LOGGING SYSTEM FOR A MINING MACHINE, AN ON-BOARD TERMINAL DEVICE, AND A LOGGING METHOD FOR A MINING MACHINE

• US 20180053406A1
• Filed: 09/08/2015
• Published: 02/22/2018
• Est. Priority Date: 09/08/2015
• Status: Abandoned Application

• Current Assignee: Hitachi Construction Machinery Company Limited (Hitachi, Ltd.)
• Original Assignee: Hitachi Construction Machinery Company Limited (Hitachi, Ltd.)
• Inventors: KAWAMATA, Yukihiro, HAMADA, Tomoyuki, KATOU, Manabu, MORIZANE, Hiroto
• Application Number:
  US15/555,692
• Publication Number:
  US 20180053406A1
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• CPC Class Codes: E21C 41/26 Methods of surface mining machines for obtaining, or the removal of, materials in open-pit mines E21C47/00; Layouts therefor
• CPC Class Codes: E21C 47/10 for quarrying stone, sand, gravel, or clay
• CPC Class Codes: G05D 1/0088 characterized by the autonomous decision making process, e.g. artificial intelligence, predefined behaviours using knowledge based models G06N5/00
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/047 Optimisation of routes or paths, e.g. travelling salesman problem
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/0631 Resource planning, allocation, distributing or scheduling for enterprises or organisations
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/0833 Tracking
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 50/02 Agriculture; Fishing; Forestry; Mining
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 50/40 Business processes related to the transportation industry shipping G06Q10/083
• CPC Class Codes: G08G 1/0112 from the vehicle, e.g. floating car data [FCD]
• CPC Class Codes: G08G 1/0129 for creating historical data or processing based on historical data
• CPC Class Codes: G08G 1/0145 for active traffic flow control
• CPC Class Codes: G08G 1/0968 Systems involving transmission of navigation instructions to the vehicle
• CPC Class Codes: G08G 1/164 Centralised systems, e.g. external to vehicles
• CPC Class Codes: G08G 1/20 Monitoring the location of vehicles belonging to a group, e.g. fleet of vehicles, countable or determined number of vehicles
• CPC Class Codes: G08G 1/207 with respect to certain areas, e.g. forbidden or allowed areas with possible alerting when inside or outside boundaries

Abstract

An on-board terminal device includes a volatile storage unit, a non-volatile storage unit, a map data storage unit that stores map data indicative of a target route, an error calculation unit that calculates an amount of positional offset of own mining machine from the target route on a basis of the map data and own mining machine position information, a departure determination unit which determines that the own mining machine has departed from the target route, and a data storage destination control unit that, if the departure determination unit determines to have departed, extracts log data out of the log data stored in the volatile storage unit, archives and stores the extracted log data in the non-volatile storage unit, and also stores log data, which would be outputted after the time point of the departure, in the non-volatile storage unit.

Claims

1. A logging system for a mining machine that travels along a target route, the logging system comprising:

a position calculating device that measures a position of the mining machine as an own mining machine and outputs own mining machine position information, and

an on-board terminal device that stores log data indicative of travel conditions of the mining machine;

wherein the on-board terminal device comprises;

a volatile storage unit that upon generating of the log data, temporarily store the log data,

a non-volatile storage unit that continues to store immediately-preceding log data, which have been extracted from the log data temporarily stored in the volatile storage unit, until an instruction for data erasure is received,

a map data storage unit that stores map data indicative of the target route,

an error calculation unit that calculates an amount of positional offset of the own mining machine relative to the target route on a basis of the map data and the own mining machine position information,

a departure determination unit which determines that the own mining machine has departed from the target route if the calculated amount of positional offset has increased to a permissible amount of offset, at which the own machine is considered to be traveling on the target route, or greater, and

a data storage destination management unit that, if the departure determination unit determines to have departed, extracts immediately-preceding log data, which have been stored from before and until a time point of the departure, out of the log data temporarily stored in the volatile storage unit, archives and stores the immediately-preceding log data in the non-volatile storage unit, and stores log data, which would be outputted after the time point of the departure, in the non-volatile storage unit.

2. The logging system according to claim 1, wherein:

the mining machine further comprises an image capture device that captures images of periphery of the own mining machine and outputs image data; and

the log data includes the image data.

3. The logging system according to claim 2, wherein:

the mining machine further comprises an travel control data acquisition unit that acquires travel control data indicative of operational conditions of the mining machine during traveling; and

the volatile storage unit and non-volatile storage unit synchronously store the image data and the travel control data as the log data.

4. The logging system according to claim 1, wherein:

a plurality of mining machines, which are traveling on the same target route, are each connected to a log management server that performs collection and management of log data via wireless communication lines;

the on-board terminal device mounted on each mining machine further comprises a terminal communication unit that transmits, to the log management server, departure information, which indicates that the departure determination unit has determined to have departed, and own mining machine position information at the time point of the departure, and also that receives, from the log management server, archive storage command information that switches a storage destination for the log data of the own mining machine from the volatile storage unit to the non-volatile storage unit; and

the log management server comprises;

a server communication unit that receives the own mining machine position information at the time point of the departure and the departure information from the respective mining machines, and also that transmits the archive storage command information to following mining machines that are traveling behind the mining machine from which the departure information has been transmitted, and

a log archive storage command unit that specifies a departure point on a basis of the own mining machine position information at the time point of the departure, identifies one of the following mining machines, the one following mining machine being to next arrive at a point a predetermined distance before the departure point, on a basis of the own mining machine position information at the time of the departure as received from the respective mining machines, and also that generates the archive storage command information for the one following mining machine.

5. The logging system according to claim 1, wherein:

the log management server further comprises a permissible offset amount setting unit that sets the permissible amount of offset.

6. The logging system according to claim 1, wherein:

the mining machine further comprises a relative distance measuring device that measures a relative distance from another mining machine; and

the on-board terminal device further comprises a relative distance determination unit that determines if the relative distance has decreased to a predetermined distance threshold or smaller;

wherein, if the relative distance determination unit determines that the relative distance has decreased to the predetermined distance threshold or smaller, the data storage destination management unit extracts immediately-preceding log data, which have been temporarily stored from before and until a time point at which the relative distance has decreased to the predetermined distance threshold or smaller, out of the log data temporarily stored in the volatile storage unit, archives and stores the immediately-preceding log data in the non-volatile storage unit, and stores log data, which would be outputted after the time point at which the relative distance has decreased to the predetermined distance threshold or smaller, in the non-volatile storage unit.

7. An on-board terminal device to be mounted on a mining machine, which travels along a target route, for storing log data indicative of travel conditions of the mining machine, the on-board terminal device comprising:

a volatile storage unit that upon generation of the log data, temporarily store the log data,

a non-volatile storage unit that continues to store immediately-preceding log data, which have been extracted from the log data temporarily stored in the volatile storage unit, until an instruction for data erasure is received,

a map data storage unit that stores map data indicative of the target route,

an error calculation unit that calculates an amount of positional offset of the mining machine as an own mining machine relative to the target route on a basis of the map data and own mining machine position information obtained by measuring a position of the own mining machine,

a departure determination unit which determines that the own mining machine has departed from the target route if the calculated amount of positional offset has increased to a permissible amount of offset, at which the own machine is considered to be passing on the target route, or grater, and

a data storage destination management unit that, if the departure determination unit determines to have departed, extracts immediately-preceding log data, which have been stored from before and until a time point of the departure, out of the log data temporarily stored in the volatile storage unit, archives and stores the immediately-preceding log data in the non-volatile storage unit, and stores log data, which would be outputted after the time point of the departure, in the non-volatile storage unit.

8. A logging method for a mining machine to store log data indicative of travel conditions of the mining machine by using a volatile storage device and a non-volatile storage device both of which are mounted on the mining machine, the logging method comprising the following steps:

temporarily storing log data, in which image data generated by capturing images of peripheral of the mining machine as an own mining machine with an image capture device and travel control data indicative of operational conditions of the mining machine during traveling are synchronized, in the volatile storage device,

calculating, on a basis of own mining machine position information obtained by measuring a position of the own machine and map data indicative of a predetermined target route for the own mining machine, an amount of positional offset of the own mining machine relative to the target route,

determining that the own mining machine has departed from the target route if the calculated amount of positional offset has increased to a permissible amount of offset, at which the own mining machine is considered to be traveling on the target route, or greater and

if determined to have departed, extracting immediately-preceding log data, which have been stored from before and until a time point of the departure, out of the log data temporarily stored in the volatile storage device, archiving and storing the immediately-preceding log data in the non-volatile storage device, and storing log data, which would be outputted after the time point of the departure, in the non-volatile storage device.

9. The logging method according to claim 8, wherein:

a preceding mining machine and following mining machines, which are traveling behind the preceding mining machine, are traveling on the same target route, and each mining machine is connected via wireless communication lines to a log management server that performs collection and management of log data; and

the logging method further comprises the following steps;

transmitting, from each mining machine to the log management server, own mining machine position information while traveling along the target route,

transmitting, from the preceding mining machine to the log management server, departure information indicative of having departed from the target route and own mining machine position information at a time point of the departure,

receiving, at the log management server, the departure information and the own mining machine position information at the time of the departure,

specifying a departure point on a basis of the received own mining machine position information at the time point of the departure, identifying one of the following mining machines, the one following mining machine being to next arrive at a point a predetermined distance before the departure point, on a basis of the own mining machine position information of the respective following mining machines as received from the respective following mining machines, generating for the one following mining machine archive storage command information that switches a storage destination for the log data from the volatile storage device to the non-volatile storage device, and transmitting the archive storage command information to the one following mining machine, all by the log management server,

receiving the archive storage command information at the one following mining machine, and

switching the storage destination for the log data of the own machine from volatile storage device to the non-volatile storage device at the one following mining machine.