Apparatus, system, and method for catalyst presence detection

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-9303545-B2
Application number	US-96568210-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Dec 10, 2010
Priority date	Dec 10, 2009
Publication date	Apr 5, 2016
Grant date	Apr 5, 2016

Abstract

A system to detect the presence of a catalyst includes an exhaust gas tube, a first temperature sensing device, a second temperature sensing device, a flow rate measurement device, and a processing device. The first temperature sensing device measures a first temperature of exhaust gas upstream of the exhaust gas tube. The second temperature sensing device measures a second temperature of the exhaust gas downstream of the exhaust gas tube. The processing device estimates an expected time delay between the measured inlet and outlet exhaust gas temperatures corresponding to a system with a catalyst present. The processing device may also determine the presence of a catalyst by comparing the measured second temperature to the measured first temperature and comparing the measured second temperature to an estimated delayed first temperature associated with the expected time delay.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. An apparatus to detect the presence of a catalyst in a catalyst housing, the apparatus comprising:
a temperature module configured to detect a temperature of exhaust gas at an inlet of the catalyst housing and a temperature of exhaust gas at an outlet of the catalyst housing;
an expected time delay module configured to determine an expected time delay between the detected temperature of exhaust gas at the inlet of the catalyst housing and the detected temperature of exhaust gas at the outlet of the catalyst housing corresponding with the presence of a catalyst; and
a similarity module configured to determine a temperature similarity value based on separate and discrete input values for the detected temperature of exhaust gas at the inlet of the catalyst housing, the detected temperature of exhaust gas at the outlet of the catalyst housing, and an estimated temperature of exhaust gas at the outlet of the catalyst housing equal to an estimated temperature of exhaust gas at the inlet of the catalyst housing delayed by the estimated expected time delay;
wherein a catalyst is present if the determined temperature similarity value is above a first threshold and a catalyst is not present if the determined temperature similarity value is below a second threshold;
wherein the similarity module determines the temperature similarity value by comparing the detected temperature of exhaust gas at the outlet of the catalyst housing to: (1) the detected temperature of exhaust gas at the inlet of the catalyst housing; and (2) the estimated temperature of exhaust gas at the outlet of the catalyst housing.

2. An apparatus to detect the presence of a catalyst in a catalyst housing, the apparatus comprising
a temperature module configured to detect a temperature of exhaust gas at an inlet of the catalyst housing and a temperature of exhaust gas at an outlet of the catalyst housing;
an expected time delay module configured to determine an expected time delay between the detected temperature of exhaust gas at the inlet of the catalyst housing and the detected temperature of exhaust gas at the outlet of the catalyst housing corresponding with the presence of a catalyst; and
a similarity module configured to determine a temperature similarity value based on separate and discrete input values for the detected temperature of exhaust gas at the inlet of the catalyst housing, the detected temperature of exhaust gas at the outlet of the catalyst housing, and an estimated temperature of exhaust gas at the outlet of the catalyst housing equal to an estimated temperature of exhaust gas at the inlet of the catalyst housing delayed by the estimated expected time delay;
wherein a catalyst is present if the determined temperature similarity value is above a first threshold and a catalyst is not present if the determined temperature similarity value is below a second threshold; wherein the temperature similarity value is defined as the parameter a that solves the optimization problem

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and wherein â is the estimated similarity value, T o is the outlet temperature, T i is the inlet temperature, D is the expected delay, k is a discrete sample time, and the summation is over a predefined number of samples preceding the current time.

3. An apparatus to detect the presence of a catalyst in a catalyst housing, the apparatus comprising:
a temperature module configured to detect a temperature of exhaust as at an inlet of the catalyst housing and a temperature of exhaust gas at an outlet of the catalyst housing;
an expected time delay module configured to determine an expected time delay between the detected temperature of exhaust gas at the inlet of the catalyst housing and the detected temperature of exhaust gas at the outlet of the catalyst housing corresponding with the presence of a catalyst; and
a similarity module configured to determine a temperature similarity value based on separate and discrete input values for the detected temperature of exhaust gas at the inlet of the catalyst housing, the detected temperature of exhaust as at the outlet of the catalyst housing, and an estimated temperature of exhaust gas at the outlet of the catalyst housing equal to an estimated temperature of exhaust gas at the inlet of the catalyst housing delayed b

Assignees

• Lana Carlos Alcides
• Qi Baohua
• Cummins Filtration Ip Inc

Inventors

• Lana Carlos Alcides
• Qi Baohua

Classifications

• F01N2550/24

  Determining the presence or absence of an exhaust treating device · CPC title

• F01N2900/1404

  Exhaust gas temperature · CPC title

• F01N11/002 Primary

  the diagnostic devices measuring or estimating temperature or pressure in, or downstream of the exhaust apparatus · CPC title

• Y02T10/47

  Cross-Sectional Technologies · mapped topic

• Y02T10/40

  Engine management systems · CPC title