Detecting anomalies in field failure data

• US 9,740,993 B2
• Filed: 12/04/2009
• Issued: 08/22/2017
• Est. Priority Date: 12/04/2009
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: GM Global Technology Operations LLC (General Motors Company)
• Original Assignee: GM Global Technology Operations LLC (General Motors Company)
• Inventors: Singh, Satnam, Bandyopadhyay, Pulak, Wolf, Calvin E.
• Primary Examiner(s): Gart, Matthew
• Assistant Examiner(s): Swartz, Stephen S
• Application Number:
  US12/630,866
• Publication Number:
  US 20110137711A1
• Time in Patent Office: 2,818 Days
• 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: G06Q 10/06 Resources, workflows, human or project management; Enterprise or organisation planning; Enterprise or organisation modelling
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/0639 Performance analysis of employees; Performance analysis of enterprise or organisation operations
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/20 Administration of product repair or maintenance
• CPC Class Codes: G07C 5/0808 Diagnosing performance data testing of vehicles G01M17/00; testing of electrical installation on vehicles G01R31/005

Abstract

A method of detecting anomalies in the service repairs data of equipment. A failure mode-symptom correlation matrix correlates failure modes to symptoms. Diagnostic trouble codes are collected for an actual repair for the equipment. The diagnostic trouble codes are provided to a diagnostic reasoner for identifying failure modes. Diagnostic assessment is applied by the diagnostic reasoner for determining the recommended repairs to perform on the equipment in response to identifying the failure modes. Each of the recommended repairs is compared with the actual repair used to repair the equipment. A mismatch is identified in response to any recommended repair not matching the actual repair. Reports are generated for displaying all of the identified mismatches. The reports are analyzed for determining repair codes having an increase in a number of anomalies. Service centers are alerted of a correct repair for the identified failure mode.

Claims

1. A method of detecting anomalies in service repairs for equipment, the method comprising:

generating a failure mode-symptom correlation matrix module that correlates failure modes to symptoms, each of the failure modes being identifiable with a respective occurrence in how equipment failure can occur, wherein the correlation of the symptoms to the failure modes are generated in response to a plurality of engineering principles, the failure mode-symptom correlation matrix module being customizable for different equipment, the failure mode-symptom correlation matrix being adaptively modifiable for updating and refinement based on respective repair operations relating to each symptom;

collecting diagnostic trouble codes for an actual repair for the equipment, the diagnostic trouble codes generated by a processor of the equipment in response to a potential malfunction of a component in the equipment;

inputting the diagnostic trouble codes to a diagnostic reasoner processor;

applying diagnostic assessment by the diagnostic reasoner processor for determining a recommended repair to perform on the equipment in response to the diagnostic trouble codes and the correlations of the failure modes and symptoms in the failure mode-symptom correlation matrix module;

comparing the recommended repair with the actual repair used to repair the equipment;

identifying a mismatch in response to the recommended repair not matching the actual repair;

generating reports displaying all of the identified mismatches;

analyzing the reports for determining repair codes having an increase in a number of anomalies; and

providing service centers the recommended repair for the failure mode of the equipment;

receiving a notice of performance of the recommended repair; and

updating the failure mode-symptom correlation matrix using the notice.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the diagnostic reasoner processor utilizes the reported diagnostic trouble codes as a symptom, wherein the diagnostic reasoner processor utilizes the failure mode-symptom correlation matrix module to correlate the symptom to at least one failure mode, and wherein the recommended repair is identified in response to the at least one failure mode.

3. The method of claim 2, wherein at least one other symptom identified by the service center is provided to the diagnostic reasoner processor, wherein the diagnostic reasoner processor utilizes the diagnostic trouble codes and the at least one other symptom for identifying the at least one failure mode.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein the engineering principles include a failure mode effects and analysis tool.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein the engineering principles include a failure mode effects and criticality analysis tool.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the engineering principles include service manuals diagnostics.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein the engineering principles include reliability reports.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein the engineering principles include field failure data.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein the recommended repair is used to identify a root cause of the equipment failure.

10. The method of claim 1, wherein the mismatches are tracked over a duration of time as a function of an equipment build date.

11. The method of claim 1, wherein the failure modes are identified as a function of repair codes by an equipment service provider.

12. The method of claim 1, wherein the repair codes are collected from a plurality of equipment service providers for collectively identifying trends in repairs.

13. The method of claim 1, wherein the reports are generated as a function of an aggregate number of anomalies for each of the repair codes.

14. The method of claim 13, wherein the reports are generated as a function of an aggregate number of anomalies for each diagnostic trouble code.

15. The method of claim 14, wherein the reports are generated as a function of an aggregate number of anomalies for a combined repair code and diagnostic trouble code, each respective repair code being segregated by an associated diagnostic trouble code recorded for the repair.

16. A field failure detection system comprising:

a failure mode-symptom correlation matrix module that correlates failure modes to symptoms, each of the failure modes being identifiable with a respective occurrence in how equipment failure can occur, and the correlation of the symptoms to the failure modes being generated in response to a plurality of engineering principles, the failure mode-symptom correlation matrix module being customizable for different equipment, the failure mode-symptom correlation matrix being adaptively modifiable for updating and refinement based on respective repair operations relating to each symptom;

a memory for storing diagnostic trouble codes of repaired equipment, the diagnostic trouble codes generated by a processor of the equipment in response to a potential malfunction of a component in the equipment, the memory further storing repair codes representing a repair made to the repaired equipment by a service provider; and

a processing unit for correlating the diagnostic trouble codes with the failure mode-symptom correlation matrix module for determining a recommended repair to perform on the equipment in response to the diagnostic trouble codes and the correlations of the failure modes and symptoms in the failure mode-symptom correlation matrix module,

wherein the recommended repair is compared with the actual repair used to repair the equipment, wherein a mismatch is identified in response to the recommended repair not matching the actual repair, and wherein reports are generated identifying the identified mismatches for determining which repair codes have an increase in a number of anomalies, wherein service centers are provided with the recommended repair for the identified failure mode of the equipment, wherein a notice of performance of the recommended repair is received, and wherein the failure mode-symptom correlation matrix is updated using the notice.

17. The system of claim 16, wherein the reports generated further include diagnostic trouble code reports, the diagnostic trouble code reports being generated as a function of the diagnostic trouble codes, wherein anomalies in the diagnostic trouble codes are identified in response to the diagnostic code reported by the service provider having no expected relationship to the repair code that identifies the repair made to the equipment.

18. The system of claim 16, wherein the reports generated further include combined diagnostic trouble code and repair code reports, the diagnostic trouble code and repair code reports being generated as a function of the repair codes grouped by an associated diagnostic trouble code.

19. The system of claim 16, wherein the processor unit is a diagnostic reasoner processor, the diagnostic reasoner processor utilizes the reported diagnostic trouble codes as a symptom, wherein the diagnostic reasoner processor utilizes the failure mode-symptom correlation matrix module to correlate the symptom to at least one failure mode, and wherein the recommended repair is identified in response to the at least one failure mode.

20. The system of claim 19, wherein at least one other symptom identified by the service center is provided to the diagnostic reasoner processor, wherein the diagnostic reasoner processor utilizes the diagnostic trouble codes and the at least one other symptom for identifying the at least one failure mode.

21. The system of claim 16, wherein the failure mode-symptom correlation matrix module is generated based on engineering principles, the engineering principles including failure analysis processes, service manuals, and reliability reports.

22. A method comprising:

obtaining equipment having at least one prior repair for an identified failure mode;

receiving a notification for the equipment, the notification indicating a recommended repair, the notification generated by;

correlating, using a plurality of engineering principles, a plurality of failure modes to a plurality of symptoms thereby producing correlated data, each of the plurality of failure modes being identifiable with a respective occurrence in how equipment failure can occur,

generating a failure mode-symptom correlation matrix module using the correlated data, the failure mode-symptom correlation matrix module being customizable for a plurality of manufactured equipment, the plurality of manufactured equipment including the equipment, the failure mode-symptom correlation matrix being adaptively modifiable for updating and refinement based on respective repair operations relating to each symptom,

collecting diagnostic trouble codes for an actual repair of the equipment, the diagnostic trouble codes generated by a processor of the equipment,

inputting the diagnostic trouble codes to a diagnostic reasoner processor,

applying a diagnostic assessment by the diagnostic reasoner processor for determining a recommended repair to perform on the equipment using the diagnostic trouble codes and correlations of the plurality of failure modes and the plurality of symptoms in the failure mode-symptom correlation matrix module,

comparing the recommended repair with the actual repair of the equipment,

identifying at least one mismatch in response to the recommended repair not matching the actual repair,

generating reports displaying the at least one mismatch, and

analyzing the reports to determine repair codes having an increase in a number of anomalies;

performing the recommended repair on the equipment thereby eliminating the failure mode of the vehicle; and

reporting performance of the recommended repair to the failure mode-symptom correlation matrix module.