Disposal emergency cellular phone

The present invention teaches an economical disposable emergency cellular phone. A further object of the invention is a new technique for having a large number of cellular phones share the same small group of access numbers and serial numbers in order to reduce the monthly charges to zero for the end consumer.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 
As it is well known cellular phones present a tremendous advantage in 
dealing with an emergency situation. For this reason a large percentage of 
automobiles are now equipped with these phones. However, there are several 
problems with present cellular phone systems. The primary one is that the 
owner must pay a monthly charge to maintain the use of a number. A 
secondary one is that the phones present a theft risk. The third problem 
is that the usage is so convenient that one can very easily run up large 
bills. Thus, while people tend to buy a cellular phone for emergency use 
they will often end up spending a significantly larger amount of money on 
the monthly charges than have been planned. 
A number of expensive solutions for emergency cellular phones have been 
proposed. Grimes (U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,479,482 and 5,388,147) and Moore (U.S. 
Pat. No. 5,334,974) teach a cellular phone connected to a positioning 
system such as a GPS or Loran. The other art deals with cellular phones 
that are restricted to calling 911. These include Zicker (U.S. Pat. No. 
5,465,388) and Seiderman (U.S. Pat. No. 5,388,148)--although Seiderman 
also teaches an integrated credit card reader. Other art covers what might 
be called "children's" restricted phones. The patent of Boubelik (U.S. 
Pat. No. 5,365,570) has a mechanical lock over the keyboard to restrict 
the use to an emergency call button. The art of Bogusz et al (U.S. Pat. 
No. 5,203,009) and the SOS Phone (product of SOS wireless communications 
of 3000 Airway Avenue, Costa Mesa, Calif. 92626) restrict the phone to 
only being able to call two different sites. These could be, for example 
911 and home or 911 and a towing company. 
The patent of Bishop et al (U.S. Pat. No. 5,563,931) assigned to SOS 
teaches an emergency phone which requires modifications to the phone 
company equipment. These modifications would allow the call to bypass the 
normal cellular call process (col 10 lines 10-13) and to accept 
specialized numbers including a "pseudo area code" (col 19, lines 14-19). 
There is no economy in these inventions. For example, the SOS Phone 
requires the activation of an access service ($99 per year) and thus the 
phone saves no money per month. In fact, most cellular companies will give 
away a full function phone for free if one pays the monthly service. 
Thus one would have a more economical and broader function phone by simply 
signing up for the cheapest monthly service and having the discipline to 
never use the phone except for an emergency. Unfortunately, few people 
have that level of discipline or control over third parties that might 
need the phone. Thus there is a need for an economical and durable 
disposable emergency cellular phone that can be operated without the need 
to pay a monthly access fee.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION AND DETAILED DESCRIPTION 
The FIG. 1 depicts the phone with the antenna collapsed from a side and 
front view. The basic mechanical components of the phone 10 are the 
speaker and speaker section 12, the antenna 14, and the microphone section 
18. The center section 19 carries the batteries and the electronics. It 
also serves as the base for the "911" button 16. 
A spring 20 to automatically deploy the antenna is shown in the speaker 
section. In an alternative embodiment, the antenna is slid down into the 
phone body with a linear spring. When the 911 button is pushed, it 
releases the antenna which then slides out the end into a fully extended 
position. 
In one embodiment, the whole phone is made waterproof through the use of 
waterproof switches, microphone, and speakers. 
FIG. 2 shows the identical components but with the antenna extended. The 
operation of the spring is such that the antenna is normally fully 
extended. 
FIG. 3 shows the phone of this embodiment in its weatherproof pouch 30. 
This pouch could be made of any water or weather proof material including 
vinyl's, polycarbonates or other polymers. Along the front end of pouch 30 
is an embedded quick release strip 34 which has a brightly colored large 
pull tab 36. For use of the phone the tab 36 is gripped and pulled down 
the complete length of release line 34 to open the pouch and access the 
phone. This then automatically deploys the antenna due to the operation of 
the integral spring. 
On the back of the phone pouch 30 is an attachment means. In the preferred 
embodiment this is shown as a Velcro.RTM. type of mechanism 32. 
Alternatively it could be suction cups for glass or adhesives for metal. 
Further alternatives would include magnets for metal. The Velcro works 
particularly well for the roof cloth or floor carpeting of many cars. Yet 
another alternative attachment mechanism would be a combination of Velcro 
and magnet for universal attachment as shown using the magnets 38 embedded 
in the pouch. 
The pouch is transparent to make the phone contents very obvious in an 
emergency situation. 
Due to the presence of dedicated integrated circuits the electronic portion 
of a conventional cellular phone design is doable by anyone skilled in the 
art of electrical engineering. The circuit in FIG. 4 in meant to be 
broadly illustrative. The circuitry is not meant to be in great detail as 
that is no longer necessary with this art. Speaker 40 is coupled through 
capacitors 42 and 44 to audio controller 60. The audio controller 60 
receives a demodulated audio line 62 from the RF section chip 66. That RF 
section chip receives the RF signal from antenna 68. Microswitch 17 is 
shown connected to the power supply chip for automatically turning on the 
phone after the antenna is deployed as shown in FIG. 1 and 2. 
Microphone 46 is coupled through capacitors 48 and 50 and resistors 52, 54, 
56, and 58 into the audio controller 60. The audio controller then sends 
the "audio out" signal on line 64 into the RF section 66 for final 
transmission out on antenna 68. When the call button 16 is depressed the 
microprocessor microcontroller 70 interprets this and activates the 
appropriate sequences and the digital controller 72 would then give the 
appropriate controls to the audio controller 60. Digital controller 72 is 
clocked by a crystal oscillator comprising capacitors 74 and 76, crystal 
78, and resistor 80. 
All of the electronic components are powered by battery 76 through the 
power supply chip 74. 
A representative audio controller is the TCM 8010 of Texas Instruments, 
P.O. Box 655303, Dallas, Tex. 75265. A representative RF section IC is the 
TRF 1015 from Texas Instruments. There are numerous manufacturers of 
microprocessors or microcontrollers. Sample devices are the 8051 or 8032 
available from numerous electronic manufactures. A representative of the 
digital controller is the TCM 8002 from Texas Instruments. Representative 
power supply ICs are the TPS9013 or the TPS9104 both of Texas Instruments. 
The battery 76 is a permanently installed primary cell such as an alkaline 
or manganese dioxide cell. The cell must provide high peak currents in 
transmission but otherwise is not required to have extremely high 
longevity. By having a permanent primary cell there is an economy over the 
use of an expensive rechargeable cell and also over the use of a 
changeable primary cell due to the expense of the battery holders chambers 
and doors. These battery holders, chambers, and doors for a battery 
chamber also introduce reliability problems. Microswitch 17 is activated 
by the antenna springing out and thus automatically turning on the device. 
FIG. 5 depicts the circuit modifications to allow for the automatic crash 
activation feature. The three axis acceleration sensor 100 will detect the 
sudden acceleration from a crash and pass this on to amplifier 102 and 
then on to the microprocessor and microcontroller 70. If a sufficient 
force is detected then the device will turn on automatically and begin 
pulsing through transistor 104 to pulse integral light 106. The light 106 
is also used to light up the 911 button after the antenna is deployed. The 
process microcontroller will also signal the rapid beeping through the 
phone speaker 40 which is shown in FIG. 4. 
If the phone is not operated within 5 minutes of the "crash" then it 
automatically turns off to save battery life. Alternatively the phone 
could include a "hang-up" button which could also stop the flashing and 
pulsing. 
Suitable acceleration sensors are available from Analog Devices of Norwich, 
Mass. 
FIG. 6 show the flow chart for the operation of the phone with particular 
attention to the unique feature that allows the operation of the phone 
without the customer having to pay a monthly access fee for a private 
number. 
The provider (distributor) of the disposable emergency cellular phones will 
pay a monthly fee for a few phone numbers. Each of these phone numbers 
(Pn) comes with a serial number (Sn) which will be transmitted with the 
phone number in order to log on to the cellular system. (A conventional 
cellular phone also tranmits its phone number and a unique serial number 
when it logs on. The serial number is kept private and is matched with the 
phone to minimize fraudulent usage.) One feature of this invention is that 
thousands of the disposable emergency phones could share a small set of 
phone numbers (Pn) and matching serial numbers (Sn). 
In operation the first step is to wait for the 911 button depression 200. 
Step 202 is to log on with Pn1 and Sn1. Step 204 is to verify that "log 
on" is established. If it is established then the method proceeds on to 
step 206 which is to transmit the 911 number. Then step 208 begins a 
timer. Finally, at step 210 the device will disable further transmissions 
when the timer reaches 60 minutes. In an alternative embodiment, a counter 
is used to limit the number of 911 calls to a small fixed number, say 5. 
The total talking time would then be limited only by the battery life and 
the patience of the 911 operators. If at step 204 "log on" was not 
established then the method proceeds to step 212 which is to verify that a 
carrier is present. If no carrier is detected then the method returns to 
step 202 to attempt to log on again. If the carrier is detected then the 
method proceeds to step 214 and increments to the next phone number and 
serial number. It then attempts in (step 216) another log-on. The reason 
for the attempt for different numbers is that it is conceivable that two 
customers would both be trying to make a 911 call at the exact same time. 
Were that to occur the first caller would normally lock out that number 
nationwide and prevent the second caller from getting through. Thus a 
disposable cellular phone provider would have a few numbers that a minimal 
monthly service fee is paid for. The system could try the phone and serial 
numbers in a fixed or random fashion. 
Alternatively the phone could simply log on with a public phone number and 
transmit a 311 or 911 call since many regions of the country require phone 
companies to accept 311 and 911 calls regardless of the account status.