Group control of elevator system improvement measures

• US 5,283,399 A
• Filed: 11/05/1991
• Issued: 02/01/1994
• Est. Priority Date: 11/05/1990
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Hitachi, Ltd.
• Original Assignee: Hitachi, Ltd.
• Inventors: Yoneda, Kenzi, Inaba, Hiromi, Fujino, Atsuya, Tobita, Toshimitsu, Yamani, Hiroaki
• Primary Examiner(s): Stephan, Steven L.
• Assistant Examiner(s): NAPPI, ROBERT E
• Application Number:
  US07/788,320
• Time in Patent Office: 819 Days
• Field of Search: 187/127, 187/124, 187/128, 187/129, 187/133
• US Class Current: 187/382
• CPC Class Codes: B66B 1/2458 For elevator systems with multiple shafts and a single car per shaft
• CPC Class Codes: B66B 2201/211 Waiting time, i.e. response time
• CPC Class Codes: B66B 2201/222 Taking into account the number of passengers present in the elevator car to be allocated
• CPC Class Codes: B66B 2201/404 by cost function evaluation

Abstract

The invention relates to a group-control elevator system for controlling an operation of elevators a group by control data. The group-control elevator system stores a plurality of improvement measures corresponding to plural inconvenience phenomenon including a long average wait time for the plurality of elevators. The inconvenience phenomenon is detected from actual data of the elevators, and the actual data is obtained by actual elevator operation and one improvement measure is selected from the improvement measures in accordance with the detected inconvenience phenomenon.

Claims

1. A group-controlled elevator system, comprising:

means for controlling an operation of a plurality of elevators as a group by control data,

means for storing a plurality of improvement measures corresponding to plural inconvenience phenomena including a long waiting time for the operations of elevators,

means for detecting said inconvenience phenomena from actual data of said elevators obtained by actual elevator operation,

means for selecting one improvement measure from said improvement measures in accordance with the detected inconvenience phenomena,

means for confirming whether the detected inconvenience phenomena are improved so as to be less inconvenient by the selected improvement measure, and

means for correcting the control data used for the control of said operation of said elevators on the basis of the selected improvement measure, when improvement of the inconvenience phenomena by the selected improvement measure is confirmed.

4. A group-controlled elevator system according to any one of claims 1 to 3, wherein said detecting means for detecting said inconvenience phenomena includes a phenomenon level table having a level set to each of said detected inconvenience phenomena in accordance with one of a degree of necessity or a degree of importance for improvement of said inconvenience phenomena, whereby said inconvenience phenomena are improved in an order of the level.

5. A group-controlled elevator system according to claim 4, wherein said phenomenon level table incudes a plurality of modes, and wherein each of said modes is indicative of traffic flow data corresponding to the elevators determined by time zones in accordance with an utilization state of the elevators.

6. A group-controlled elevator system according to any one of claims 1 to 3, wherein said means for storing improvement measures includes an improvement measure table having a plurality of phenomena and improvement measures corresponding to said inconvenience phenomena.

7. A group-controlled elevator system according to claim 6, wherein said improvement measure table includes an attribute corresponding to implementation of said improvement measures and wherein said attribute is one of implemented, implementation possible and implementation impossible.

8. A group-controlled elevator system according to claim 6, wherein said improvement measure table includes an attribute corresponding to implementation of said improvement measures and wherein said attribute is one of implemented, implementation possible, implementation inquiry and implementation impossible, and wherein said group-controlled elevator system further comprises conversation type input and output means for outputting said improvement measures and determining an advisability of the implementation when said attribute of the implementation of the improvement measures is an implementation inquiry.

9. A group-controlled elevator system according to claim 6, wherein said improvement measure table includes an attribute corresponding to a necessity of report of implementation of the improvement measures and wherein said attribute is one of a report required or a report not required.

10. A group-controlled elevator system according to claim 9, wherein said detecting means further includes output means for outputting said improvement measures from said improvement measure table when said attribute is the report required.

11. A group-controlled elevator system according to any one of claim 1 to 3, wherein said detecting means for detecting said inconvenience phenomena includes a knowledge base including phenomena detection knowledge expressing conditions for detecting said inconvenience phenomenon from the control data by an if-then format rule, and wherein the phenomenon detection knowledge in said knowledge base is collated with the control data to detect said inconvenience phenomena.

12. A group-controlled elevator system according to any one of claim 1 to 3, wherein said selecting means for selecting said improvement measures includes an origin knowledge base including origin knowledge expressing a relation of a phenomenon and an origin by an if-then format rule, origin detection means for detecting an origin causing a phenomenon from the origin knowledge in said origin knowledge base, a factor knowledge base including factor knowledge expressing a relation of a factor causing the origin by said if-then format rule, and factor estimation means for estimating a factor from the factor knowledge in said factor knowledge base.

13. A group-controlled elevator system according to claim 12, wherein said selecting means for selecting said improvement measures further includes means for limiting selection of said improvement measures to improvement measures adopted by the origin detected by said origin detection means.

14. A group-controlled elevator system according to claim 12, wherein said selecting means for selecting said improvement measures obtains said improvement measures by changing the factor estimated by said factor estimation means.

15. A group-controlled elevator system according to any one of claims 1 to 3, wherein said detecting means for detecting said inconvenience phenomena detects a phenomenon to be improved from a neural network having operation data and produces an occurrence of phenomenon.

16. A group-controlled elevator system according to any one of claims 1 to 3, wherein said improvement measures correspond to an improvement of control corresponding to an operation in said group of said plurality of elevators and improvement of operation of each individual elevator of said elevators.

2. A group-controlled elevator system, comprising:

means for controlling an operation of a plurality of elevators as a group by control data,

means for storing a plurality of improvement measure corresponding to plural inconvenience phenomena including a long waiting time for the operation of elevators,

means for detecting said inconvenience phenomena from actual data of said elevators obtained by actual elevator operation,

means for selecting one improvement measure from said improvement measures in accordance with the detected inconvenience phenomena,

means for confirming whether the detected inconvenience phenomena are improved so as to be less inconvenient by the selected improvement measure,

means including an interactive type input and output unit for receiving an advisability determination by displaying said improvement measures on said interactive type input and output unit, in accordance with an implementation attribute corresponding to said improvement measure, and

means for correcting the control data used for the control of said elevators on the basis of the selected improvement measure, when improvement of the inconvenience phenomena by the selected improvement measure is confirmed.

3. A group-controlled elevator system, comprising,

means for controlling an operation of a plurality of elevators as a group by control data,

means for storing a plurality of improvement measures corresponding to plural inconvenience phenomena including a long waiting time for the operation of elevators,

means for detecting said inconvenience phenomena from actual data of said elevators obtained by actual elevator operation,

means for detecting the operation causing the detected inconvenience phenomena,

means for estimating a cause of a problem by the operation causing the detected inconvenience phenomena,

means for selecting one improvement measure from the plural improvement measures for correcting the estimated cause of the problem,

means for confirming whether the detected inconvenience phenomena are improved so as to be less inconvenient by the selected improvement measure,

means including an interactive type input and output unit for receiving an advisability determination by displaying said improvement measures on said interactive type input and output unit, in accordance with an implementation attribute corresponding to said improvement measure, and

means for correcting the control data used for control of said elevators on the basis of the selected improvement measure, when improvement of the inconvenience phenomena by the selected improvement measure is confirmed.