Electricity: electrical systems and devices – Housing or mounting assemblies with diverse electrical... – For electronic systems and devices
Reexamination Certificate
1999-09-29
2002-03-12
Picard, Leo P. (Department: 2835)
Electricity: electrical systems and devices
Housing or mounting assemblies with diverse electrical...
For electronic systems and devices
C361S730000, C342S352000, C342S357490
Reexamination Certificate
active
06356437
ABSTRACT:
TECHNICAL FIELD OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates in general to the field of real-time instruction and maintenance support, and more particularly, to the use of a portable system, apparatus and method for the remote repair or maintenance of complex mechanical systems that is hands-free and which is customizable on-site for a particular piece of equipment, process, operation or system.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
Without limiting the scope of the invention, its background is described in connection with a portable computer for use during repair, support and maintenance support operations, as an example.
In order to remain competitive, many industries, such as the aircraft industry, have increasingly automated their assembly processes through the use of computer-controlled equipment. The increase in complexity of the mechanical and computer systems in the airline, automobile, and other industries that rely heavily on automation, have led to the need for an increasingly sophisticated labor force. Unfortunately, the labor markets are failing to meet the demand for highly competent repair and maintenance employees at reduced costs. As equipment becomes more complex, the diagnosis of faults and maintenance of the equipment have, likewise, become more complex.
During the repair and maintenance process, operators are often responsible for diagnosing and resolving problems. Since the processing that occurs with a fully functional piece of equipment is stopped during the repair and maintenance time, it is important that the operator diagnose and resolve the fault expeditiously. The problem is further enhanced by the need for specialized labor that often must be brought from a remote site or another city to perform the repair procedure.
In the case of preventative maintenance, a similar problem to that of repair work is the need to file reports detailing the procedures and repairs accomplished. Part of the task of reporting repair and maintenance work is the need to specify the parts replaced, as well as, reordering of new parts to maintain in inventory. Typically, preventative maintenance is scheduled based upon manufacturer estimates for the lifetime of various components. In order to accurately and completely follow and maintain these schedules, the operator must not only be well-versed in both equipment part location and maintenance procedures, but in correctly filing-out and filing the reports in a timely manner.
Furthermore, the reporting process must allow the user and others to retrieve, view, enhance, and interpret the information. One such procedure is to dictate or “annotate” the diagnosis to produce a final report that may be accessed by other maintenance personnel. More modem systems, such as those in medical record keeping, involve the use of multiple media data with static graphic drawings on the report. These prior art techniques, however, use visual annotations to annotate process and procedures along with the annotators voice, and to playback the recorded result. Then, the annotations must be transcribed manually in order to produce a complete report.
A system for repair is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,754,451, issued to Williams entitled, “Preventative Maintenance and Diagnostic System”. Williams discloses a maintenance system for a machine controlled by a programmable logic controller having a memory that stores input data received from the machine and output data communicated to the machine. The maintenance system includes a computer interfaced to the memory to be non-intrusive with respect to the programmable logic controller; the computer being operative to monitor a state of the machine over a plurality of manufacturing cycles, including input and output data. The computer is able to detect a fault condition for a component of the machine based upon a state of a current manufacturing cycle and a state of a previous manufacturing cycle. A display device is in communication with the computer to alert an operator of the fault condition and to graphically display a location of the component within the machine to facilitate a corrective measure by the operator. One problem with the prior art, however, is that the operator is always tethered to the computer and must provide commands through a keyboard or like device. Furthermore, the maintenance instructions are native to the machine that is in need of repair or maintenance, requiring that it be in the “on” position during maintenance. Yet another problem with the invention as described is that the machine in need of repair must have been pre-programmed to respond to the maintenance requirements of the hard wire tether and be able to communicate with the computer to which the machine is tethered.
For existing systems in the repair and maintenance industry, or within industries in need of highly specialized on-site repair and maintenance personnel, there is presently no system, apparatus or method of providing multimedia data acquisition, interpretation, instruction and reporting.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The present invention provides a light, portable hands-off or hands-free maintenance and repair system, using a task-specific hypertexted, animated, voice-synthesized, and/or voice-activated communications and search engine that is able to access a task-specific database. The instructional program or engine is made task-specific by accessing a database of machine, process or operational specific data, which may be computer data, audio and even video clips that provide the user with real-time instructional information about the task or tasks that the user is to perform at a remote location.
The computer device is sufficiently lightweight to use at the remote location and provides hands-free command of the engine and access to the task-specific database so that the user may perform maintenance and repair on the machine, process or operation with the use of both hands. The task-specific information may include technical views and design diagrams of the machine, process flow or operation. The task-specific data will also provide instruction for accessing the machine, process or operation and be displayed to the viewer through a display device that may be, e.g., a head set with partial view of the operation and of the computer display or may even be a hand-held display that the user positions within the user's view.
The present invention includes an information retrieval and input system for displaying task-specific data, with a computer having an input/output device, access to a large capacity information storage and a retrieval device interfaced with the input/output device adapted to receive a memory medium containing the predetermined digitized data. The storage and retrieval device is adapted to access the task-specific data on the memory medium and to provide the data to the input/output device, the predetermined digitized data may be organized in, e.g., a hypertext format.
Hypertext may be accessed directly through a hypertext engine or via software written to access hypertext-based data, as well as data in other formats, e.g., in Microsoft Access or D-Base format. Audio and video input and output devices may be included in a headset adapted to be worn by the user. The head mounted image display is supported by the headset having a virtual image display having one or more eye-pieces adapted to be positioned within the view of the user while performing a specific task thereby providing video display information from the computer to the user in a hands-free, lightweight manner.
The task-specific storage and retrieval instructional program of the present invention provides read/write capability for task-specific data, as well as, hands-free voice recognition for providing access to data that is task-specific on a storage medium or via download. The system provided herein may be part of a network. One such system for use with the portable computer of the present invention is a network card, which provides a wireless computer interface with other users or even a customer support center (CSC) connected th
Head James V. W.
Lewis Dennis G.
Mitchell Dennis B.
Lea-Edmonds Lisa
Philip G. Meyers Intellectual Property Law, P.C.
Picard Leo P.
Siemens Dematic Postal Automation, L.P.
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