Method and system for monitoring problem resolution of a machine

• US 6,993,675 B2
• Filed: 07/31/2002
• Issued: 01/31/2006
• Est. Priority Date: 07/31/2002
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: General Electric Company
• Original Assignee: General Electric Company
• Inventors: Bliley, Richard Gerald, Roddy, Nicholas Edward, Gibson, David Richard
• Primary Examiner(s): Beausoliel, Robert
• Assistant Examiner(s): MCCARTHY, CHRISTOPHER S
• Application Number:
  US10/210,815
• Publication Number:
  US 20040025082A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,280 Days
• Field of Search: 701/19, 701/39, 701/29, 701/35, 714/37, 714/2, 714/48, 714/26, 714/31, 714/57, 379/9.03
• US Class Current: 714/2
• CPC Class Codes: B61L 27/57 for vehicles or trains, e.g. trackside supervision of train conditions
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/0748 in a remote unit communicating with a single-box computer node experiencing an error/fault remote testing G06F11/2294
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/079 Root cause analysis, i.e. error or fault diagnosis in a hardware test environment G06F11/22; in a software test environment G06F11/36
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/0793 Remedial or corrective actions recovery from an exception in an instruction pipeline G06F9/3861; by retry G06F11/1402; for recovering from a failure of a protocol instance or entity H04L69/40
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/2294 by remote test

Abstract

A method and apparatus for determining when to close a problem case associated with a machine that includes identifying at least one failure condition associated with the problem case, determining whether the failure condition is repeated after a recommended fix instruction is executed and closing the problem case if the failure condition does not repeat within a predetermined amount of time after the fix instruction has been executed. The machine may be a remote machine such as a locomotive and electronic data indicative of the failure condition may be transmitted from the remote machine to a control center over a telecommunications medium such as the Internet. The control center may include a processor for managing the electronic data that may be transmitted from a plurality of remote machines. The control center processor may be adapted to request downloads from the remote machines and monitor downloaded data to determine whether the failure condition are repeating after the fix instruction has been executed.

Claims

1. A method for determining whether to close a problem case associated with a machine, the problem case identifying at least one failure condition of the machine, the method comprising:

acquiring a first set of operational data, the first set of operational data indicative of a first set of operational parameters associated with the machine, the first set of operational parameters being measured prior to a recommended fix instruction being executed wherein the first set of operational data contains the at least one failure condition;

acquiring a second set of operational data, the second set of operational data indicative of a second set of operational parameters associated with the machine, the second set of operational parameters being measured after the recommended fix instruction is executed;

determining whether the at least one failure condition is contained in the second set of operational data;

closing the problem case if the at least one failure condition is not contained in the second set of operational data;

creating an electronic data file associated with the problem case, the electronic data file containing a set of data indicative of a customer'"'"'s information and the machine'"'"'s information;

storing the electronic data file in a customer database;

determining whether the recommended fix instruction repaired the at least one failure condition;

marking the electronic data file as a success if the recommended fix instruction repaired the at least one failure condition;

marking the electronic data file as a failure if the recommended fix instruction did not repair the at least one failure condition;

marking the electronic data file as a re-opened problem case;

issuing an updated recommended fix instruction;

acquiring an updated set of operational data, the updated set of operational data indicative of an updated set of operational parameters associated with the machine, the updated set of operational parameters being measured after the updated recommended fix instruction is executed; and

closing the re-opened problem case if the at least one failure condition is not contained in the updated set of operational data.

2. The method of claim 1, the steps of acquiring a first set and a second set of operational data comprising:

downloading the first and second set of operational data to a remote service center; and

storing the first and second set of operational data in a customer database.

3. The method of claim 1 further comprising:

reporting the closing of the problem case to a remote service center.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein the electronic data file contains data indicative of customer and machine specific information associated with the problem case and further comprising:

marking the electronic data file as executed if the recommended fix instruction has been executed; and

time stamping the electronic data file with a time that the recommended fix instruction was executed.

5. The method of claim 4, the step of closing the problem case further comprising marking the electronic data file as closed if the at least one failure condition is not contained in the second set of operational data within a predetermined period of time measured from the time that the recommended fix instruction was executed.

6. The method of claim 1 further comprising:

delivering a message to a service delivery team alerting the team that the problem case has not been solved if the at least one failure condition is contained in the second set of operational data.

7. The method of claim 1 wherein the step of determining is conducted at a remote service center.

8. The method of claim 1 further comprising:

acquiring a set of repair data, the set of repair data indicative of whether the recommended fix instruction has been executed; and

analyzing the set of repair data to determine whether the recommended fix instruction has been executed.

9. The method of claim 1 further comprising:

diagnosing the problem case by associating the occurrence of the at least one failure condition with a set of potential malfunctioning conditions of the machine; and

issuing the recommended fix instruction based on the diagnosis of the problem case.

10. A method for managing data to determine whether to close a problem case associated with at least one locomotive, the method comprising:

downloading a first set of data from the at least one locomotive to a remote control center, the first set of data indicative that the problem case exists in association with the at least one locomotive;

identifying at least one failure condition associated with the problem case;

downloading a second set of data from the at least one locomotive to the remote control center, the second set of data indicative of a set of operational parameters associated with the at least one locomotive, the second set of operational parameters being determined after a first recommended fix instruction has been executed in relation to the at least one locomotive;

closing the problem case if the at least one failure condition is not contained in the second set of data;

creating an electronic data file associated with the problem case;

marking the electronic data file as a failure if the recommended fix instruction did not repair the at least one failure condition;

re-opening the problem case in the event the recommended fix instruction did not repair the at least one failure condition;

transmitting a second recommended fix instruction for the at least one locomotive;

downloading a set of undated operational parameters from the at least one locomotive, the set of updated operational parameters being measured after the second recommended fix instruction is performed; and

closing the re-opened problem case if data indicative of the at least one failure condition is not contained in the updated set of operational parameters.

11. The method of claim 10 further comprising:

compiling a fault log for the problem case and storing it in a customer database, the fault log containing data indicative of the at least one failure condition.

12. The method of claim 11 further comprising the step of:

diagnosing the problem case by analyzing the fault log to identity a potential malfunctioning condition of the at least one locomotive.

13. The method of claim 12 further comprising the step of:

transmitting a first recommended fix instruction to the at least one locomotive, the recommended fix instruction prepared in response to the step of diagnosing.

14. The method of claim 10 further comprising:

receiving a first set of repair data at the remote control center, the first set of repair data indicative of whether a customer has executed the first recommended fix instruction; and

determining whether the first recommended fix instruction has been executed.

15. The method of claim 14 further comprising:

marking the electronic data file as executed if the first recommended fix instruction has been executed; and

time stamping the electronic data file with the time that the first recommended fix instruction was executed.

16. A method for determining whether to close a problem case associated with a machine for which a recommended fix instruction has been issued, the problem case being at least in part defined by an occurrence of at least one failure condition of the machine, the method comprising:

accessing a customer database to determine whether the recommended fix instruction has been executed in association with the machine;

determining whether data indicative of the at least one failure condition is contained in a first set of operational data, the first set of operational data indicative of a set of operational parameters associated with the machine wherein the set of operational parameters are established after the recommended fix instruction has been executed;

closing the problem case if the data indicative of the at least one failure condition is not contained in the first set of data;

creating an electronic data file associated with the problem case;

marking the electronic data file as a failure if the recommended fix instruction did not repair the at least one failure condition;

re-opening the problem case in the event the recommended fix instruction did not repair the at least one failure condition;

transmitting a second recommended fix instruction for the at least one locomotive;

downloading a set of updated operational parameters from the at least one locomotive, the set of updated operational parameters being measured after the second recommended fix instruction is performed; and

closing the re-opened problem case if data indicative of the at least one failure condition is not contained in the updated set of operational parameters.

17. The method of claim 16, the step of accessing a customer database comprising:

receiving a first set of repair data at a service center remote from the machine, the first set of repair data indicative of whether the recommended fix instruction has been executed in association with the machine; and

evaluating the first set of repair data to determine whether the recommended fix instruction has been executed.

18. The method of claim 17 further comprising:

requesting the first set of repair data to be transmitted from the machine to the service center.

19. The method of claim 16 further comprising:

downloading the first set of operational data from the machine to a remote service center; and

storing the first set of operational data in a machine database at the remote service center.

20. The method of claim 16 further comprising:

creating an electronic data file for tracking events associated with the problem case;

storing the electronic data file in the customer database; and

marking the electronic data file as executed if the recommended fix instruction has been executed.

21. The method of claim 20 further comprising:

time stamping the electronic data tile with a time that the recommended fix instruction was executed; and

the step of closing the problem case further comprising closing the problem case only if the data indicative of the at least one failure condition is not contained in the first set of data within a predetermine period of time measured from the time the recommended fix instruction was executed.

22. The method of claim 16 further comprising:

downloading a second set of operational data from the machine to a remote service center, the second set of operational data indicative of the set of operational parameters wherein the operational parameters are established prior to the recommended fix instruction being executed;

storing the second set of operational data in a database at the service center;

retrieving the second set of operational data with a processor, the processor configured to analyze the second set of operational data to determine whether data indicative of the at least one failure condition is contained in the second set of aperational data; and

instructing the processor to issue the recommended fix instruction if data indicative of the at least one failure condition is contained in the second set of operational data, the recommended fix instruction based on at least the at least one failure condition.

23. The method of claim 22 further comprising:

downloading the first set of operational data from the machine to the remote service center; and

storing the first set of operational data in the database at the service center.

24. A computerized system for determining whether to close a problem case associated with a machine for which a recommended fix instruction has been issued, the problem case being at least in part defined by an occurrence of at least one failure condition of the machine, the system comprising:

a first processor onboard the machine, the first processor configured to monitor and store a set of data indicative of a set of operational parameters associated with the machine;

a first database onboard the machine for storing the set of data;

a second processor at a service center remote from the machine, the second processor configured to receive the set of data downloaded from the first processor;

a second database at the remote service center for storing the set of data;

the second processor further configured to analyze the set of data to determine whether data indicative of the at least one failure condition is contained in the set of data after the recommended fix instruction has been executed;

the second processor further configured to close the problem case if data indicative of the at least one failure condition is not contained in the set of data;

a module for creating an electronic data file associated with the problem case;

a module for marking the electronic data file as a failure if the recommended fix instruction did riot repair the at least one failure condition;

a module for re-opening the problem case in the event the recommended fix instruction did not repair the at least one failure condition;

a module for transmitting a second recommended fix instruction for the at least one locomotive if the at least one failure condition is contained in the second set of data;

a module for downloading a set of updated operational parameters from the least one locomotive to the service center if data indicative of the at least one failure condition is contained in the second set of data; and

a module for closing the re-opened problem case if data indicative of the at least one failure condition is not contained in the updated set of operational parameters.

25. A computer program product comprising a computer-usable medium having executable computer-readable code therein for managing data to determine whether to close a problem case associated with at least one locomotive, said computer-readable code comprising:

computer-readable code for downloading a first set of data from the at least one locomotive to a remote control center, the first set of data indicative that the problem case exists in association with the at least one locomotive;

computer-readable code for identifying at least one failure condition associated with the problem case;

computer-readable code for downloading a second set of data from the at least one locomotive to the remote control center, the second set of data indicative of a set of operational parameters associated with the at least one locomotive, the second set of operational parameters being determined after a first recommended fix instruction has been executed in relation to the at least one locomotive;

computer-readable code for closing the problem case if the at least one failure condition is not contained in the second set of data;

computer-readable code for creating an electronic data file associated with the problem case;

computer-readable code for marking the electronic data file as a failure if the recommended fix instruction did not repair the at least one failure condition;

computer-readable code for re-opening the problem case in the event the recommended fix instruction did not repair the at least one failure condition;

computer-readable code for transmitting a second recommended fix instruction for the at least one locomotive if the at least one failure condition is contained in the second set of data;

computer-readable code for downloading a set of updated operational parameters from the at least one locomotive to the remote control center if data indicative of the at least one failure condition is contained in the second set of data; and

computer-readable code for closing the re-opened problem case if data indicative of the at least one failure condition is not contained in the updated set of operational parameters.