Electronic maximum measuring device

Claim 1

In a device for measuring maximum energy consumption which includes a computing device for computing the energy consumption over a fixed period of time, a non-volatile memory for storing the maximum value of energy within any one of successive fixed periods and means to store as a new value in said memory any computed value which exceeds that previously stored, said computing device being supplied with pulses representing energy consumption, the improvement comprising: (a) means in said computing device for simultaneously computing the energy consumption over a sliding measuring period in addition to computing the energy consumption over the predetermined fixed period of time comprising: (i) means for generating a clock signal; (ii) a shift register having the pulses representing energy consumption as a data input and the said clock signal as a clock input; and (iii) means for storing a pulse count, responsive to said pulses to increase its count and responsive to the output of said shift register to decrement said count, whereby the stored count will represent a mean value over a sliding period determined by said clock rate and shift register length; (b) means in said non-volatile memory for also storing the maximum value of energy within said sliding period, in addition to storing the maximum value of energy within any one of the successive fixed periods; and (c) means for also transferring into said non-volatile memory, as a new value of said maximum over said sliding period, any computed value occurring in said means for storing a pulse count during said sliding period which exceeds that previously stored as the maximum during said sliding period.