Panasonic Intellectual Property Management Co., Ltd.

Panasonic Corporation

The High Pressure Gas Safety Institute of Japan

Mitsuo Yokohata

Yusuke Kitano

Hajime Miyata

Kazuo Kubo

Ryuji Iwamoto

Mitsuo Namba

Kazutaka Asano

Youichi Itou

Kouichi Ueki

Tadanori Shirasawa

Takuhisa Ootani

Hisashi Saito

Hirozumi Nakamura

Motoyuki Nawa

Shota Teramoto

Kenji Nagatomo

Takanori Kamimura

Masaaki Sakata

A flow measurement device includes a flow rate measurement unit, an arithmetic unit that calculates a difference value between a the first flow rate value and a second flow rate value, and a difference value conversion unit that calculates a flow rate ratio, based on the difference value. An appliance characteristic extraction unit extracts at least one appliance characteristic quantity indicating a characteristic of a flow rate change and a value calculated from a first flow rate value and a second flow rate value, as an appliance characteristic quantity. Furthermore, an appliance inherent characteristic information holding unit holds appliance inherent characteristic quantities indicating a characteristic flow rate state of a specific gas appliance, and an appliance discrimination unit discriminates a gas appliance, based on a comparison between the appliance characteristic quantity and the appliance inherent characteristic quantity.

Flow measurement device

A flow rate measurement device includes a flow rate measurer to measure a fluid flow rate at regular time intervals, a period setting unit, an arithmetic unit to calculate first average flow rates and amounts of change each between the average flow rates in sequence, and second average flow rates and amounts of change each between the average flow rates in sequence, and a fuel cell determinator to determine whether a fuel cell is in operation. The fuel cell determinator determines that a fuel cell is in operation when an increment of the second average flow rate repeats for first predetermined successive times, an increment of the first average flow rate repeats for second predetermined times or more in each of the second periods, and an increment of the first average flow rate not greater than or equal to a third predetermined flow rate in each of the second periods.

Flow rate measurement device

Flow rate measurement device includes flow rate measurement unit that measures a flow rate of gas at a prescribed time interval, and arithmetic unit that calculates a characteristic flow rate from the flow rates measured within a predetermined period, and calculates a ratio of each flow rate measured at multiple times within the predetermined period with respect to the characteristic flow rate. In addition, flow rate measurement device includes appliance characteristic extraction unit that extracts an appliance characteristic quantity which indicates a characteristic of a flow rate change in currently using gas appliances within the predetermined period, the appliance characteristic quantity being the ratio or information obtained from the ratio, and appliance inherent characteristic information holding unit that holds an appliance inherent characteristic quantity indicating a characteristic flow rate state of a specific gas appliance. Furthermore, flow rate measurement device includes appliance discrimination unit that discriminates the currently using gas appliance by comparing the appliance characteristic quantity with the appliance inherent characteristic quantity.

A gas meter that is a flow rate measurement device includes a flow rate measurement unit for measuring, at a constant time interval, a flow rate of gas flowing in a passage, a pressure measurement unit for measuring pressure of the gas in the passage, a power supply unit for supplying power to a pressure measurement unit, and an appliance determination unit for determining an appliance being used based on a gas flow rate value. The gas meter further includes a measurement interval controller for determining a gas non-use state, an appliance determination performing state, or an appliance determination non-performing state based on the gas flow rate value and operation information of the appliance determination unit, for controlling the power supply unit in accordance with the determined state, and for changing an interval for turning on/off power supplied to the pressure measurement unit.

A fluid instrument information providing device comprises a gas usage amount integrating section for integrating the usage amount of a gas for each of the kinds of gas instruments which is determined by a gas instrument determiner section, based on a change in the flow of the gas which is measured by the flow measuring section; an instrument information generating section for generating a plurality of gas instrument information including charge information relating to the gas instrument corresponding to the integrated usage amount for each kind of the gas instrument which is integrated by the gas usage amount integrating section, based on the integrated usage amount; an information selecting section operated by a user to select gas instrument information from among the gas instrument information generated by the gas instrument information generating section; and an output section for outputting instrument information selected by the information selecting section.

Fluid instrument information providing device

A problem of the present invention is to provide a flow rate measurement device which is capable of simplifying calculation, reducing the amount of memory necessary for calculation, absorbing variations resulting from manual operation or ignition state when the appliances are used alone or in combination, and improving appliance identification precision of appliances having similar characteristics with a configuration which extracts characteristics of appliances. The flow rate measurement device identifies the appliances with high precision by extracting characteristics of gas appliances from code sequences into which a differential conversion unit converts, at regular time intervals, differentials by a first calculation unit which calculates differentials at regular time intervals in the flow rates measured by a flow rate measurement unit and by a second calculation unit which calculates differentials at time intervals different from the first calculation unit.

Flow rate measuring device

A gas meter of the present invention includes a flow measuring section for measuring a flow value of a gas flowing through a fluid passage connected to a gas instrument at each specified time interval; a measurement flow memory for storing the measured flow value; and a fuel cell determiner section for determining that the instrument using a gas is a fuel cell, when a condition A and a condition B are satisfied, in which the condition A is such that a maximum value of determination target flow values is equal to or less than a second predetermined value, the determination target flow values being a predetermined number of flow values measured before and after a reference flow value which is equal to or greater than a first predetermined value and is closest to the first predetermined value, the determination target flow values being included in stored flow values, and the condition B is such that a difference value derived by subtracting from each of all of the determination target flow values, an average value found from the each determination target flow value and a predetermined number of measurement flow values measured before the each determination target flow value, is equal to or less than a third predetermined value.

Flow meter device

A problem of the present invention is to provide a flow rate measurement device which is capable of simplifying calculation, reducing the amount of memory necessary for calculation, absorbing variations in the flow rate which changes in various ways depending on the state of usage, and improving identification precision of appliances with a configuration which extracts characteristics of appliances. The flow rate measurement device monitors and determines the change in the flow rate measured by a flow rate measurement unit, and extracts and determines codes obtained by a differential conversion unit and appliance characteristic flow rates representing the characteristics of gas appliances, thereby identifying the gas appliances in which appliance characteristics vary depending on the state of usage.

A problem of the present invention is to provide a flow rate measurement device which is capable of simplifying calculation, reducing the amount of memory necessary for calculation, absorbing variations resulting from manual operation or ignition state when appliances are used alone or in combination, and improving appliance identification precision with a configuration which extracts characteristics of appliances. The flow rate measurement device monitors and determines the change in a flow rate measured by a flow rate measurement unit, monitors and determines the code obtained by differential conversion unit, extracts appliance characteristic flow rates representing the characteristics of the gas appliances, and compares them with the appliance-specific characteristics, thereby identifying the gas appliances.

A flow rate measuring device simplifies calculation, reduces memory required for calculation, absorbs variations due to manual operation and, depending on the state of ignition, improves the accuracy of appliance identification by extracting features of appliances. The flow rate measuring device includes: a difference value conversion unit that converts into codes difference values of the flow rate measured at constant time intervals by an ultrasonic flowmeter; an appliance feature extraction unit creates an appliance feature code string indicating a feature of each appliance by, for example, making comparison and judgment using a third last code, a second last code, a last code and a current code of the codes obtained at constant time intervals, and by performing code deletion; and an identification unit performs appliance identification by comparing the appliance feature code string with an appliance inherent feature code string indicating the feature code string inherent in each appliance.

The present invention provides a gas shutoff device that prevents tampering procurement of gas or tamper due to stealing of the gas shutoff device. When an event, in which a gas pressure value of a pressure measuring unitafter a predetermined operation performed by a provider in installation is kept equal to or less than a first predetermined pressure value for a first predetermined time or longer and then the gas pressure value is kept equal to or more than a second predetermined pressure value for a second predetermined time or longer, happens at a predetermined number of times, the gas is shut off by a shutoff unit, communication with the outside is performed by an external communication unit, restoration is permitted by a restoring unitwhile when there is a predetermined operation by the provider after the shutoff, the restoration permission state implemented by communicating with the outside by the predetermined operation by the provider and inputting communication of a response from the outside.

Gas shutoff device

A newly-purchased gas appliance is detected and reported to a gas administrator. There are provided a flow rate detection portion, a flow rate calculation portion, a code extraction portion, an initial code learning portion, a code maintaining portion, a code judging portion, an additional code learning portion, and an external communication portion. The code extraction portion extracts a code pattern E. The initial code learning portion gathers similar code patterns E as a gas appliance code pattern F. The code judging portion judges whether or not the code pattern E matches any of gas appliance code patterns F held by the code maintaining portion within a predetermined range. The code patterns E that have failed to match are subjected to additional identification of a gas appliance in the additional code learning portion. The gas cut-off device can thereby let the additional code learning portion detect whether or not a new gas appliance has emerged and the external communication portion send a report to the gas administrator.

Gas blocking device

Setting safety function, as appropriate, according to a user environment is enabled, thereby enhancing safety function. According to selection information from a safety function selection unit, a function setting unitsets arbitrary function among a plurality of functions as safety function pertaining to usage of a gas. When operating conditions for safety function are fulfilled, a monitoring unitdetects malfunction, which would arise during usage of a gas, and outputs a safety signal to a control unitin accordance with the set safety function. In accordance with a safety signal from the monitoring unit, the control unitcuts off a gas supply when an event fulfilling operating conditions for the set function has arisen. When an event fulfilling operating conditions for an unset function has arisen, a communication unitreports occurrence of malfunction pertaining to unset function to the monitoring center

Gas meter and gas safety system

The present invention is intended to make it possible to set security functions as necessary depending on usage environment, etc. and to improve the security functions; a function setting sectionsets security function information received from the outside via a communication line as security functions regarding the user of gas. According to the set security function, in the case that the operation conditions of the security function are satisfied, a monitoring sectiondetects a problem during the use of gas and outputs a security signal to a control section. Based on the security signal from the monitoring section, the control sectionshuts off the supply of gas in the case that a phenomenon satisfying an operation condition of the set function having been set has occurred.

Growing community of inventors

Osaka, Japan

Mitsuo Yokohata