Addressable vehicular lighting system
First Claim
1. A vehicular lighting system for a vehicle comprising:
- multiple semiconductor based light sources each providing a light output;
at least two of said light sources having a different wavelength within the visible spectrum;
means for independently controlling current to said light sources to control the intensity of their outputs; and
fiber coupling means for transmitting light from said light sources to at least one optical load on said vehicle.
1 Assignment
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Accused Products
Abstract
A vehicle with a plurality of individually addressable light sources, preferably semiconductor laser light sources or light emitting diodes, each of which produce a beam of light, are optically coupled to a fiber optic waveguide. The laser light sources are grouped together preferably at a single location within the vehicle for easy access and conveniently located within the vehicle. Fiber waveguides distally transmits the beams to the optical loads of the vehicle, including the brake lights, taillights, instrumentation lights and turn signals. Each fiber optic waveguide may be a single optical fiber, such as a multimode fiber, having a numerical aperture large enough to receive illumination from a plurality of light sources. In cases where some optical loads require a larger flux or brightness of light, such as vehicular headlights, which may greater than a single optic fiber can transmit, the waveguide may comprise of a bundle of optical fibers. Multiple light sources to a single optical output load allows switching to another operational light source or increase the intensity of remaining light sources should one light source fail. In this manner, the operational life of the vehicular lighting system is increased. Also disclosed is circuitry for operating applications of the system as well as illustrating the employment of color wavelength laser light sources.
102 Citations
18 Claims
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1. A vehicular lighting system for a vehicle comprising:
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multiple semiconductor based light sources each providing a light output; at least two of said light sources having a different wavelength within the visible spectrum; means for independently controlling current to said light sources to control the intensity of their outputs; and fiber coupling means for transmitting light from said light sources to at least one optical load on said vehicle. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12)
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13. A vehicular lighting system comprising:
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a plurality of semiconductor based light emitting sources located in a compartment at a central location within a vehicle; light from said light sources coupled into a plurality of optical fibers; at least some of said fibers distributed to separate optical loads on said vehicle; a temperature controller in said compartment for sensing the temperature of said light sources to maintain the operating temperature of said lights sources at a predetermined temperature condition within the compartment independent of environmental vehicular temperatures external of the compartment. - View Dependent Claims (14)
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15. A vehicular lighting system comprising:
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multiple semiconductor light sources comprising different wavelengths providing different visible colors; light from said multiple light sources coupled to a plurality of multimode fibers; at least one optical load coupled to receive at least two different wavelengths of light from said sources; a dispersion means at said optical load onto which outputs of said two different wavelengths of light from said sources is directed; and control means to selectively display one or more of said wavelengths at a given time so that several different colors can be selectively produced on said load lens. - View Dependent Claims (16, 17, 18)
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Specification