PATENT CLAIM ANALYSIS

Application Number: 15760136
Application Type: Utility
Filing Date: 2018-03
Publication Date: 2018-09
Patent Classification: ["700", "282000"]

Abstract:
A recording means records a value of pressure of fluid on a downstream side of a differential pressure generation means during a time period after a flow control valve open and control of a flow rate is started or after the flow control valve is closed and the control of a flow rate is stopped until a measured flow rate becomes stable, and a diagnostic means contrasts a controlled value acquired based in a value of the pressure of the fluid on the downstream side recorded by the recording means, with a controlled value when abnormality has not occurred, and diagnoses that abnormality has occurred in the flow meter when a difference between the both controlled values exceeds a threshold. Thereby, a mass flow controller and a diagnostic method which can simply diagnose generation of abnormality in a differential pressure type flow meter without requiring time only for performing the diagnosis.

Claim (Index 21):
A mass flow controller comprising:\n a flow meter configured to provide a measured flow rate of a fluid based on:\n a value of a first pressure that is a pressure of said fluid on an upstream side of a differential pressure generation means interposed in a path of said fluid; and \n a value of a second pressure that is a pressure of said fluid on a downstream side of said differential pressure generation means; \n a flow control valve configured to control the flow rate of said fluid; and a control means configured to output a control signal to said flow control valve such that the measured flow rate matches a set flow rate that is a target value of the flow rate of said fluid; wherein said mass flow controller further comprises: a recording means configured to record both, or either one of, an opening pressure value and a closing pressure value;\n wherein the opening pressure value is a value of said second pressure during a time period after said flow control valve changes from a closed state to an open state and control of the flow rate is started until said measured flow rate becomes stable; \n wherein the closing pressure value is a value of said second pressure during a time period after said flow control valve changes from the open state to the closed state and control of the flow rate is stopped until said measured flow rate becomes zero; and \n a diagnostic means configured to diagnose that an abnormality has occurred in said flow meter when an absolute value of a difference between a measured controlled value and an initial controlled value exceeds a predetermined threshold;\n wherein the measured controlled value is a controlled value acquired based on both, or either one of, said opening pressure value and said closing pressure value; and \n wherein the initial controlled value is said controlled value when the abnormality has not occurred in said flow meter.

Metadata:
- Claim Count in Document: 5.0
- Percentile: 90.0
- Lexical Diversity: 2.12162
- Patent Class: 700.0
- Transitional Phrase Type: open
- Component Type: 1
- Foreign Priority: True
- Related Applications: ['12513353', '13651089', '13250602', '12065438', '14671746']

Analysis Scores:
- 35 USC 101 Eligibility (BERT): 0.3747552442240956
- 35 USC 102 Novelty (BERT): 0.4779026987025095
- Combined Prediction Score: 0.385069989671937
- Mean Citation Score: 209.490862
- Max Citation Score: 230.46364
- Similarity Product: 197.39829598993305

Labels:
- Claim Label 101: 1
- Claim Label 102: 0
- Claim Label 103: 1
- Claim Label 112: 1
- Combined Label: 0
- Label 101 Adjusted: 1

Dataset: test