Patent Application
20180082564
This present invention relates generally to monitoring and alerting solution for home appliances, and more particularly to an apparatus and a system for network-based, remote monitoring of appliances using rotary control knobs.
With today's busy life, people often work on multiple tasks at the same time and often get distracted while cooking or operating home appliances which are prone to safety hazards if left unattended. According to US national fire and protection association report 2013, unattended cooking causes nearly 90 percent of all kitchen fires in US. Various systems and solutions have been proposed or implemented to help reduce hazards.
Hoellerich, U.S. Pat. No. 6,294,994 describes an attendance monitoring apparatus is provided for an appliance, such as an electrical appliance, and includes a housing and a motion sensor assembly contained in the housing. A timer assembly is electrically connected to the motion sensor assembly, and an alarm assembly is electrically connected to the timer assembly. The timer assembly is adjustable for selecting a range of predetermined time intervals. Optionally, a current controller is electrically connected to the timer assembly. The current controller controls electric power to the appliance, such as an electric stove. The attendance monitoring apparatus of the invention signals a person with an audible alarm when the person has not attended to the electric stove for a predetermined period of time. Optionally, the attendance monitoring apparatus can turn off electrical power to the stove under these conditions. In this way, the attendance monitoring apparatus of the invention increases an operator's freedom and electric stove safety when the stove is in use. As a result, the attendance monitoring apparatus can prevent fires and save lives.
Klash, U.S. Pat. No. 7,002,109 describes a burner sensor is electrically interconnected with a control circuit, the burner sensor enabled for detection of burner operation, the control circuit providing a timing feature enabled, during burner operation, for continuous repetitive timing cycles each for a fixed selected time interval and for activating at least one of an audio, i.e., buzzer, and a visual alarm for a fixed duration, at the completion of each of the timing cycles. Thus, the operator is alerted to the fact that a heating coil is hot so that a significant burn and fire hazard is avoided.
Common solutions for reducing hazards often require professional installation as it involves changes in the wiring of the home appliances. Also, there does not exist a universal solution that would suit all appliances, for example, solutions applied to electrical stoves could not be used directly on gas stoves. Besides, with the development of internet of things and mobile technology, people always want to get more closely connected with family members and to learn what is happening at home at any time anywhere. However, existing related arts mentioned above lack the ability to communicate real-time operative status of home appliance to other remote users.
It is therefore an object of the present invention to provide an improved appliance attendance and usage monitoring apparatus that signals a person to be attentive to an appliance without modifying the wiring or fuel source of the appliance. Electrical knobs of the present invention are used to replace existing knobs on the appliance and sends knob position change information indicating operational status of the appliance to a backend server through a service gateway. The attendance monitoring apparatus of the present invention signals a person with an audible alarm and or a visual alarm, when the person has not attended to the appliance for a predetermined period of time.
It is another object of the present invention to provide remote monitoring features, such as push notification to remote devices. Users gets notification on their mobile device when the knob is turned on or off. Users can also check the status of the appliance remotely at any time with internet access. Notification could be short text message, push notification to mobile devices or emails sent to user predefined email accounts. This provides access for other family members or caregivers to remotely monitor operative status and usage of the appliance.
It is a further object of the present invention to record and store appliance usage data and alerts history on the backend server and made such information accessible by authorized users. Such data could also be used for further activity analysis and incident analysis.
It is another object of the present invention to provide a multi-users remote monitoring system which enables a user to access the information of an electrical appliance, as well as allowing other users with granted access to receive notification and access the information remotely, thereby enabling family members or guardians to assist in monitoring appliance and its usage. Optionally, a control unit could be added to the system to control the electric current in order to remotely shut off the power supply to the appliance, or to receive signals from a server to shut off the power supply of the appliance under predetermined conditions.
These and other objects are provided, according to the present invention, by a home appliance safety and usage monitoring system used on any home appliance with knobs operation which comprises electrical knob with knob position sensor, a service gateway interconnected wirelessly with motion sensor and audible alert, cloud based server and an application running on mobile device or PC. Optionally, the electrical knob comprises an actuator, such as a current control box or smart switch, to control the electrical power supply to the appliance. Users replace the regular knobs on the appliance with the electrical knobs from this present invention, plug in the service gateway to the power outlet and connect to network. Mobile device apps can be downloaded from the app store or pushed down to the devices for user to receive notification and use of the app.
The subject matter regarded as the invention is particularly pointed out and distinctly claimed in the concluding portion of the specification. The invention, however, both as to organization and method of operation, together with objects, features, and advantages thereof, may best be understood by reference to the following detailed description when read with the accompanying drawings in which:
It will be appreciated that for simplicity and clarity of illustration, elements shown in the figures have not necessarily been drawn to scale. For example, the dimensions of some of the elements may be exaggerated relative to other elements for clarity. Further, where considered appropriate, reference numerals may be repeated among the figures to indicate corresponding or analogous elements.
It shall be understood that the accompanying drawings are presented solely to elucidate the following detailed description, are therefore, exemplary in nature and do not include all the possible permutations of the present invention.
In order to make the purpose of the utility model, technical solutions and advantages more apparent below in conjunction with the accompanying drawings and embodiments described in further details for a network-based remote monitoring and alerting solution for home appliance. It shall be understood that the drawings are for purposes of illustration only and not by way of limitation of the invention.
In one embodiment, electrical knob 10 is a vertically mounted knob that includes an accelerometer or a magnetoresistive angle sensor to serve as knob position sensor 12. In another embodiment, electrical knob 10 is a horizontally mounted knob, in which case, may include a magnetoresistive angle sensor as knob position sensor 12. When a magnetoresistive angle sensor is used, a magnet ring is installed on the stove surface underneath the knob. Earth gravity field and magnetic field detected by knob position sensor 12 carries information on properties such as direction, presence, rotation, angle or electrical currents. Such information is used by the service gateway 20 to determine rotation angle change information of the electrical knob, which in turn is indicative of a change in the operative status of the appliance. This present invention determines rotation angle change information by making calculation based upon the detected earth gravity field, or the detected magnetic field, or combination thereof.
In another embodiment, electrical knob 10 comprises a battery unit which provides power to Knob position sensor 12 and RF transceiver 16. In order to support longer standby time of 6 months or more, an ultra-low power wireless protocol is adopted for wireless communication between the electrical knob and the service gateway.
In a preferred embodiment, when a user operates the appliance using the electrical knob 10, microprocessor 12 sends information detected by knob position sensor 12 using RF Transceiver 16 to service gateway 20 via short range wireless protocols 40, including but not limited to, Bluetooth, Z-Wave or ZigBee. Service gateway 20 uses the received information detected by knob position sensor 12 to determine rotation angle change information which is indicative of an operative status of the appliance under monitor. Motion sensor receiver 22 is wirelessly connected to an external motion sensor unit. Motion sensor receiver 22 then receives information about human presence in proximity of the monitored appliance detected by the external motion sensor. Service gateway 20 activates audible alarm 24 or visual alarm 26 or both when the determined operative status indicates that the electrical device is in operation and said second sensor detects no human presence in proximity for a predetermined period of time.
Motion sensor 110 detects human presence in the proximity of the appliance under monitor.
In a preferred embodiment, when a user operates the appliance using the electrical knob 10, microprocessor 12 sends information detected by knob position sensor 12 using RF Transceiver 16 to service gateway 20 via short range wireless protocols 40, including but not limited to, Bluetooth, Z-Wave or ZigBee. Service gateway 20 uses the received information detected by knob position sensor 12 to determine rotation angle change information which is indicative of an operative status of the appliance under monitor. service gateway 20 also receives information from motion sensor 110. Service gateway 20 activates an alarm unit when said operative status indicates that the electrical device is in operation and said second sensor detects no human presence in proximity for a predetermined period of time.
In an alternate embodiment, service gateway 20 is further connected to backend server 100 using the internet through an integrated router, or via home router using Wi-Fi, power line or other home network 50. Rotation angle change information detected in electrical knob 10 and human presence information detected by motion sensor 110 are sent to backend server 100 through service gateway 20. Backend server 100 then processes the received data, analyzes the collation, stores appliance usage, incident records and trends, and makes such data records accessible by authorized users. Two main purpose of those data: 1) usage data per appliance for energy consumption analysis. 2) attendance and alerts data for behavior analysis. By collating with other behavior data, it could provide early alert for potential memory drop.
Backend server 100 could be hosted in a cloud, in home network or a private network.
Mobile device 90 could be a smart phone, a tablet, or other mobile devices. Users can download a mobile device application and receives notification sent to such mobile application when the system detects a change in the operative status of the appliance under monitor, as well as receives a separate notification when the detected operative status indicates that the electrical device is in operation but there is no human presence in proximity of the appliance under monitor for a predetermined period of time. The mobile application also enables a user to configure system parameter settings, including but not limited to, the desired time period to monitor before activating an alarm, whether to activate a visual alarm or an audible alarm or both, as well as whether to take into account human presence information. In a further embodiment, the monitoring system of the present invention supports access and control by multiple users. Thus, the system does not only enable the user operating the appliance to receive and access the information of an electrical appliance, but also allows other users with granted access to receive notification and access information remotely, thereby enabling family members or guardians to assist in monitoring operative status of an appliance and its usage.
Having described the electrical knob, the service gateway and the system of the present invention, reference is now made to
Indeed, the foregoing description has been presented for purposes of illustration and description. It is not intended to be exhaustive or to limit the invention to the precise forms disclosed. Obvious modifications or variations are possible in light of the above teachings. For example, a cooking appliance has been used as an example of a home appliance of the present invention. However, it will be appreciated that the present invention may apply to any home appliance with rotary knob operation.
The embodiments of the present invention are not limited to the particular formulations, process steps, and materials disclosed herein as such formulations, process steps, and materials may vary somewhat. Moreover, the terminology employed herein is used for the purpose of describing exemplary embodiments only and the terminology is not intended to be limiting since the scope of the various embodiments of the present invention will be limited only by the appended claims and equivalents thereof.
Therefore, while embodiments of the invention are described with reference to exemplary embodiments, those skilled in the art will understand that variations and modifications can be effected within the scope of the invention as defined in the appended claims. Accordingly, the scope of the various embodiments of the present invention should not be limited to the above discussed embodiments, and should only be defined by the following claims and all equivalents.
This application claims priority from U.S. provisional patent application Ser. No. 62/396,215, filed Sep. 18, 2016, the entire contents of which are incorporated herein by reference.
| Number | Date | Country | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 62396215 | Sep 2016 | US |
