Eaton Corporation

Timothy Allen Christensen

Martin Lee Dickrell

Steve S Wu

George F Nicholas

Anthony Edward Develice

Shane Morse Rowell

John Eugene Fulmer

Mark A Goskowicz

James H Sager

A monitoring system for detecting faults in an apparatus, such as a ski lift, employs a communication network onto which a sensor bus controller periodically transmits a safety message and receives a echo of each safety message. Different sensors are coupled to sensor adapter modules that in turn are connected in a series to the communication network. After the last sensor adapter module in the series, each safety message is echoed back along the communication network. Each sensor adapter module, upon receiving a safety message, increments a count in that message and transmits the resultant safety message to another module. When a sensor indicates a fault condition, the associated sensor adapter module blocks propagation of safety messages along the communication network. The sensor bus controller determines, in response to a failure to receive the echo and to the count in the echo, whether a fault occurred.

System for monitoring a plurality of sensors

A proximity sensor has a resonant circuit which when stimulated by a pulse produces a signal with decaying oscillations. The number of such oscillations above a signal threshold varies in relation to the distance between a metal object and the proximity sensor. The sensor operation is configured by deriving a function that defines how the performance of a given proximity sensor deviates from performance reference data. The function is employed to normalize the count of oscillations produced by the given proximity sensor and the normalized count is used to determine presence of an object. By normalizing sensor performance, common configuration data can be used to setup a given proximity sensor without having to take into account specific performance variations of that sensor.

Method for configuring an operational characteristic of a proximity sensor

A sensor assembly includes a housing and a plurality of lenses. The lenses are connected with a lens carrier by a plurality of releasable connector elements. A circuit board is disposed on the lens carrier. The circuit board has a black coating. A connector assembly connects the circuit board with an electrical conductor. The connector assembly includes a body portion and a flange portion. The flange portion engages a recess in the sensor housing to hold the body portion of the connector assembly against axial movement relative to the sensor housing. A retainer extends from a cover portion of the sensor housing into engagement with the flange portion of a connector assembly to hold the flange portion against rotation to thereby block unauthorized access to the interior of the sensor housing. A light detector is movable relative to a light source to enable the distance from the light source to a location from which reflected light is received by the detector to be adjusted.

Sensor assembly

A proximity sensor has a transducer coil that is part of an oscillator circuit. The oscillating signal varies as a function of the presence or absence of a metallic object adjacent the transducer coil. By analyzing selected characteristics of that oscillating signal, the presence of and object and the distance to the object can be determined. Other analysis techniques enable the sensor to distinguish between ferrous and non-ferrous materials. A mechanism also is provided to automatically configure operation of the proximity to avoid interference from another adjacent proximity sensor.

Pulsed excited proximity sensor

A coil is inherently aligned with the open face of a cup core and prevented from recessing into the core upon assembly of the coil and core into a housing by placing a resilient foam washer within the core under the coil to cause the coil to normally extend beyond the open face of the core and subsequently securing the subassembled core and coil pressed against a common internal surface of the housing, compressing the foam washer. Internal tabs on the foam washer are compressed between the center boss of the cup core and the internal surfaces of the coil opening to retain the coil assembled to the core as a separate subassembly.

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Camano Island, WA, United States of America

Timothy Allen Christensen