Apparatus, systems, and methods for diagnosing anomalous mass flow controller operation
First Claim
1. A method of diagnosing drift in an in-situ mass flow controller comprising the steps of:
- collecting and storing data characterizing a valve voltage, control set point voltage, and feedback signal of the in-situ mass flow controller;
computing an actual valve voltage difference as a voltage difference between the valve voltage of the in-situ mass flow controller and a representation of valve voltage characterizing a calibrated mass flow controller at the same control set point voltage;
computing an actual feedback error as a voltage difference between the control set point voltage and the feedback signal;
selecting for the actual valve voltage difference at least one membership function in which the actual valve voltage difference has a membership from a knowledge base comprising a plurality of membership functions, the selected at least one membership function corresponding to a possible state of the actual valve voltage difference;
selecting for the actual feedback error at least one membership function in which the actual feedback error has a membership from a knowledge base comprising a plurality of membership functions, the selected membership function corresponding to a possible state of the actual feedback error;
combining said membership functions selected for said actual valve voltage difference and said feedback error features using fuzzy rules to diagnose anomalous operation of said mass flow controller and;
recalibrating the mass flow controller when a drift exceeding a preselected level is detected during said step of diagnosing.
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Abstract
A processing system (10) includes a mass flow controller (22) operating in response to a plurality of control signals, and a data processor system (40). Data processor system (40) collects and stores data characterizing the plurality of control signals from the mass flow controller (22). Features are extracted from the data which characterizes failure modes of the mass flow controller (22), such as miscalibration and malfunction. Data processor system (40) combines there features represented by membership functions using fuzzy rules to diagnosis anomalous operation of the mass flow controller (22). If the mass flow controller 22 is miscalibrated, the data processor system 40 automatically recalibrates it by the rate-of-nie calibration procedure. In case of malfunction, a warning is raised to the operator. Processing system (10) employs self-learning techniques to initialize and refine the knowledge base.
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Citations
8 Claims
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1. A method of diagnosing drift in an in-situ mass flow controller comprising the steps of:
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collecting and storing data characterizing a valve voltage, control set point voltage, and feedback signal of the in-situ mass flow controller; computing an actual valve voltage difference as a voltage difference between the valve voltage of the in-situ mass flow controller and a representation of valve voltage characterizing a calibrated mass flow controller at the same control set point voltage; computing an actual feedback error as a voltage difference between the control set point voltage and the feedback signal; selecting for the actual valve voltage difference at least one membership function in which the actual valve voltage difference has a membership from a knowledge base comprising a plurality of membership functions, the selected at least one membership function corresponding to a possible state of the actual valve voltage difference; selecting for the actual feedback error at least one membership function in which the actual feedback error has a membership from a knowledge base comprising a plurality of membership functions, the selected membership function corresponding to a possible state of the actual feedback error; combining said membership functions selected for said actual valve voltage difference and said feedback error features using fuzzy rules to diagnose anomalous operation of said mass flow controller and; recalibrating the mass flow controller when a drift exceeding a preselected level is detected during said step of diagnosing. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5)
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6. A method of detecting anomalous operation in a mass flow controller operating in response to a plurality of control signals comprising the steps of:
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collecting and storing data characterizing the plurality of control signals; extracting features characterizing selected failure modes of the mass flow controller from the data; selecting for each feature at least one membership function in which the feature has a membership from a knowledge base comprising a plurality of membership functions, each membership function corresponding to a possible state of the feature; combining the membership functions selected for the features using fuzzy rules to diagnose anomalous operation of the mass flow controller and; recalibrating the mass flow controller when the diagnosed measurement drift exceeds a preselected amount. - View Dependent Claims (7, 8)
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Specification