure diagnosis system for gas equipment according to the present invention.

The user's house 1 is provided with a gas device 2 to which gas is supplied via a gas meter 3, and the gas meter 3 and the gas device 2 are connected to a host computer 6 of a service center 5 via a public telephone network 4. It is supposed to be connected. The gas device 2 has a communication unit (not shown) for communicating with the host computer 6, and a flow rate sensor (not shown) for detecting the flow rate of the gas flowing into the inside.

The information transmitted from the gas meter 3 to the host computer 6 is, for example, the flow rate of the gas flowing through the gas meter 3, while the information transmitted from the gas device 2 to the host computer 6 is, for example, the gas device 2. It is the flow rate of the gas flowing into the inside.

Next, the failure diagnosis by the failure diagnosis system for gas equipment of this embodiment will be described.

When the gas equipment 2 does not operate normally, the user informs the service center 5 in the area of the occurrence of the failure by telephone, and the person in charge of the service center 5 who receives the call calls the model name or the failure of the gas equipment 2. It is the same as before until the user hears the location or the status of the failure, but in this embodiment, the staff member of the service center 5 who receives the call uses the public telephone network 4 to host the host computer 6, the gas device 2, and the gas meter 3. And connect.

When this connection is completed, the clerk of the service center 5 uses the host computer 6 to determine the gas flow rate flowing into the gas equipment 2 and the gas flow rate flowing through the gas meter 3 when the gas equipment 2 is stopped. 2 and the gas meter 3, and then the clerk asks the user of the gas apparatus 2 to operate the gas apparatus 2, and flows the gas flow rate and the gas meter 3 flowing into the gas apparatus 2 during operation. The gas flow rate is received by the host computer 6 from the gas device 2 and the gas meter 3.

Then, the clerk of the service center 6 compares the gas flow rates from the gas equipment 2 and the gas meter 3 when the gas equipment 2 is stopped with the two gas flow rates when the gas equipment 2 is in operation. If there is no gas, the gas does not flow into the gas device 2 even when the gas device 2 is in the operating state, that is, the sticking of the valve for causing the gas to flow into the gas device 2 or the blockage of the gas path causes a failure. It may be the cause. On the contrary, when the difference between the compared gas flow rates is abnormally large as compared with when the gas device 2 is normally used, there is a possibility that gas leakage may occur inside the gas device 2. In this case, the staff member of the service center 6 requests the user of the gas equipment 2 to completely stop the use of the gas equipment 2 until the repair worker goes there. By doing so, it is possible to prevent gas leakage and prevent fires and the like.

By the way, a system for connecting a gas meter and a host computer via a public telephone network to automatically read the amount of gas used (for example, My Two Ho system) has already been put into practical use. When connecting the gas meter and the gas equipment to the host computer through the public telephone network 4 as in the present embodiment, the user who has already introduced the My Two Ho system uses the equipment related to the communication of the My Two Ho system. Since the gas equipment can also communicate with the host computer, it is possible to reduce the cost of equipment for the failure diagnosis system for the gas equipment.

FIG. 2 is a block diagram of a second embodiment of a failure diagnosis system for gas equipment according to the present invention.

The user's home 1 is provided with a gas device 2 which is supplied with gas via a gas meter 3, and the gas device 2 is connected to a host computer 6 of a service center 5 via a public telephone network 4. It is like this. The gas device 2 has a communication unit (not shown) for communicating with the host computer 6, and a flow rate sensor (not shown) for detecting the flow rate of the gas flowing into the inside.

In the present invention, as in the embodiment shown in FIG. 2, only the gas equipment 2 may be connected to the host computer 6 of the service center 5. In FIG. 2, the information transmitted from the gas device 2 to the host computer 6 is
Similar to the first embodiment, only the flow rate of the gas flowing into the gas equipment 2 detected by providing a flow rate sensor inside the gas equipment 2 may be used, or the operating state of each actuator in the gas equipment 2 may be used. The information may be electric information such as information about the voltage or current in other electric circuits.

The failure diagnosis by the failure diagnosis system for gas equipment of the present embodiment is the same as that of the first embodiment, and therefore its explanation is omitted.

FIG. 3 is a block diagram of a third embodiment of a failure diagnosis system for gas equipment according to the present invention.

The present embodiment is an example in which the gas appliance is a gas water heater, and the user's house 1 is supplied with gas through the gas meter 3 and is supplied with tap water through the water meter 8. A gas water heater 7 is installed, and the gas meter 3, the water meter 8 and the gas water heater 7 are connected to the host computer 6 of the service center 5 via the public telephone network 4.
It is designed to be connected to. The gas water heater 7 includes a communication unit (not shown) for communicating with the host computer 6, a flow sensor (not shown) for detecting the flow rate of gas flowing in, and a flow sensor for detecting the flow rate of tap water flowing in. It does not have a flow sensor.

The information transmitted from the gas meter 3 to the host computer 6 is, for example, the flow rate of the gas flowing through the gas meter 3, and the information transmitted from the water meter 8 to the host computer 6 is, for example, via the water meter 8. Information sent from the gas water heater 7 to the host computer 6 is, for example, the flow rate of gas flowing into the gas water heater 7 or the tap water flowing into the gas water heater 7. The flow rate.

This embodiment is similar to the first and second embodiments in the failure diagnosis with reference to the gas flow rate, but when the gas equipment is a gas water heater as in this embodiment, the gas It is preferable that the host computer 6 of the service center 5 can refer to the flow rate of tap water in addition to the flow rate of. By doing so, it is possible to diagnose a failure due to blockage of the path of tap water in the gas water heater 7.

In each of the above-mentioned embodiments, the staff of the service center 5 diagnoses the failure of the gas equipment based on the information obtained by the host computer 6 via the public telephone network 4. The host computer 6 is not limited to this, but the host computer 6 may be automatically diagnosed by mounting an expert system on the host computer 6. In this case, even a person who has no technical expertise in gas equipment can serve as a staff member of the service center 5.

Further, in each of the above-mentioned embodiments, the gas equipment 2 and the like are connected to the host computer via the public telephone network 4, but this communication means is wired communication such as ISDN or a dedicated line. It may be PHS, tele-terminal system, MCA system, wireless communication such as satellite communication. It goes without saying that the wireless communication is not limited to radio waves and may be light, sound waves or the like.

[0031]

As described above, according to the present invention,
It is possible to provide a failure diagnosis system for a gas appliance used for identifying a failure location without the need for a repair worker to visit the site when a request for repairing the gas appliance is made.

As a result, it becomes possible to perform remote failure diagnosis of the gas equipment, reduce the number of cases where a repair worker at the service center goes to the site, and reduce the cost for repair.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of a first embodiment of a failure diagnosis system for gas equipment according to the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a block diagram of a second embodiment of a failure diagnosis system for gas equipment according to the present invention.

FIG. 3 is a block diagram of a third embodiment of a failure diagnosis system for gas equipment according to the present invention.

[Explanation of symbols]

 1 User's house 2 Gas equipment 3 Gas meter 4 Public telephone network 5 Service center 6 Host computer 7 Gas water heater 8 Water meter

─────────────────────────────────────────────────── ─── Continuation of the front page (51) Int.Cl. ⁶ Identification code Office reference number FI Technical display location G05B 23/02 302 H04Q 9/00 311H H04Q 9/00 311 7531-3H G05B 15/02 Z (72 ) Inventor Suzuki 1399-7-242 Sezaki-cho, Soka-shi, Saitama Prefecture (72) Inventor Masa Ishimoto 2-11-2 Kajigaya, Kajigaya, Takatsu-ku, Kawasaki-shi, Kanagawa No. 222 Dormitory, Kajigaya (72) Inventor, Satoshi Morita Tokyo 6-9-5 Chuo, Ota-ku No. 24 Omori Dormitory

Claims (5)

[Claims] 1. A communication means is provided in a gas device, wherein a host computer communicates with the gas device at a remote location and diagnoses a failure of the gas device based on information sent from the gas device. Characteristic gas equipment failure diagnosis system. 2. The failure diagnosis system for a gas device according to claim 1, wherein the host computer receives information about the flow rate of the gas flowing inside the gas device from the gas device. 3. The gas sent from the gas meter, wherein the host computer further communicates with a gas meter attached to a pipe for supplying gas to the gas device, receives the flow rate of the gas flowing through the gas meter, and sends the gas flow rate from the gas meter. The failure diagnosis system for gas equipment according to claim 1 or 2, wherein failure diagnosis of the gas equipment is performed based on a flow rate. 4. The water supply that flows through the water meter, wherein the gas device is a gas water heater, and the host computer further communicates with a water meter attached to a pipe that supplies tap water to the gas water heater. The failure diagnosis system for gas equipment according to claim 3, wherein the failure diagnosis of the gas equipment is performed based on a flow rate of tap water sent from the water meter. 5. The failure diagnosis system for gas equipment according to claim 1, wherein the host computer is equipped with an expert system for diagnosing failure of the gas equipment.