WO2005014364A1

WO2005014364A1 - Control arrangement in an automatic transport system

Info

Publication number: WO2005014364A1
Application number: PCT/FI2004/000470
Authority: WO
Inventors: Matti KÄHKIPURO; Timo Pullinen
Original assignee: Hyvinkaan Techvilla Oy
Current assignee: Hyvinkaan Techvilla Oy
Priority date: 2003-08-07
Filing date: 2004-08-06
Publication date: 2005-02-17
Anticipated expiration: 2006-02-07
Also published as: FI20031141A0; FI116519B; FI20031141L

Abstract

The invention relates to a control arrangement in an automatic transport system, in which system there is at least a central control unit (5) and substantially discrete or interlinked, electrically-driven vehicles (1) that run without a driver on travel-ways (2), and in which the vehicles contain at least a chassis, wheels, a drive motor and a control system (13). At least a part of the travelway (2) of the transport system is located inside a building (6), and the central control unit (5) of the transport system is arranged to control the opening of the automatic door (7) of the building for the vehicle (1) when the vehicle (1) is coming to a pre-defined distance from the automatic door (7).

Description

CONTROL ARRANGEMENT IN AN AUTOMATIC TRANSPORT SYSTEM

The present invention relates to a control arrangement as defined in the preamble of claim 1 in an automatic trans- port system.

APM (Automated People Mover) systems have been built primarily for transporting people and their baggage at airports and in their adjacent areas, including hotels these areas contain, as well as for transporting people at amusement parks or other such locales. In addition, the APM system is suitable as a transport system in industrial estates and hospital areas, or similar areas, as well as for new or re- planned areas in towns and cities where the urban area de- velopment plan can incorporate these types of transport systems before the construction stage. APM systems have also been used in some applications to handle mainline traffic, notably the VAL metro in Lille, France, and SkyTrain in Vancouver, Canada.

APM systems generally consist of electrically-driven, driverless vehicles, which may be either discrete or interlinked, that travel on rails or on a planar guideway. The systems also include control computers, which control the movements of the vehicles on the travelways.

One of the problems is optimizing the transport capacity and synchronizing the timing of the different means of transportation. A further problem is the lack of a system for auto- matically entering a building that would allow passengers to continue their journeys directly to, for example, the destination floor of the building by elevator.

The object of the present invention is to overcome the above-mentioned drawbacks and to achieve a practical and efficient control arrangement in an automatic transport system that can be utilized as comprehensively as possible. The object is to achieve an automatic transport arrangement that works reliably without a driver, in which the vehicle transporting passengers on its travelway and the door drive system in the building as well as the functions of the elevator system are together synchronized, thereby enabling a flexible and efficient automatic transport system in which the times passengers wait to transfer from one mode of transport to another are minimized. The solution of the invention is characterized by what is disclosed in the characterization part of claim 1. Other embodiments of the invention are characterized by what is disclosed in the other claims.

One advantage of the solution according to the invention is that the arrangement of the invention enables a vehicle op- erating without a driver to drive into the inside of a building automatically. A further advantage is that both the control system of the vehicle and the control system of the elevator for the building are connected and/or their functions are synchronized with each other, and consequently passengers can change from a vehicle to an elevator, and vice versa, with minimum waiting times or even without any waiting times. A further advantage is that the entry of the vehicle does not create disturbances caused by the weather in the indoor premises of the building, because the vehicle drives into a space in which one door can always be held closed when the other door is open, in a similar manner to a wind chamber. The solution according to the invention also improves the transport capacity of the system.

In the following, the invention will be described in more detail by the aid of an embodiment example with reference to the attached drawings, wherein

Fig. 1 presents a vehicle of the automatic transport system according to the invention on its travel- way and viewed from the side and Fig. 2 presents a diagrammatic and simplified top view of the vehicle according to the invention approaching the building and the indoor premises of the building.

The figures present one vehicle 1 suitable for use in an automatic transport system according to the invention, said vehicle being on its travelway 2. The travelway 2 has one or more travel surfaces provided with rails or similar, along which the vehicle travels on its wheels. The vehicle 1 is equipped with a steering and drive system 13, the computer of which is in contact with a central control unit 5 for the transport system, said central control unit consisting of at least one computer, via a suitable network such as a public and/or private mobile phone network or the Internet network. The vehicle has connection-making means for communication contact. In addition, each vehicle 1 contains suitable means for receiving, processing and actuating operating instructions issued by the central control unit 5 and arriving from a mobile phone network or similar, as well as means for no- tifying the central control unit 5 of the position, status and speed of the vehicle via a mobile phone network or similar. The vehicle is suitable for 3-8 passengers, for example, in terms of size.

The steering and drive system 13 of the vehicle 1 according to the invention consists of at least the operating and control appliances and means listed below. The vehicle 1 has three types of main motor, namely, a drive motor acting on the rear wheels, a door motor that handles the opening and closing motion of the door, and one or more steering motors acting on the front wheels. The control of all the motors is based on frequency converters and especially on inverter drives, which receive their drive energy from a connection with the travelway 2. In addition, the vehicle can have ac- cumulators or a supercapacitor for energy storage. Of the actuating devices of the vehicle, at least the drive motor, the brakes, the door motor and one or more steering motors are connected by means of a suitable fieldbus to the drive part of the vehicle 1. In addition, a navigation means 3 that collects position and speed data and that is equipped with navigation sensors is connected by means of said field- bus to the drive part of the vehicle 1. Correspondingly, a contact means, such as a GSM modem or other means of contact that supports a wireless phone or data connection, is also connected to the computer of the vehicle, and the vehicle is wirelessly in contact with the central control unit 5 via said contact means.

The central control unit 5 has means for receiving and proc- essing a customer order arriving from a mobile phone network, another wireless network or the Internet network or similar and information arriving from the vehicle 1. In addition, the central control unit 5 has means for giving operating instructions to the vehicles 1 via a mobile phone network or other of the networks mentioned, at which time the central control unit 5 and the control system 13 of the vehicle 1 are in contact with each other via the mobile phone network or other of the networks mentioned above. Upon receiving an order from a customer for a certain station, the central control unit 5 ascertains which appropriate vehicle is the closest to the relevant station and gives this vehicle an instruction to go to the departure station in question. The central control unit 5 also optimizes the fastest route between stations taking into account any ser- vicing work on the travelway and other exceptions. The central control unit 5 monitors in real time the position and speed of the vehicles, and consequently knows where each vehicle is at each moment, what speed each vehicle is moving at and what the status of the vehicle is, or in other words whether the vehicle is empty and waiting for a customer, travelling to a station after receiving an order, transporting customers or perhaps temporarily broken, out of service or being serviced or similar. The central control unit 5 supervises the transport system all the time and schedules the vehicles 1 so that they are substantially equidistant from each other in their travelway loops and do not collide with each other. If the traffic becomes denser, the central control unit reduces the intervening distance and speed of the vehicles. In addition, the central control unit 5 receives the information about the target station and any emergency stop command from the vehicle. The central control unit 5 also realizes invoicing of the customer. The central control unit .thus has actuating devices and means for performing at least all the above-mentioned functions.

The stations are in practice small travelway loops, from which the central control unit 5 initiates a departure synchronously such that the vehicle leaving the station is synchronized with the other vehicles of the travelway loop. The leaving of a vehicle from loop to the station happens in a similar manner.

Figure 2 presents in simplified and diagrammatic form one vehicle 1 arriving at its station, said station being inside a building. Figure 2 also shows a part of the navigation arrangement for the travelway 2, by means of which the vehi- cle 1 monitors its position on the travelway at all times and notifies its position and speed to the central control unit 5. Individually identifiable indicators 4, such as RFID tags or magnets, are located at regular intervals along the travelway below the vehicle, and the central control unit 5 knows the exact position of said RFID tags or magnets from the calculated zero point of each travelway loop. The navigation means 3 in the vehicle 1 identifies and registers the indicators 4 and notifies the central control unit 5 of each indicator that said navigation means passes. Based on this information the central control unit 5 knows the position of the vehicle and is also able to calculate the speed of the vehicle, because the distances between the indicators are known. Based on the position information of the vehicle, the central control unit 5 supervises the vehicles such that the vehicles keep a defined minimum distance from each other that is appropriate to the situation in substantially all situations.

In Figure 2 the vehicle is just arriving at the building 6 and is approaching the automatic door 7 in the building, and the control of said automatic door is connected to the con- trol of the automatic transport system by means of central control unit 5. When the vehicle 1 crosses a pre-defined indicator 4, the control system of the transport system receives information that the indicator has been crossed and opens the automatic door 7 of the building after a pre- defined time, whereupon the vehicle 1 is able to drive without obstruction inside the wind chamber 8 of the building. When the vehicle 1 has stopped, the control system closes the outer door 7 of the building by means of central control unit 5 and opens both the door of the vehicle 1 and the rearmost door 9 of the wind chamber. At this time the passengers can leave and go into the building. Thus, the central control unit 5 has actuating devices and means, in addition to those mentioned earlier, for opening and closing at the correct times the automatic doors 7, 9 of buildings that the vehicle enters.

In the control system according to the invention, the elevator control system 12 of the building and the control system of the automatic transport system are synchronised with each other such that the elevator control system 12 and the central control unit 5 of the transport system are in contact with each other. That being the case, the elevator control system 12 has been given, in good time, information about the approach of the vehicle 1 and the number of passengers in the vehicle and the desired destination floor in the building. The information was received from the customer when the customer placed the order and the central control unit 5 passed it on to the elevator control system 12 in the building β. When the passengers arrive in the building, the elevator 10 that was ordered in advance comes to wait and opens its doors 11. Consequently, the passengers can change flexibly and without waiting times from the vehicle to the elevator 10 of the building and go the rest of the journey to the destination floor by elevator.

The same arrangement, of course, also works in reverse. In other words, when leaving a floor of a building a passenger can order a vehicle to wait at the elevator hall or at a station on another suitable floor.

It is obvious to the person skilled in the art that the invention is not limited to the embodiment example presented above, but that it may vary within the scope of the claims to be presented below. Thus, the structure and properties of the vehicles may deviate from those presented above. Likewise, the structures and arrangements of the travelway inside the building may deviate from those presented above. For example, depending on the situation, the wind chamber is not necessarily needed. Also, detection of the arrival of a vehicle can be based on other than RFID detectors. A radar or similar detector, or an optical or mechanical detector, for example, may be positioned in the proximity of the automatic door 7 of the building to detect an approaching vehicle and observe its distance.

Claims

1. Control arrangement in an automatic transport system, in which system there is at least a central control unit (5) and substantially discrete or interlinked, electrically- driven vehicles (1) that run without a driver on travelways (2), and in which the vehicles contain at least a chassis, wheels, a drive motor and a control system (13) , characterized in that at least a part of the travelway (2) of the transport system is situated inside the building (6), and in that the central control unit (5) of the transport system is arranged to control the opening of the automatic door (7) of the building for the vehicle (1) when the vehicle (1) is coming inside the building (6).

2. Control arrangement according to claim 1, characterized in that the central control unit (5) of the transport system is arranged to control the opening of the automatic door (7) of the building for the vehicle (1) when the vehicle 1 is coming to a pre-defined distance from the automatic door (7).

3. Control arrangement according to claim 2, characterized in that the pre-defined distance activating the opening of the automatic door (7) of the vehicle (1) is observed by means of detectors (4) in the travelway (2) and a navigation means (3) in the vehicle.

4. Control arrangement according to claim 1, 2 or 3, charac- terized in that the central control unit (5) of the transport system is arranged to control the closing of the automatic door (7) of the building after the vehicle (1) has driven inside the automatic door (7).

5. Control arrangement according to any of the claims above, characterized in that the central control unit (5) of the transport system is adapted to operate in conjunction with the elevator control system (12) of the building (6) such that the arrival and departure of the vehicles (1) are synchronized with at least one control of an elevator (10) of a building (6) .

6. Control arrangement according to any of claims 1-4 above, characterized in that the central control unit (5) of the transport system and the elevator control system (12) of the building are at least partially or wholly connected to- gether.

7. Control arrangement according to any of the claims above, characterized in that adjoining the frontmost automatic door (7) of the travelway (2) is a wind chamber (8), in which is a rearmost automatic door (9), said rearmost automatic door being arranged to open only when the vehicle (1) has stopped and the frontmost automatic door (7) has closed.