Automatically enabled airplane-mode portable power source

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-2016342188-A1
Application number	US-201615146969-A
Country	US
Kind code	A1
Filing date	May 5, 2016
Priority date	May 19, 2015
Publication date	Nov 24, 2016
Grant date	—

Abstract

A portable power device including an enclosure, a plurality of power elements housed within the enclosure, and a controller housed within the enclosure and configured to control the power output of the plurality of power elements. The controller is configured to determine if the portable power device is located on an aircraft that is operating in a stationary, taxiing, or flight mode, and if the aircraft is in the stationary, taxiing, or flight mode, to prevent power to be supplied from the plurality of power elements.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1 . A portable power device comprising:
an enclosure; a plurality of power elements housed within the enclosure; and a controller housed within the enclosure and configured to control the power output of the plurality of power elements, wherein the controller is configured to determine if the portable power device is located on an aircraft that is operating in a stationary, taxiing, or flight mode, and if the aircraft is in the stationary, taxiing, or flight mode, to prevent power to be supplied from the plurality of power elements.

2 . The portable power device of claim 1 , further comprising a switch located within the enclosure and electrically configured between the plurality of power elements and an output of the portable power device.

3 . The portable power device of claim 2 , wherein the controller is configured to control the switch, and if the aircraft is in the stationary, taxiing, or flight mode, the controller controls the switch to disengage and prevent power output from the plurality of power elements.

4 . The portable power device of claim 1 , wherein the determination made by the controller is based on at least one of GPS location, RFID tagging or other RF proximity scheme, manual input, Wi-Fi location determination, and Bluetooth.

5 . The portable power device of claim 1 , further comprising a first output power line from the plurality of power elements and a second output power line from the plurality of power elements.

6 . The portable power device of claim 5 , further comprising a switch electrically configured on the first output power line, the controller configured to control the power output along the first output power line by controlling the switch, and the second output power line configured to continuously supply power even if the controller stops power along the first output power line.

7 . The portable power device of claim 1 , wherein the plurality of power elements comprise a plurality of at least one of (i) batteries, (ii) power cells, and (iii) piezoelectric generators.

8 . A method of controlling power to one or more devices, the method comprising:
monitoring the location of a portable power device having a plurality of power elements; determining that the portable power device is located on an aircraft that is stationary, taxiing, or in-flight; and disabling a power output of the plurality of power elements of the portable power device.

9 . The method of claim 8 , wherein the disabling comprising switching a switch located between the plurality of power elements and an output of the portable power device.

10 . The method of claim 8 , wherein the determining comprises one of at least one of GPS locating, RFID or other RF proximity scheme detection, manual input, Wi-Fi location determination, and Bluetooth detection.

11 . The method of claim 8 , wherein the plurality of power elements comprise a plurality of at least one of (i) batteries, (ii) power cells, and (iii) piezoelectric generators.

Assignees

• Carrier Corp

Inventors

• Varga Stephen
• Blumsack Craig Stephen

Classifications

• G06F1/3206 Primary

  Monitoring of events, devices or parameters that trigger a change in power modality · CPC title

• H04W4/02

  Services making use of location information · CPC title

• G06F1/3287

  by switching off individual functional units in the computer system · CPC title

• Y02D30/70

  in wireless communication networks · CPC title

• H04W4/029

  Location-based management or tracking services · CPC title