Custom-shape wireless dog fence system and method

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-9101113-B2
Application number	US-201414279026-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	May 15, 2014
Priority date	May 18, 2010
Publication date	Aug 11, 2015
Grant date	Aug 11, 2015

Abstract

A custom-shaped wireless fence system is provided that contains one or more dogs in a user-defined containment area without the need for a physical fence or underground wire. The system, which is easy to set up and use, includes at least three base units and at least one collar and, preferably, a remote controller. A virtual fence is defined around the containment area, as well as around optional exclusion zones within the containment area, during system set up through communication between the base units and a trackable device as the user walks around the desired border. Visualization software enables the user to verify that the location of the fence is as desired and that the system is operating properly using a computing device having a display screen. In use, the system employs improved filtering of consecutive distance measurement values taken between the base units and the collar to discount errant measurement values in terms of their contribution to the current calculation of the dog's location. These filtering techniques, in combination with improved signal strength and antenna diversity in the communication between the base units and the collar, improve the accuracy and consistency with which the dog's location within a containment area is tracked so that unwanted corrections are not administered to the dog.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A wireless boundary system for tracking a location of a dog in a user-defined roaming area comprising:
a master base unit including a transceiver unit and at least two slave base units each having a transceiver unit, said master base unit and said slave base units being positioned in spaced relationship to one another within a generally central location;
a master base unit activating mechanism for activating the master base unit during a system topology set-up stage to initiate a communication sequence between the master base unit and the slave base units during which respective distances and spatial relationships between the master base unit and the slave base units are determined and placed on a predefined planar coordinate system in which said distances and spatial relationships are identified by respective coordinates within said planar coordinate system to define an overall base unit topology;
a trackable device configured to communicate with the master base unit and the slave base units during a boundary set-up stage during which said base units track consecutive positions of the trackable device as the trackable device is moved around a user-defined perimeter surrounding the generally central location, said user-defined perimeter defining a custom-shaped boundary, an area inside the boundary constituting the user-defined roaming area; and
a device movable with the dog, said movable device including a transceiver unit in signal communication with the transceiver units of said master base unit and said slave base units for tracking a location of said movable device, each of said base units being configured to continuously obtain distance values between itself and the movable device on a real time basis using said transceiver units and to communicate said distance values to the master base unit for calculation of a tracking location value indicating a location of the dog within the planar coordinate system.

2. The wireless boundary system as set forth in claim 1 , wherein said movable device is mounted on a collar worn by the dog.

3. The wireless boundary system as set forth in claim 2 , wherein said collar includes a correction unit that initiates administration of a correction to the dog when the tracking location value calculated by the system indicates the dog is outside the user-defined roaming area.

4. The wireless boundary system as set forth in claim 2 , wherein said collar is the trackable device.

5. The wireless boundary system as set forth in claim 1 , wherein said system is further configured to weight and filter a plurality of said continuously obtained distance values when calculating the tracking location value and to assign less weight to distance values considered suspect due to disparity between said suspect distance values and previously measured distance values and previously calculated tracking location values indicating the location of the dog within the planar coordinate system.

6. The wireless boundary system as set forth in claim 1 , wherein said generally central location is a building and said base unit topology includes the master base unit and three slave base units that are respectively positioned at four different locations relative to said building.

7. The wireless boundary system as set forth in claim 6 , wherein the location of the dog within the planar coordinate system is calculated using a trilateration process that includes receiving at the master base unit current distance values from said three slave base units, said distance values including a first distance value (DV1) between said master base unit and said movable device, a second distance value (DV2) between a first slave base unit and said movable device, a third distance value (DV3) between a second slave base unit and said movable device, and a fourth distance value (DV4) between a third slave base unit and said movable device; defining a circle around said master base unit having a radius equal to DV1; defining a circle around said first slave base unit having a radius equal to DV2; defining a circle around said second slave base unit having a radius equal to DV3; defining a circle around said third slave base unit having a radius equal to DV4; checking for an intersection between those two circles having radii corresponding with the two smallest distance values, said intersection when found including two points, each of said two points representing a possible location of the movable device; and using a circle having a next smallest distance value as a third circle to find a point of intersection between the third circle and one of said two points within a tolerance value, said point of intersection representing the current location value of the movable device.

8. The wireless boundary system as set forth in claim 7 , said system being configured to smooth out the current location value by determining a trilateration level of said current location value, said trilateration level being a relative measure of the nearness of the third circle's point of intersection with one of the two points at which the first two circles intersected, ranking the trilateration level values according to likely accuracy and using said ranked trilateration values to weight the current location value.

9. The wireless boundary system as set forth in claim 1 , further comprising a plurality of flags placed along or close to the boundary by the user during system set-up, said flags visually indicating an extent of said roaming area.

10. The wireless boundary system as set forth in claim 1 , wherein said roaming area includes at least one exclusion zone having a border defined by the user during an exclusion zone set-up stage after the boundary set-up stage by the user walking the trackable device around the exclusion zone border while the base units track consecutive positions of the trackable device.

11. The wireless boundary system as set forth in claim 10 , wherein said boundary and said exclusion zone border are made of a plurality of connected line segments, end points of said line segments being defined by selected positions of the trackable device as tracked by the base units during the boundary and exclusion zone set-up stages.

12. The wireless boundary system as set forth in claim 11 , wherein said system is configured to detect that the dog is outside the roaming area using a point-in-polygon methodology that includes using the tracking location value or a current location value as a starting point, mathematically generating a vector from said starting point to infinity, calculating a number of boundary and exclusion zone line segments intersected by said vector, and if said number is odd, determining that the current location value or tracking location value is within the roaming area and, if said number is even, determining that the current location value or tracking location value is either in an exclusion zone or outside the roaming area.

13. The wireless boundary system as set forth in claim 1 , further comprising visualization software compatible with a personal computer device having a display screen, said software configured to run during the boundary set-up stage and to create a visual representation of the boundary which is displayed on the display screen.

14. The wireless boundary system as set forth in claim 13 , wherein said visualization software includes an auto-scaling feature that automatically sizes the virtual representation of the defined boundary to a “full-screen” view on the display.

15. The wireless boundary system as set forth in claim 13 , wherein the visualization software displays the locations of the b

Assignees

• Woodstream Corp

Inventors

• Rich Christopher T
• Kamery Christopher
• Lubic Marko
• Patterson Wade
• Conrad Steve
• Gurley Jason S
• Phillips Terry G
• White Jr John J

Classifications

• A01K15/023 Primary

  Anti-evasion devices · CPC title

• G08B21/18

  Status alarms (G08B21/02 takes precedence) · CPC title

• A01K27/009 Primary

  with electric-shock, sound, magnetic- or radio-waves emitting devices · CPC title

• G08B21/0261

  System arrangements wherein the object is to detect trespassing over a fixed physical boundary, e.g. the end of a garden · CPC title

• A01K27/001

  Collars · CPC title