EP1509665A1 - Door gap monitoring - Google Patents

Abstract

The present disclosure relates to a method of monitoring a door gap to determine whether a proper final closed position of doors exists after a closing of doors of rail vehicles, or other vehicles or elevators. The vehicles or elevators have at least one door leaf which is equipped on its main closing edge with an elastically deformable or elastically mounted profile. The position and/or shape of the profile is detected by electric, pneumatic, optical, inductive, capacitive or magnetic sensors or a combination of such sensors in connection with an electronic monitoring system which analyzes the signals of the sensors and, if applicable, determines the existence of the door gap. The method steps include closing the doors, activating the electronic monitoring system after the closing of the doors; monitoring the door gap and determining a final closed position of the doors by the electronic monitoring system.

Description

 Türspaltübcrwachung

The invention relates to a device for monitoring the door gap of the doors of rail vehicles, lifts, or the like. With at least one door leaf which is optionally provided with an elastically deformable or elastically mounted profile on its main closing edge and a method for monitoring such a door gap.

The various safety devices for the doors of rail vehicles or lifts, but also the nacelles of cable cars, etc. monitor a wide variety of parameters, especially while the door is being closed. This can be the force necessary for closing, from which it can be deduced whether objects or people are pushing against the closing movement, this can be the closing speed from which one can also conclude trapped people or objects, this can cause deformations on the main cutting edge , which is usually formed from a relatively voluminous rubber profile, from which it can be concluded that the door ran into an obstacle during the closing movement and the like. more.

The reaction to the detection of an obstacle or a jammed object or part of the body is different, depending on the application. In some cases it is required that the closing movement is changed to an opening movement and the door only starts the closing movement again after a predetermined time has passed, in other cases the door is only required to stand still for a predetermined period, in other cases again follows only a short and localized reversal of movement to allow pinched people to free themselves and various other things. There are also door control systems in which the reaction to the detection of a jammed object is different for the first time during a closing movement than subsequently, in order to prevent vandals and saboteurs from deliberately blocking the closing of the door.

In all of these systems, a distinction must necessarily be made in what position the door is in when it closes when it encounters an obstacle, since the reactions must differ depending on the position. Especially in the last closing area, in which the main closing channel of the door wing has approached the door frame or the main closing edge of the second door wing to such an extent that no arm or leg or pocket or the like. voluminous object may be trapped, otherwise if this had already been determined in a further open position of the door leaf, the reaction threshold of the sensors is extremely increased due to the dynamic loading of the door leaf and the vibrations and impacts associated therewith, or the sighting devices are switched off at all in order to allow the door to be closed without the door opening, only due to the vibrations that occur when moving into the final closing position.

These systems have largely proven their worth so far, but rationalization and savings measures are increasingly being used, not only, as before, lifts, but also subways, local trains and the like. send unmanned on the road and only monitor the trip from a central point, which is possible with significantly fewer staff than in normal manned operations.

In such an operation, there is a very different way than in manned operation that thin objects are caught at the end of the closing movement without this being detected by the conventional security systems. Since there is no visual inspection along the train, this hitherto easy and reliable detection of the jamming of a walking stick, a crutch, a dog leash and the like. impossible with this new type of operation and thus leads to a blatant risk.

The aim of the invention is to avoid this risk and to propose a safeguard which is capable of reliably recognizing such objects or their jamming.

According to the invention, this is done by monitoring the door gap after it has closed, the monitoring being able to be carried out by pneumatic, optical, electrical, capacitive or magnetic sensors or combinations.

As can be seen from the above explanations, it is not necessary for the door gap monitoring according to the invention to be activated during the closing of the door. The door gap monitoring according to the invention thus does not change the behavior of a given automatic closing mechanism and can therefore also be easily and easily retrofitted.

It is essential that the device according to the invention and the method according to the invention for monitoring the door gap is activated or carried out after the doors have been closed and that it is then determined whether the shape of the main closing edge the door, usually made of elastic material, which corresponds to the shape which correlates with the correct closing condition of the door or whether it is deformed, which is interpreted as a result of a jammed object and triggers a message or an alarm. In principle, a physical quantity is measured which corresponds to the shape or position of the gap / profile and is compared with the size of the correct shape / position of the gap / profile.

The invention is explained below with reference to the drawing. 1 and 2 show a first embodiment of the invention purely schematically, FIGS. 3 to 5 show a second embodiment of the invention in views similar to those of FIGS. 1 and 2 and FIG. 6 shows a schematic view of a test arrangement.

1 shows a first embodiment of the invention. A door designated in its entirety by 1 has two door leaves 2, 3, each of which is provided with an elastic profile 4 (FIG. 2) in the region of its main closing edge. The profile 4 essentially has the sticks of the door leaves 2, 3 and is provided with undercut areas 5 which facilitate assembly on the end face of the door leaf. The actual end face 6 of the profile 4 is designed to be curved so that the main closing edges are sealed even if the door wings do not meet in exact alignment. In addition, the shape of the Profilcs 6 has a certain adjusting effect, through which tolerances in the guidance of the door leaves can be compensated.

The profile 4 also has two cavities, an approximately triangular cavity 7 and a rather slot-like cavity 8. The two cavities extend parallel to the main closing channels, together with the end face 6, and have the following tasks: The approximately triangular cavity 7 gives the profile 4 flexibility if 6 objects are jammed between the end faces. The cavity 8 also deforms when objects are jammed between the end faces 6, this deformation is monitored by contact elements 9 ′, 9 ″, which come into contact with one another even with a slight deformation of the shape of the cavity 8 and thereby short-circuit a monitoring circuit. The cable routing and the arrangement of the switching elements is shown in a purely schematic manner in FIG. 1, from each of the contact strips designated in their entirety by 9 a signal cable which can participate in the opening and closing movement of the door leaf leads to a signaling unit 10, from which in turn Control lines 1 1 forwards the corresponding signals: "Door properly closed" or "Pinched object in the door" to the train station, where the appropriate reactions are triggered.

1 and 2, a magnetic or capacitive system can of course be used instead of the contact strips 9, this is easy for the person skilled in the field of sensor technology to understand and to adapt to the particular circumstances in the knowledge of the invention.

3 to 5 represent a variant of the invention, which is based on an optical basis. As can be seen from the cohesion of FIGS. 4 and 5, the two door leaves 2 and 3 have strips 12, 14 of different design in this variant. Such profiles are used in the prior art as special finger protection profiles, the sealing takes place via lips 13, which are provided on each of the two profiles, an additional thin-walled cylindrical tube 18 is slightly deformed in the closed state (FIG. 5) and also contributes to Sealing and acoustic insulation.

There is now an optical or infrared transmitter 19 '(FIG. 3) at the foot end of the strip 12 in the region of the hollow space of the tube 18 and a corresponding receiver 19 "at the other end of the tube 18 Profiles 12, 14 is clamped, the tube 18 is squeezed together, the light beam is interrupted and the receiver 19 "sounds via the monitoring electronics 10 and the line 1 1 alarm. 6 shows the mode of operation of the devices according to the invention, for example when a dog's leash is pinched, using an experimental arrangement with which the sensitivity of the device can be tested: a dog leash or the like. 16 is fixed in the direction normal to the level of the door leaf with one end on a suitable fastening, an attachment point 19, the line 16 being normal from the attachment point 19 to the door gap between the profiles 12, 14 (or also the profiles 4) in the tightened state Door leaf clcbcnc runs. Then the line is pivoted horizontally with a predetermined, constant pull, as by the strichlicrtc guidance indicated, and it is determined the angle at which the system triggers an alarm. Conversely, of course, the train required to trigger the alarm can also be determined at a given angle.

In this way, it is also possible to detect pinched flexible objects with an extremely small cross-section as pinched, devices according to the invention are able to recognize rigid test specimens with a diameter of 6 mm and flexible line-like or cord-like structures with a thickness of 1 mm with a pull-out direction of only 15 ° to the normal on the door level and a tensile load of 80 N in the cord-like structure. In comparison, the conventional monitoring devices used during the closing can only detect objects with a dimension of at least 20 x 80 mm or 30 x 60 mm, so apart from the problems of self-activation due to the shocks in the closing area, they are also of their geometric sensitivity not suitable for the purposes of the invention.

The invention can be modified in various ways: for example, the profile 4 can be designed with only one cavity, the cavity 8 and without a cavity 7; in the version according to FIGS. 3-5, electrical monitoring with contact strips can be used instead of monitoring with infrared light which are arranged on the inside of the front portion of the cylindrical tube 18, for example glued, take place. Of course, the devices 19 'and 19 "are omitted. It is not necessary that an elastic profile 4 is provided on the main closing edge if it also protects the sensors from damage. In particular with elevator doors, it is possible to find out without such a profile. Also if such a profile is present, it does not have to consist of an elastomeric material, as shown, but can be an elastically supported but inherently "rigid" profile. In this case, its position, especially the elastic mounting, is preferably monitored using at least one sensor.

In particular with lift doors, but in principle with all single-leaf doors, a profile whose shape is monitored can be attached to the door frame instead of the door leaf, which eliminates all problems of the movable signal cables and mechanically stressed sensors.

It is possible and in many cases advantageous that the sensors provided according to the invention are not at the moment the closing of the door leaf ends (or just before) to activate, but with a certain delay in order to prevent the sensors from incorrectly detecting a "pinched state" and giving an alarm due to possible shocks and vibrations of the door leaves. The delay in activation can, depending on the door type, be in intervals of less than one second up to span several seconds.

It is also advantageous to deactivate the sensors some time after determining the correct closed state, or when leaving the station, individually or by the train control centrally, on the one hand to avoid false alarms while driving and on the other hand to not activate the sensors for too long to keep. It is of course possible to keep the sensors themselves activated for longer or even continuously and only to refrain from or to ignore the evaluation of the signals originating from them, but this constitutes a worsened embodiment of the invention because of the load on the sensors and the complexity of the evaluation represents and at any rate falls under "activation of the device" as a whole.

Claims

Palcntansprüche: 1. Device for monitoring the door gap of the doors of rail vehicles, lifts or the like, with at least one door leaf (2, 3) which is optionally provided with an elastically deformable or elastically mounted profile (4) on its main closing edge, characterized in that the device (10, 1 1) is activated when each door leaf (2, 3) of the door is in its closing end position, and in that the monitoring by electrical, pneumatic, optical, inductive, capacitive or magnetic sensors (9 , 19) or combinations of such sensors. 2. Device according to claim 1, characterized in that the device compares the current shape or position of the profile (4) with its shape or position in the properly closed state of the door leaf (2, 3). 3. Device according to claim 1 or 2, characterized in that the device (10, 1 1) has a delay element which causes the activation after a predetermined time interval, starting with the reaching of the closing end position of each of the door leaves (2, 3). 4. Device according to one of the preceding claims, characterized in that the device (10, 1 1) has a deactivating element which deactivates it after a predetermined time interval, starting with the determination of the correct closing of the door. 5. A method for monitoring the door gap of the doors of rail vehicles, lifts or the like, with at least one door leaf (2, 3) which is optionally provided on its main closing edge with an elastically deformable or elastically mounted profile (4), characterized in that the monitoring is carried out by electrical, pneumatic, optical, inductive, capacitive or magnetic sensors (9, 19) or combinations of such sensors. 6. The method according to claim 5, characterized in that a monitoring device that the current shape or position of the profile (4) corresponding to the measured variable of the sensor is transmitted, that in the monitoring device this measured variable is compared with a reference variable that the measured variable of the shape or Corresponds to the position of the profile (4) when the door leaf (2, 3) is properly closed.