Escalator entrapment detection system
AssigneeOtis Elevator Company
InventorsRandall Roberts, Johanna Whitwell
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
An escalator system is provided and includes a balustrade including a skirt with a brush, a moving step, which is drivable to move in a conveyance direction along the balustrade to form a step-skirt interface between ends of the brush of the skirt and a corresponding side of the moving step, and an entrapment monitoring and detection system. The entrapment monitoring and detection system includes a sensor and a processor. The sensor is disposed at the step-skirt interface and is configured to sense an object being present at the step-skirt interface. The processor is configured to determine whether the sensor senses the object being present at the step-skirt interface for a predetermined time.
Claims20
An escalator system, comprising:
- a balustrade comprising a skirt with a brush;
- a moving step, which is drivable to move in a conveyance direction along the balustrade to form a step-skirt interface between ends of the brush of the skirt and a corresponding side of the moving step;
- and
- an entrapment monitoring and detection system comprising:
- a sensor disposed at the step-skirt interface and configured to sense an object being present at the step-skirt interface;
- and
- a processor configured to determine whether the sensor senses the object being present at the step-skirt interface for a predetermined time.
An escalator system, comprising:
- balustrades, each comprising a skirt with a brush;
- a moving step, which is drivable to move in a conveyance direction between the balustrades to form step-skirt interfaces between ends of each brush and corresponding sides of the moving step;
- and
- an entrapment monitoring and detection system comprising:
- a sensor disposed at each step-skirt interface and configured to sense an object being present at each step-skirt interface;
- and
- a processor configured to determine whether either sensor senses the object being present at either step-skirt interface for a predetermined time, to judge that an entrapment incident is in effect or is imminent in accordance with an affirmative determination that either sensor senses the object being present at either step-skirt interface for the predetermined time and to take a mitigation action accordingly.
A method of operating an entrapment monitoring and detection system of an escalator system in which a moving step passes by ends of a brush of a balustrade at a step-skirt interface, the method comprising:
- scanning the step-skirt interface;
- determining whether results of the scanning are indicative of an object at the step-skirt interface;
- determining whether the results of the scanning are indicative of the object at the step-skirt interface persisting for a predetermined time;
- and
- judging that an entrapment is in effect or imminent in accordance with the results of the scanning being indicative of the object at the step-skirt interface and persisting for the predetermined time.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.