US-12620279-B2 - Thermal management sensors

US12620279B2US 12620279 B2US12620279 B2US 12620279B2US-12620279-B2

Abstract

A refuse vehicle includes a chassis, a body assembly coupled to the chassis, the body assembly defining a refuse compartment, and a thermal event monitoring system. The thermal event monitoring system includes a plurality of sampling elements each configured to sample an environmental condition associated with a sampling location within the refuse compartment and a processing circuit operatively coupled to and configured to receive sampling data from the plurality of sampling elements and to determine a presence and location of a thermal event within the refuse compartment.

Inventors

Joshua D. Rocholl
Vince Schad
Chad K. Smith
Reagan May

Assignees

OSHKOSH CORPORATION

Dates

Publication Date: 20260505
Application Date: 20240304

Claims (8)

1 . A refuse vehicle, comprising: a chassis; a body assembly coupled to the chassis, the body assembly defining a refuse compartment; a packer configured to compact refuse in the refuse compartment; and a thermal event monitoring system comprising: one or more sampling elements configured to sample an environmental condition associated with the refuse compartment; and a processing circuit operatively coupled to the packer and the one or more sampling elements and configured to: receive sampling data from the one or more sampling elements; determine a presence of a fire within the refuse compartment; and in response to determining the presence of the fire, transmit an instruction causing the packer to actuate.
2 . The refuse vehicle of claim 1 , wherein the one or more sampling elements are configured to measure temperature and the sampling data comprises temperature measurements.
3 . The refuse vehicle of claim 2 , wherein determining the presence of the fire comprises determining that a temperature measurement exceeds a predetermined threshold.
4 . The refuse vehicle of claim 2 , wherein the processing circuit is configured to time-average the temperature measurements, wherein determining the presence of the fire comprises determining that the time-averaged temperature measurements exceed a predetermined threshold.
5 . The refuse vehicle of claim 1 , wherein determining the presence of the fire comprises determining that a rate of change associated with the sampling data exceeds a first predetermined threshold.
6 . The refuse vehicle of claim 5 , wherein the processing circuit is configured to time-average the sampling data, wherein the rate of change is associated with the time-averaged sampling data.
7 . The refuse vehicle of claim 5 , wherein the processing circuit is configured to: to transmit a first alert upon determining that the rate of change is between a second predetermined threshold and the first predetermined threshold; and transmit the instruction causing the packer to actuate upon determining that the rate of change exceeds the first predetermined threshold.
8 . A method of controlling a packer of a refuse vehicle, the refuse vehicle comprising a chassis and a body assembly coupled to the chassis, the body assembly defining a refuse compartment, the packer configured to compact refuse in the refuse compartment, the method comprising: receiving sampling data from one or more sampling elements that are configured to sample an environmental condition associated with the refuse compartment; determining a presence of a fire within the refuse compartment; and in response to determining the presence of the fire, transmitting an instruction causing the packer to actuate.

Description

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED PATENT APPLICATIONS This patent application is a continuation of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 17/900,981, filed Sep. 1, 2022, which is a continuation of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 17/232,253, filed Apr. 16, 2021, which claims the benefit of and priority to U.S. Provisional Patent Application No. 63/011,332, filed on Apr. 17, 2020, the disclosures of which are hereby incorporated by reference in their entireties. BACKGROUND Refuse vehicles collect a wide variety of waste, trash, and other material from residences and businesses. Operators of the refuse vehicles transport the material from various waste receptacles within a municipality to a storage or processing facility (e.g., a landfill, an incineration facility, a recycling facility, etc.). SUMMARY One implementation of the present disclosure is a refuse vehicle comprising a chassis, a body assembly coupled to the chassis, the body assembly defining a refuse compartment, and a thermal event monitoring system including an air sampling line configured to capture air from the refuse compartment of the refuse vehicle and transport the air to a sensor positioned outside of the refuse compartment and a processing circuit operatively coupled to the sensor and configured to detect a thermal event indicating at least one of a fire or an overheating component based on a signal from the sensor. In some embodiments, the refuse vehicle further includes a user interface operatively coupled to the processing circuit, wherein the processing circuit is further configured to send an alert to an operator of the refuse vehicle via the user interface upon determining the presence of a thermal event. In some embodiments, the thermal event monitoring system further includes an air purge system configured to provide compressed air to the air sampling line to clear debris from at least one of an inside of the air sampling line or a sampling opening of the air sampling line. In some embodiments, the sensor is configured to analyze the air to detect the thermal event. In some embodiments, the thermal event monitoring system further comprises a temperature sensor operatively coupled to the processing circuit and configured to measure at least one of an air temperature or a temperature of a surface the temperature sensor is coupled to. In some embodiments, the temperature sensor is positioned in the refuse compartment. In some embodiments, the temperature sensor includes a resistance temperature detector (RTD) configured to measure a temperature associated with the refuse compartment. In some embodiments, the temperature sensor is positioned between a cab of the refuse vehicle and the refuse compartment. In some embodiments, the thermal event monitoring system further comprises a plurality of temperature sensors positioned in the refuse compartment and operatively coupled to the processing circuit, and wherein the processing circuit is further configured to determine a location of the thermal event based on measurements from the plurality of temperature sensors. In some embodiments, the refuse vehicle further includes a packer configured to compact loose refuse, wherein the processing circuit is further configured to operate the packer to smother the fire in response to determining a presence of a fire in the refuse compartment. Another implementation of the present disclosure is a thermal event monitoring system for a refuse vehicle. The thermal event monitoring system includes an air sampling line configured to capture air from the refuse compartment of the refuse vehicle and transport the air to a sensor positioned outside of the refuse compartment of the refuse vehicle and a processing circuit comprising a processor and memory. The memory has instructions stored thereon that, when executed by the processor, cause the processing circuit to receive a signal from the sensor regarding the air and detect a thermal event indicating at least one of a fire or an overheating component based on the signal from the sensor. In some embodiments, the instructions further cause the processing circuit to alert an operator of the refuse vehicle of the thermal event via a user interface of the refuse vehicle. In some embodiments, the thermal event monitoring system further includes an air purge system configured to provide compressed air to the air sampling line to clear debris from at least one of an inside of the air sampling line or a sampling opening of the air sampling line. In some embodiments, the thermal event monitoring system further includes a temperature sensor configured to measure at least one of an air temperature or a temperature of a surface the temperature sensor is coupled to. In some embodiments, the temperature sensor includes a resistance temperature detector (RTD) positioned to measure a temperature associated with the refuse compartment. In some embodiments, the temperature sensor is positioned between a cab of the refuse vehicle and the