Back to results
US 2014/0156035 A1Published application
Dynamic maintenance scheduling system for surface cleaning machines
AssigneeTennant Company
InventorsPaul L. Groschen, Robert J. Erko
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
An automatic and dynamic maintenance scheduling system for surface cleaning machines. Based on the receipt or lack of receipt of machine usage data from the machine, the system will adjust or maintain scheduled service call dates.
Claims20
A dynamic machine maintenance scheduling system comprising:
- a surface maintenance machine supporting a central data unit (CDU) comprising one or more programmable processors, wherein the one or more programmable processors of the CDU are adapted to collect machine usage data from the machine;
- and
- an offsite computer comprising one or more programmable processors;
- wherein the one or more programmable processors of the CDU and the one or more programmable processors of the offsite computer are adapted to execute instructions to cause, on an automatic, recurring basis, at least one of
- i. the offsite computer to prompt the CDU to transmit the machine usage data to the offsite computer, and
- ii. the CDU to transmit the machine usage data to the offsite computer;
- wherein if the offsite computer receives machine usage data from the CDU, the one or more processors of the offsite computer are adapted to automatically reschedule an onsite machine service call date when the machine usage data meets a rescheduling criteria or automatically keeps a previously scheduled onsite machine service call date when the machine usage data fails to meet a rescheduling criteria;
- and
- wherein if the offsite computer fails to receive machine usage data from the CDU, the one or more processors of the offsite computer are adapted to automatically keep the previously scheduled onsite machine service call date.
6 more elements
A dynamic machine maintenance scheduling system for a fleet of vehicles, comprising:
- a plurality of surface maintenance machines within the fleet of vehicles, each surface maintenance machine for maintaining surfaces at different locations, each surface maintenance machine supporting an engine control unit (ECU) and a central data unit (CDU) that are in data communication for transferring machine usage data from the ECU to the CDU, each CDU comprising one or more programmable processors;
- an offsite computer at a location remote from the a plurality of surface maintenance machines, the offsite computer comprising one or more programmable processors;
- wherein the one or more programmable processors of each CDU and the one or more programmable processors of the offsite computer are adapted to execute instructions to cause, on an automatic, recurring basis, at least one of
- i. the offsite computer to prompt the CDUs to transmit the machine usage data associated with such CDU to the offsite computer, and
- ii. each CDU to transmit the machine usage data of the floor treatment machine associated with such CDU to the offsite computer;
- wherein if the offsite computer receives machine usage data from a particular one the CDUs, the one or more programmable processors of the offsite computer are adapted to automatically reschedule an onsite machine service call date for the surface treatment machine associated with the particular one of the CDUs when such machine usage data meets a rescheduling criteria or automatically keep a previously scheduled onsite machine service call date for the surface treatment machine associated with the particular one of the CDUs when such machine usage data fails to meet a rescheduling criteria;
- and
- wherein, if the offsite computer fails to receive machine usage data from the particular one of the CDUs, the one or more programmable processors of the offsite computer are adapted to automatically keep the previously scheduled onsite machine service call date for the surface treatment machine associated with the particular one of the CDUs.
5 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.