System and method for facilitating welding system diagnostics

• US 7,853,435 B2
• Filed: 05/17/2004
• Issued: 12/14/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 05/24/2001
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: Lincoln Global Incorporated (Lincoln Electric Holdings Incorporated)
• Original Assignee: Lincoln Global Incorporated (Lincoln Electric Holdings Incorporated)
• Inventors: Dodge, Robert, Hillen, Edward Dennis, Blankenship, George Daryl
• Primary Examiner(s): Bhat; Aditya
• Application Number:
  US10/847,052
• Publication Number:
  US 20040215422A1
• Time in Patent Office: 2,402 Days
• Field of Search: 702/34, 702/183, 219/130.5, 219/136, 219/130.01, 219/137, 700/9, 455/41, 455/66
• US Class Current: 702/183
• CPC Class Codes: B23K 9/0953 using computing means
• CPC Class Codes: B23K 9/10 Other electric circuits therefor; Protective circuits; Remote controls
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 19/406 characterised by monitoring or safety G05B19/19 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 2219/33285 Diagnostic
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 2219/34038 Web, http, ftp, internet, intranet server
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 2219/45135 Welding
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 2223/06 Remote monitoring
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 23/0259 characterized by the response to fault detection

Abstract

Systems and methods for facilitating welding system diagnostics is provided. The invention includes a welder, a local system, a remote system, and/or an alarm component. The invention further provides for receiving sensor input(s), performing test sequence(s) based, at least in part, upon the sensor input(s), performing internal diagnostics, and/or initiating corrective action. The invention further provides for determining a health status of the welder and communicating the health status of the welder to the local system, the remote system and/or the alarm component. The health status of the welder can include welder alarm(s) and/or fault(s). Information regarding the health status of the welder can be sent by telephone, voicemail, e-mail and/or beeper. The welder can communicate with the local system and/or remote system to schedule maintenance. The invention further provides for an expert component to facilitate welding diagnostics.

Claims

1. A welding system, comprising:

a welder operatively coupled to a remote system, the welder comprising;

a sensor component that receives information, comprising information associated with operation of the welder from test equipment and information associated with weld characteristics from monitoring equipment, wherein the monitoring equipment is at least one of a digital camera or a streaming video camera;

a control component that receives the information from the sensor component and performs at least one test sequence based at least in part upon the information received from the sensor component; and

a diagnostic component that;

receives the information from the sensor component and at least one result of the at least one test sequence from the control component;

performs internal diagnostics on the welder based at least in part on the information from the sensor component and the at least one result of the at least one test sequence;

determines a health status of the welder based at least in part on the information from the sensor component, the at least one result of the at least one test sequence and the internal diagnostics;

initiates a corrective action based at least in part on the health status of the welder; and

sends information associated with the health status of the welder to the remote system via a network interface, wherein

the remote system comprises an expert component that receives the information associated with the health status of the welder and facilitates welding diagnostics using at least one modeling technique, wherein the at least one modeling technique is based on at least one of a Bayesian model, a probability tree network or fuzzy logic, and wherein the expert component adaptively modifies the at least one modeling technique based at least in part upon a success of one or more previous welding diagnostics.

2. The welding system of claim 1, further comprising a communications component that facilitates communications between the welder and a remote system via at least one of Dynamic hypertext markup language (HTML), HTML, server side include HTML (SHTML), Visual Basic (VB) Script, JAVA, common gateway interface (CGI) Script, JAVA Script, dynamic HTML, point-to-point protocol (PPP), remote procedure call (RPC), teletype network (TELNET), transmission control protocol/internet protocol (TCP/IP), file transfer protocol (FTP), active server pages (ASP), extensible markup language (XML), portable document format (PDF), electronic data interchange (EDI) or wireless markup language (WML) formats.

3. The welding system of claim 1, further comprising a communications component that:

receives information regarding the health status of the welder,

dynamically formats information regarding the health status of the welder and

communicates the formatted information regarding the health status of the welder to the remote system.

4. The welding system of claim 3, the communication component sends a request to schedule maintenance to the remote system.

5. The welding system of claim 1, the test equipment is at least one of an ohm meter, a voltage meter or a current meter.

6. The welding system of claim 1, further comprising a web page database that stores links to welding diagnostic resources.

7. The welding system of claim 1, further comprising a welder data store that stores at least one of:

a welder serial number, a welder model number, a welder build date, a welder software version identifier, a component part identifier, a component version identifier or a component software version identifier.

8. The welding system of claim 1, the welder and the remote system are operatively coupled via at least one of a local network, an extranet, or the Internet.

9. The welding system of claim 1, the welder further comprising at least one of a web server, a hypertext transfer protocol (HTTP) server, or a simple mail transfer protocol (SMTP) server.

10. The welding system of claim 1, the welder sends a message associated with the health status of the welder to the remote system via at least one of voicemail, e-mail, telephone, or beeper.

11. The welding system of claim 1, further comprising an event component that:

receives the information from the sensor component, the at least one result of the at least one test sequence and the internal diagnostics;

determines an occurrence of a welder event based at least in part on the information from the sensor component, the at least one result of the at least one test sequence and the internal diagnostics; and

reports the occurrence of the welder event to the remote system.

12. The welding system of claim 11, the event component stores information associated with the occurrence of the welder event in an event log.

13. The system of claim 1, the diagnostic component:

determines the health status of the welder that a parameter exceeds a threshold level based at least in part upon the information from the sensor component, the at least one result from the at least one test sequence and the internal diagnostics, and

initiates the corrective action by reducing the parameter to a level below the threshold level.

14. The system of claim 13, wherein the parameter is a current.

15. A non-transitory computer readable medium containing computer instructions stored therein for causing a computer processor to perform a method for facilitating welding diagnostics, the method comprising:

receiving an input, comprising information associated with operation of a welder from at least one sensor input and information associated with weld characteristics from monitoring equipment, wherein the monitoring equipment is at least one of a digital camera or a streaming video camera;

performing at least one test sequence based at least in part upon the input;

receiving a result of the at least one test sequence;

performing diagnostics on at least one internal component based at least in part upon at least one of;

the input or at least one result of the at least one test sequence;

determining a health status of the welder based upon the diagnostics, wherein the health status includes information about an alarm or fault;

sending information about the health status to a remote system;

facilitating welding diagnostics using at least one modeling technique, wherein the at least one modeling technique is based on at least one of a Bayesian model, a probability tree network, or fuzzy logic; and

adaptively modifying the at least one modeling technique based at least in part upon a success of one or more previous welding diagnostics.

16. The method of claim 15, further comprising at least one of:

logging the health status; and

initiating a corrective action based upon the health status.