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Universial AMR system

  • US 9,400,192 B1
  • Filed: 12/16/2013
  • Issued: 07/26/2016
  • Est. Priority Date: 11/16/2004
  • Status: Active Grant
First Claim
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1. A universal meter interface unit (MIU) configured for transmitting utility data, said meter interface unit comprising:

  • a MIU housing suitably configured for housing MIU components;

    a controller associated with a memory and disposed inside said MIU housing wherein said controller is one of (a) electrically associated with a transceiver and (b) configured with an on chip transceiver wherein said transceiver is electrically associated with an antenna that is one of (a) disposed at least partially inside said MIU housing and (b) external to said MIU housing;

    a register interface configured for being electrically associated with an external data source via at least one of (a) a wired interface and (b) a wireless interface and wherein said register interface is further electrically associated with said controller and wherein said controller is configured to use said register interface to retrieve device-data from said external data source according to a predefined schedule;

    a power pack that is one of (a) disposed inside said MIU housing and (b) disposed within a power pack housing configured for being removably mechanically associated with said MIU housing wherein said power pack is suitably configured for supplying power to said MIU components including at least two of said controller, said transceiver and said register interface;

    wherein said controller is configured to execute any one of a plurality of MIU modes without hardwire modifications and according to a MIU mode schedule wherein at least one MIU mode is configured for drive-by interrogations and at least one MIU mode is configured for fixed network interrogations;

    wherein said MIU mode schedule comprises the MIU mode that is to become active;

    wherein said controller is configured to generate MIU-data stored in event logs comprising information about the status of the MIU; and

    wherein said controller is further configured to program said transceiver to transmit a MIU-data-signal comprising at least one of (a) MIU-data and (b) at least part of said device-data.

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