The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Nov. 07, 2000
Filed:
Apr. 17, 1998
Irfan Ali, Schenectady, NY (US);
Michael Paul Weir, Mainville, OH (US);
Kenneth Brakeley Welles, II, Scotia, NY (US);
General Electric Company, Schenectady, NY (US);
Abstract
A linking process allows a head-end unit (HEU) of a railroad train to determine the sequence of cars in the train using wireless links between nodes on the cars, and requires no physical connection between the nodes or cars. Each car in the train is equipped with a wireless communication device which models an oscillator i. Each oscillator is phase-variable, the phase .theta..sub.i linearly increasing from 0 to 1 such that, when the i.sup.th oscillator 'fires', transmitting a packet, and phase .theta..sub.i then jumps back to zero. When a car receives the transmission of another car, it changes the phase of its oscillator according to a phase-response curve function, setting up a wave pattern of transmission from nodes, from one end of the train to the other end. The wave pattern, along with protocol logic, enables each car to determine the sequence in which cars are arranged in its vicinity. The protocol logic also enables each car to forward or relay this 'local map' from all cars to the HEU, allowing the HEU to construct the entire train map which is the sequence of cars in the train. The compiled train map is compared with consist information and the operator is notified of any discrepancy.