Dairy Teat Treatment Buffer Device for Liquid Changeover Detection
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Solution Overview
Problem
Dairy animal treatment assemblies often detect false positive liquid changeovers, leading to unnecessary actions and potential harm from incorrect liquids being delivered, such as acid or lye instead of teat treatment liquid, due to inadequate detection methods.
Innovation Solution
The assembly includes a buffer device connected to the liquid line with a through-flow cell, an impedance meter, and an optical detector to measure impedance and color characteristics, allowing for reliable detection of liquid presence and changeovers, preventing false alarms and ensuring safety by maintaining a buffer of teat treatment liquid.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Measurement precision
If a sensor system with through-flow cell is used to detect liquid changeovers, then liquid changeover detection capability is improved, but false positive detections increase leading to unnecessary actions
Solution Approach 1:
A buffer device is positioned between the liquid supply and the treatment device, pre-filled with the correct teat treatment liquid. This buffer acts as a safety reservoir that ensures the correct liquid is delivered even if a false positive changeover detection occurs downstream, preventing harmful actions before they can affect the animal
Solution Approach 2:
The buffer device serves as a protective cushion that absorbs the impact of false positive detections. By maintaining a reserve of correct liquid in the buffer, the system is cushioned against the harmful effects of incorrect liquid delivery, allowing time for corrective measures while ensuring animal safety
2Speed
If direct liquid line connection is used for quick response to liquid changeovers, then response time is improved, but safety is reduced because incorrect liquid can be delivered immediately
Solution Approach 1:
The buffer device acts as an intermediary element inserted into the liquid delivery system. It mediates between the liquid supply and the treatment device, ensuring that even if a changeover is detected downstream, the buffer's contents are delivered first, preventing direct contact between the animal and potentially incorrect liquid
Solution Approach 2:
The buffer is pre-filled with the correct liquid and positioned to deliver this liquid first. This preliminary action ensures that the correct liquid is administered to the animal before any potential incorrect liquid from a changeover could reach the treatment point, maintaining safety while allowing quick response
3Reliability
If buffer device is added to provide safety buffer, then safety and operational convenience are improved, but device complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The buffer device is merged with the existing liquid delivery system, utilizing the same through-flow cell and sensor infrastructure. This integration approach allows the buffer to provide safety functionality while minimizing additional complexity by sharing common components and pathways with the existing system
Applied Scientific Principles
This section explains which scientific principles are used to turn an abstract innovation direction into a practical engineering solution.
Function Achieved in This Case
The solution significantly reduces false positive alarms, ensures the delivery of the correct teat treatment liquid, and provides a buffer to allow for corrective measures, enhancing both animal safety and operational convenience by accurately detecting liquid changes and preventing incorrect liquid delivery.
Implementation Method 1
the sensor system comprises an impedance meter which is configured to measure the impedance value of the liquid in the through-flow cell
Implementation Method 2
at least one optical detector to measure and determine a value of an optical colour characteristic of the liquid in the through-flow cell
Implementation Method 3
the optical detector is configured to emit light and transmit it through the through-flow cell, and is also configured to pick up and measure an intensity for at least two wavelengths of light which has passed along one or more optical paths through the through-flow cell
Data Source
Figure 1
Figure 2~3
Figure 4~6
AI summary
Dairy animal treatment assembly, comprising a teat treatment device to apply a liquid, a control device for the teat treatment device, wherein the teat treatment device comprises a liquid line and a sensor system with: - a through-flow cell (2) - a detector device (6) to measure a characteristic of the liquid in the cell (2) and to generate an associated detector signal, and - a sensor control (7) which is configured to analyse the detector signal, configured to detect a liquid changeover (8) in the through-flow cell (2) if a change per time unit in the detector signal and/or a change in the detector signal is greater than a predefined change threshold value or than a predefined threshold value, wherein the dairy animal treatment assembly furthermore comprises a storage container (30) for the liquid and a buffer device (24), wherein the buffer device (24) is directly connected to the liquid line (27), and wherein the storage container (30) and the buffer device (24) are directly interconnected by means of a buffer delivery line, wherein the buffer delivery line comprises the through-flow cell (2).