The Casino Software Corporation of America

Barry H Wong

James K Mikulak

Carey W Starzinger

Paul H Clark

A chip (12) counter (10) employs an ultrasonic distance measuring system (40) to determine the number of chips in a stack (54, 56) in a chip tray (16) channel (14). A computer (32) initially stores an average chip thickness (T) and receives distance data from the ultrasonic distance measuring system indicative of a first distance (D.sub.1) to the bottom of an empty channel. To count chips, the computer repeatedly receives data from the ultrasonic distance measuring system indicative of a second distance (D.sub.2) to the top of the stack of chips in the channel. The computer subtracts the second distance from the first distance to determine a height of the stack of chips and then divides the height by the average chip thickness to provide a continuous count of the number of chips in the channel. In a multichannel chip tray, each channel has a distance measuring transducer, and a multiplexer (28) scans all the transducers to provide the computer with second distance data for all channels in the chip tray.

Growing community of inventors

Vancouver, WA, United States of America

Barry H Wong