Electronic ballast having end of lamp life, overheating, and shut down protections, and reignition and multiple striking capabilities
5 Assignments
0 Petitions
Accused Products
Abstract
An electronic ballast having end of lamp life and overheating protection, and automatic reignition and multiple striking capabilities includes AC/DC rectifier, PFC/boost, inverter, and ballast protection and control circuits. The ballast protection and control circuit is operable to place the ballast in a protected state when the lamp load connected to the ballast reaches an end of lamp life condition or the ballast overheats. The ballast protection and control circuit also automatically ignites the lamp load when it is connected to the ballast and generates multiple striking attempts for hard to strike lamp loads. The ballast may be connected to AC or DC power sources and different types of lamp loads, and may include various different types of inverter circuits.
47 Citations
65 Claims
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1-11. -11. (canceled)
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12. An electronic ballast protection and control circuit, comprising:
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an end of lamp life sensing and control circuit adapted to sense an end of lamp life condition in a gas discharge lamp load connected to an electronic ballast and to cause the electronic ballast to enter an end of lamp life protected state when the end of lamp life condition occurs; and
wherein the end of lamp life sensing and control circuit is adapted to be capacitively coupled across an output of the electronic ballast, to sense the end of lamp life condition by sensing a peak-to-peak voltage that develops across the gas discharge lamp load when the end of lamp life condition occurs, to generate an end of lamp life control signal when the peak-to-peak voltage exceeds a predetermined end of lamp life reference voltage, and adapted to set the predetermined end of lamp life reference voltage using an end of lamp life reference component included in the end of lamp life sensing and control circuit. - View Dependent Claims (13, 14, 15, 16, 17)
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18. A protection and control circuit for an electronic ballast, comprising:
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an end of lamp life sensing and control circuit adapted to be capacitively coupled across an output of the electronic ballast, to sense an end of lamp life condition in a gas discharge lamp load connected to the electronic ballast and to cause the electronic ballast to enter an end of lamp life protected state when the end of lamp life condition occurs;
wherein the end of lamp life sensing and control circuit is adapted to generate an end of lamp life control signal that is used to cause the electronic ballast to enter the end of lamp life protected state; and
wherein the end of lamp life sensing and control circuit is adapted to generate the end of lamp life control signal when a DC end of lamp life reference voltage generated by the end of lamp life sensing and control circuit exceeds a predetermined DC end of lamp life reference voltage. - View Dependent Claims (19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24)
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25. A protection and control circuit for an electronic ballast, comprising:
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an overheating sensing and control circuit adapted to be capacitively coupled across an output of the electronic ballast, to sense an overheating condition in a gas discharge lamp load connected to an electronic ballast and to cause the electronic ballast to enter an overheating protected state when the overhearing condition occurs;
wherein the overheating sensing and control circuit is adapted to generate an overheating control signal that is used to cause the electronic ballast to enter the overheating protected state; and
wherein the overheating sensing and control circuit is further adapted to generate the overheating control signal only after the overheating condition occurs and using an overheating reference component included in the overheating sensing and control circuit. - View Dependent Claims (27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32)
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26. The protection and control circuit of claim 26, wherein the overheating control signal is set at a first predetermined overheating reference voltage before the overheating condition occurs and, when the overheating condition occurs, steps up to a second predetermined overheating reference voltage.
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33. A protection and control circuit for an electronic ballast, comprising:
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an overheating sensing and control circuit adapted to be capacitively coupled across an output of the electronic ballast, to sense an overheating condition in a gas discharge lamp load connected to the electronic ballast and to cause the electronic ballast to enter an overheating protected state when the overheating condition occurs;
wherein the overheating sensing and control circuit is adapted to generate an overheating control signal that is used to cause the electronic ballast to enter the overheating protected state; and
wherein the overheating sensing and control circuit is adapted to generate the overheating control signal when a DC overheating reference voltage generated by the overheating sensing and control circuit exceeds a predetermined DC overheating reference voltage. - View Dependent Claims (34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39)
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40. A control circuit for an electronic ballast, comprising:
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a reignition sensing and control circuit adapted to sense when a gas discharge lamp load is reconnected to an electronic ballast and, in response, to generate a reignition control signal that can be used to cause the electronic ballast to attempt to reignite the gas discharge lamp load;
wherein the reignition control signal is generated when a voltage across a reignition reference component included in the reignition sensing and control circuit exceeds a predetermined reignition reference voltage; and
wherein the reignition sensing and control circuit is further adapted to amplify the reignition control signal using a regenerative feedback circuit. - View Dependent Claims (41, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49)
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50. A control circuit for an electronic ballast, comprising:
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a multiple striking sensing and control circuit adapted to sense when a gas discharge lamp load connected to an electronic ballast fails to ignite in response to an initial striking attempt and, in response, to generate a multiple striking control signal that can be used to cause the electronic ballast to generate multiple striking attempts until the gas discharge lamp load ignites or a predetermined striking time period is exceeded;
the multiple striking sensing and control circuit being further adapted to generate, when the predetermined striking time period is exceeded, a lamp load failure control signal that can be used to cause the electronic ballast to enter a lamp failure protected state; and
wherein the multiple striking sensing and control circuit is still further adapted to generate the lamp load failure control signal based on a peak-to-peak voltage developed across the gas discharge lamp load. - View Dependent Claims (51, 52, 53, 54, 55, 56, 57, 58, 59, 60)
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61. A ballast protection and control circuit, comprising:
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a combined reference voltage circuit adapted to be connected to a gas discharge lamp load and an electronic ballast, the combined reference voltage circuit including a voltage divider and a rectifier/charging circuit connected to the voltage divider; and
a combined comparison circuit connected to the combined reference voltage circuit, the combined comparison circuit including a combined voltage controlled switch connected to the rectifier/charging circuit. - View Dependent Claims (62, 63, 64, 65)
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Specification