Data recorder suitable for use as a railcar hunting detector
First Claim
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1. A data recorder for detecting railcar hunters comprising:
- an accelerometer having an accelerometer output;
a bandpass filter tuned to the approximate frequency of a railcar hunter and filtering the output of the accelerometer output to produce a filtered accelerometer output;
a memory; and
a controller for monitoring the filtered accelerometer output, the controller having a low power consumption mode and a high power consumption mode, the controller operating substantially in the low power consumption mode, the controller intermittently operating in the high power consumption made and storing the output in the memory if the filtered accelerometer output exceeds a threshold.
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Abstract
A data recorder for use as a hunting detector includes a piezofilm accelerometer. A bandpass filter tuned to the approximate frequency of a hunting railcar couples the output of the accelerometer to a hold circuit. A controller, operating primarily in a low power consumption “sleep” mode, awakens periodically to check the hold circuit. If the contents of the hold circuit is greater than a predetermined value, a counter is incremented. When the counter exceeds a preset limit, then a flasher on the exterior of the data recorder is enabled.
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Citations
25 Claims
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1. A data recorder for detecting railcar hunters comprising:
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an accelerometer having an accelerometer output; a bandpass filter tuned to the approximate frequency of a railcar hunter and filtering the output of the accelerometer output to produce a filtered accelerometer output; a memory; and a controller for monitoring the filtered accelerometer output, the controller having a low power consumption mode and a high power consumption mode, the controller operating substantially in the low power consumption mode, the controller intermittently operating in the high power consumption made and storing the output in the memory if the filtered accelerometer output exceeds a threshold. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14)
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15. A method of operating a self contained data recorder to detect a railcar hunter comprising:
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energizing a controller in a low power mode; filtering an accelerometer output with a bandpass filter to produce a filtered accelerometer output, the bandpass filter tuned to the approximate resonant frequency of a railcar hunter; intermittently energizing the controller in a high power mode; if the filtered accelerometer output exceeds a first threshold, storing a time period the filtered accelerometer output exceeded the first threshold as a hunting time period; and if the filtered accelerometer output falls below the first threshold, energizing the controller in the low power mode. - View Dependent Claims (16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21)
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22. A method for operating a self-contained data recorder, the self-contained data recorder having an accelerometer with an accelerometer output, a bandpass filter coupled to the accelerometer and tuned to the approximate resonant frequency of a railcar hunter, and a controller having a sleep mode and an active mode, comprising:
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placing the controller in the sleep mode; filtering the accelerometer output with the bandpass filter to produce a filtered accelerometer output; storing the filtered accelerometer output; periodically placing the controller in the active mode to monitor the accelerometer output; if the filtered accelerometer output exceeds a first threshold, timing a first time period when the accelerometer output exceeds the first threshold; storing the first time period in a memory; and if the first time period exceeds a predetermined period of time, then enabling a communicator. - View Dependent Claims (23, 24, 25)
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Specification