Fault tolerant vital power supply system
First Claim
1. A power supply system for supplying power to a device, the system comprising:
- a voltage converter for producing a desired voltage;
first and second vitality monitoring circuits for monitoring the voltage produced by said voltage converter and produce respective reference voltages;
a control system comprising two or more processing units operably connected to the vitality monitoring circuits, the control system being operable to determine a vitality of the converter based on outputs from the vitality monitoring circuits and further operable to shut down the power being supplied to the device based on a determination to shut down the power from at least two of the processing units.
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Accused Products
Abstract
A vital power supply system that utilizes a two out of three determination scheme to control the tolerance of the output voltage and also to shut down the output voltage. The power supply system includes monitoring circuits that determine over-voltage and under-voltage conditions and when a redundant supply is switched-in in the event the main power supply fails. One of the monitoring circuits includes switches that shut down the supplied power when at least two out of three processing units determine that such action is needed. Another monitoring circuit includes different switches that are selectively enabled to control a level of a reference voltage which indicates the voltage level being supplied by the supply. By changing the reference voltage up or down the tolerance for voltage monitor is controlled. Preferably, the system complies with CENELEC standards.
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Citations
27 Claims
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1. A power supply system for supplying power to a device, the system comprising:
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a voltage converter for producing a desired voltage;
first and second vitality monitoring circuits for monitoring the voltage produced by said voltage converter and produce respective reference voltages;
a control system comprising two or more processing units operably connected to the vitality monitoring circuits, the control system being operable to determine a vitality of the converter based on outputs from the vitality monitoring circuits and further operable to shut down the power being supplied to the device based on a determination to shut down the power from at least two of the processing units. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13)
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14. A power supply system comprising:
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a converter having at least four output voltages;
first and second vitality monitoring circuits corresponding to each of the output voltages for monitoring each output voltage;
a control system comprising two or more processing units operably connected to the vitality monitoring circuits, the control system being operable to determine a vitality of each of the output voltages of the converter based on outputs from the vitality monitoring circuits and further operable to shut down one or more of the output voltages based on a determination to shut down the voltage from at least two of the processing units. - View Dependent Claims (15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26)
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27. A power supply system for supplying power to a device, the system comprising:
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at least two similarly configured power supply subsystems, each subsystem comprising a voltage converter for producing a desired voltage and first and second vitality monitoring circuits for monitoring the voltage produced by said voltage converter and producing respective reference voltages; and
a control system comprising two or more processing units operably connected to the vitality monitoring circuits of each subsystem, the control system being operable to determine a vitality of the respective converters based on outputs from the vitality monitoring circuits and further operable to shut down the power being supplied by one of the subsystems to the device based on a determination to shut down the power from at least two of the processing units.
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Specification