Holographic CHMSL including a hologram assembly and a refractive element laminarly attached thereto for diverging zero order beam

• US 5,488,493 A
• Filed: 11/01/1993
• Issued: 01/30/1996
• Est. Priority Date: 11/01/1993
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Delphi Technologies, Inc. (BorgWarner Incorporated)
• Original Assignee: Hughes Aircraft Company (Rtx Corporation)
• Inventors: Moss, Gaylord E.
• Primary Examiner(s): Gonzalez, Frank
• Assistant Examiner(s): VIERRA EISENBERG, JASON D
• Application Number:
  US08/146,244
• Time in Patent Office: 820 Days
• Field of Search: 340/468, 340/479, 362/80.1, 359/13-15, 359/19, 359/22, 359/742, 359/710
• US Class Current: 359/13
• CPC Class Codes: B60Q 1/302 mounted in the vicinity, e.g. in the middle, of a rear window
• CPC Class Codes: G03H 1/0256 having specific functional layer
• CPC Class Codes: G03H 1/2202 Reconstruction geometries or arrangements
• CPC Class Codes: G03H 2223/17 Element having optical power

Abstract

A holographic center high mounted stoplight system that includes a light source for providing a nearly collimated beam, an expanding lens responsive to the nearly collimated beam for providing a diverging or converging reconstruction beam, and a stoplight hologram responsive to the expanding beam for producing stoplight illumination. Also disclosed is a holographic center high mounted stoplight system that includes a light source for providing a nearly collimated beam, a light bending hologram for providing a diffracted near collimated beam, and an expanding stoplight lens array responsive to the diffracted near collimated beam for providing non-collimated stoplight illumination.

Claims

1. A holographic stoplight system comprising:

means for providing a near collimated beam;

an expanding lens responsive to the nearly collimated beam for providing a diverging reconstruction beam;

a stoplight hologram assembly responsive to the diverging reconstruction beam for producing stoplight illumination; and

wherein said expanding lens and said hologram assembly are laminarly attached to each other.

2. The holographic stoplight system of claim 1 wherein said expanding lens comprises a negative lens.

3. The holographic stoplight system of claim 2 wherein said negative lens is a cylindrical lens.

4. The holographic stoplight system of claim 2 wherein said negative lens is a Fresnel lens.

5. The holographic stoplight system of claim 1 wherein said expanding lens comprises a positive lens that provides a converging beam that converges to a focus that is close to the hologram assembly, wherein said converging beam thereafter diverges.

6. The holographic stoplight system of claim 5 wherein said positive lens is a cylindrical lens.

7. The holographic stoplight system of claim 5 wherein said positive lens is a Fresnel lens.

8. The holographic stoplight system of claim 1 wherein said laminarly attached expanding lens and hologram assembly are secured to a rear window of a vehicle.

9. The holographic stoplight system of claim 1 wherein said expanding lens comprises a red filter.

10. A holographic stoplight system comprising:

a source of near collimated light;

an array of holographic cells arranged in rows and columns;

an array of cylindrical lenses respectively associated with the rows of said array of holographic cells and responsive to said near collimated light for illuminating each row of said array of holographic cells with a respective diverging reconstruction beam; and

wherein said array of cylindrical lenses and said array of holographic cells are laminarly attached to each other.

11. The holographic stoplight system of claim 10 wherein said array of cylinder lenses comprises an array of negative cylinder lenses.

12. The holographic stoplight system of claim 10 wherein said array of cylinder lenses comprises an array of positive cylinder lenses

13. The holographic stoplight system of claim 10 wherein said laminarly attached array of cylinder lenses array and array of hologram cells are secured to a rear window of a vehicle.

14. The holographic stoplight system of claim 10 wherein said array of cylinder lenses comprises a red filter.

15. A holographic stoplight system comprising:

means for providing a near collimated beam;

a light bending hologram responsive to said near collimated beam for producing a diffracted near collimated beam;

a refractive stoplight lens responsive to said diffracted near collimated beam for producing stop-light illumination; and

wherein said light bending hologram and said refractive stoplight lens are laminarly attached to each other.

16. The holographic stoplight system of claim 15 wherein said light bending hologram and stoplight lens are secured to a rear window of a vehicle.