METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR DETERMINING ACTUAL AND POTENTIAL FAILURE OF HYDRAULIC LIFTS

摘要

An early warning system includes monitoring of the hydraulic pressure used to power the hydraulic motor used to raise a man lift during operation, and providing a prognostication algorithm coupled to the output of the sensor to predict based on data from the sensor when there will be a catastrophic failure of the lift.

主权项

1. A method for detecting catastrophic failure of a man lift, comprising the steps of:
sensing the fluid pressure utilized to raise and lower the lift using a sensor so as to provide monitored data; and, processing the monitored data for a change in pressure while the lift is in operation that would indicate the imminence of a catastrophic failure so as to provide an alarm indicative of the imminence of catastrophic failure, whereby a lift operator can be lowered to safety before catastrophic failure the processing step including the step of utilizing a prognostication algorithm for predicting catastrophic failure, the prognostication algorithm having diagnostic and prognostic capabilities including dynamic reasoning algorithms and both a health monitoring reasoner and a maintenance operations reasoner coupled to a health monitoring and diagnostics execution algorithm to assess probability operating on changes in sensed pressure, with the prognostication algorithm initialized with pressures that would be expected throughout the operation of the lift, the prognostication algorithm determining when the pressures during the elevation of the lift drop below a predetermined line or drop below a predetermined change indicating an abrupt change to indicate a potential catastrophic failure.