GB2133296A - A scoring device for a game of darts - Google Patents

Abstract

An electronic scoring device for a game of darts having a scoring keyboard in the form of a representation of a dart board, the keys of which are located in scoring positions of the representative dart board. The keyboard is connected electronically to a display for indicating players' scores in a separate and subtractive accumulative manner as required by the rules of the game, upon actuation of the appropriate keys in those representative scoring positions corresponding to the scoring positions achieved by a player in a single throw of a multiple dart throw sequence. <IMAGE>

Description

SPECIFICATION A scoring device for a game of darts Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a scoring device for recording and computing the scores of players in teams in the above game of darts, and displaying such recorded and computed information on a continuous basis as the game proceeds.

Background of the Invention Hitherto, or at least until relatively recently, the running total of the score in a game of darts between two players has been indicated in chalk on a blackboard by the players involved. Such a method, while being reasonably suitable in certain environments such as pubs and in the home, is certainly not appropriate where the game is played on a professional basis. Apart from being unwieldy the accumulation of chalk dust within the room in which the dart board is situated is most undesirable resulting in, apart from anything else, an environmental hazard.

Accordingly resort has been made to electronic means for effecting the calculations involved necessitating only the pressing of buttons and the reading of digital displays to enable the score during any particular game to be worked out.

Summary of the Invention It is an object of the present invention to provide an improved scoring device for the game of darts which by means of its design is simple to operate, and totally obviates the old fashioned manual method of chalk and blackboard as described above.

According to the invention there is provided a scoring device for a game of darts comprising display means for displaying a respective player's score during a game, characterised in the provision of a keyboard in the form of a representation of a dart board, the keys of which are located in scoring positions of the representative dart board, and operating means whereby the score of said respective player is displayed in said display means in response to selective actuation of the appropriate ones of said keys corresponding to the scoring posjtions attained by said respective player during a multiple dart throw sequence in the game.

The advantage of this arrangement is that scoring is made much easier and quicker, since on the one hand, the pressing of a single key registers immediately a score corresponding to the score achieved by a single dart throw, while on the other, the choice of which key to press is rendered very simple due to the fact that the appropriate key in the keyboard is positioned in that scoring position achieved by the player after he has thrown his dart.

Other features and advantages of the present invention will become apparent from the following description of a preferred embodiment of the invention taken with reference to the accompanying drawings wherein Figure 1 shows a front view of a scoring device for playing a game of darts, and Figure 2 illustrates an electronic circuit for operating a scoring device for playing a game of darts according to the invention.

The scoring device shown in Figure 1 comprises a fascia panel 1 divided into an upper display section 2 for scoring a particular game and lower section 3 for operating the score display section 2.

On the lower section 3 is mounted an electronically operated keyboard 4 in the form of a representation of a dart board. As shown the keys 5 of the keyboard 4 are mounted in the respective scoring positions of the dart board, each key 5 being preferably marked with a number corresponding to the score achieved by a dart landing in that scoring position. For example the key in double twenty is marked (40), the key in single twenty is marked (20) and that in treble twenty is marked (60). Actuation of the individual keys of the keyboard causes that number appearing on any particular key being pressed (or number corresponding to the value of the scoring position in which the key is located) to register in a predetermined position in the score display section 2 as will be explained hereinafter.

The score display section 2 is provided with a first display portion 6 having two electrically operated L.E.D. displays 7 each of which is capable of displaying up to four digits. The displays 7 indicate the respective running totals of two players during a particular game and for convenience in this description, the various manipulative scoring steps during a game will be referred to as left hand or right hand operations on the scoring device as viewed in the drawing.

A second display portion 8 having an L.E.D.

display 9 is arranged beneath the displays 7 in which can be entered by means of thumb wheels the decided score to be diminished for example 10001,501,301 etc.

Beneath the display 9 is a third display portion 10 having an L.E.D. display 11 capable of displaying up to three digits, in which can be registered the score achieved by a player in a single dart throw and an accumulated score after a multiple dart throw sequence.

The display section 2 is also provided with a game start button 12 situated between the display portions 6 and 8, while the display portion 8 is provided with a score transfer button 1 3 for the left hand and right hand player, with appropriate lights 1 3A, and the display portion 10 with a recall button 14 to recall previous combined totals one at a time, and a combined score clear switch 1 5.

In the event that an error occurs during the entering in of the score total in display 11, a cancel entry control 1 6 is provided for cancelling the digits entered in the display 11 prior to the subtraction or score transfer buttons 13 being operated. In this way a corrected score can be entered and the subtraction made using agreed accurate figures.

The device operates as follows. The initial score to be diminished for example 501 is entered in the display 9 by setting the thumb wheel switches as required. Subsequent to this step the game start switch 12 is operated at which time all previous totals displayed are cleared and the score to be diminished set by the thumb wheel switches 13, displayed on both game total displays 7.

Subsequent to pressing the game start switch 12 the light 1 3A for the score switch 13 for the left hand player becomes illuminated indicating that the player to start will use the left hand score transfer button 13 in the display portion 8 to transfer his scores for totalising in the left hand segment display 7 in the upper display portion 6.

The left hand player than throws a dart and for example strikes treble twenty. He then pushes the treble twenty key in the corresponding scoring position on the keyboard 4 and sixty will be displayed in numerals on the L.E.D. display 11.

The player then throws a second dart in the normai three dart throw sequence, and if for example he strikes a single one the single one key on the keyboard 4 is pushed and sixty one in numerals will appear on the display 11.

Subsequently if with his third dart he strikes single eighteen the pushing of the appropriate key on the keyboard 4 will accumulate the score in the display 11 and seventy nine in numerals will appear thereon.

If by mistake a fourth key is pressed the incorrect score illuminating button 1 6 will flash and the electronic circuit arrangement is such that the score will not be deducted from the game total or score to be diminished appearing in displays 7 according to which of the left hand or right hand players are involved.

Assuming that the agreed correct score is entered in the L.E.D. display 11 , operation of the appropriate score transfer button 1 3 will effect subtraction of the score appearing in the display 11 from the score to be diminished in the appropriate one of the displays 7. If for example the wrong score transfer button 1 3 is pressed there will be a nil response from the device.

Once a score transfer has taken place the other score transfer button 1 3 for the other player will be indicated by illumination of the appropriate light 1 3A and he will then commence to throw his darts and the process will be repeated. As will be understood from the rules of the game of darts a position will be reached during the changing score when one player will have reached zero before the other. In this situation if the score to be deducted is the same as the figure reached in the changing score the pressing of the appropriate score transfer switch 13 will result in both game total displays 7 flashing for five seconds thus indicating the end of the game. The game start switch 12 can then be pressed to set up for a new game.

If the score to be deducted on the other hand is greater than the game total the command to transfer the score will be ignored and the score display 11 will return to zero.

Apart from the initial manual step of entering the decided score to be diminished in the display 11, the scoring device as described is wholly electrically operable by electronic circuitry attached to the rear of the fascia panel 1. The operation of the device during a particular game as described above, will indicate to those skilled in the art the nature of such circuitry required to effect the arithmetical and logic processing involved.

A typical circuit for operating the device of Figure 1 is shown in Figure 2. The circuit consists of four sections as follows; 1. Power supply and regulation circuitry.

2. Keyboard array circuit.

3. Display driver circuit.

4. Microcomputer circuit.

Power Supply and Regulation Circuitry The power supply unit P shown in Figure 2, consists of a mains transformer, rectifier and smoothing capacitor, all of which are mounted within a 3-pin mains adaptor. The output from this circuit as shown, is low voltage unregulated DC.

The regulation circuitry is located on the main PCB (Printed Circuit Board) and consists of a regulator IC (Integrated Circuit), loading resistor and line and load smoothing capacitors. In addition decoupling capacitors are utilised at various points in the regulation circuit, in order to smooth any noise generated by the circuit compon-ents.

Keyboard Array Circuit The keyboard array K, consists of 67 pushcontact switches, arranged in a 6 x 8 array (as shown some switches are connected directly across each other) and connected to two of the parallel parts of the microcomputer in the microcomputer circuit M. One of the parts is configured to drive the keyboard array, and the second to read data from the array. The second part has eight pull-up resistors, one per data line, to ensure that the array does not give erroneous data when there are no switches depressed.

In the circuit shown, it will also be noted that a game select switch G is provided, for automatically registering the score to be diminished in the display 2 of the device shown in Figure 1. This is a variation on the thumb-wheel actuating mechanism mentioned in the earlier description with regard to Figure 1. As shown, a separate input line, with its own pull-up resistor, is used to sample the state of the game select switch G.

The 67 push contact switches correspond respectively to the 60 key operated scoring positions 5 in the dart board representation 3 of the scoring device, the two clear and recall buttons 14 and 15, the two score transfer buttons 13, and the game start switch 12. The switches 12, 13, 14 and 1 5 are indicated in the keyboard array section in the circuit of Figure 2.

Display Driver Circuit The display driver circuit D consists of a digit selector IC, data recoding IC's, voltage regulating resistors and LED's, (light emitting diodes) arranged in common cathode formation.

Data is presented in the re-coding IC's and strobed into their internal registers by a pulse produced by the selector IC in response to a code loaded by the microcomputer into its temporary register. The re-coding IC's transform this data to the format required for the seven segment displays of the displays 1 and 10, and also provide sufficient current for these displays. The voltage regulation resistors are used to ensure that the LED's are not over-drawn. The three separate LED's are treated as if they are three separate segments of another digit.

Microcomputer Circuit The microcomputer circuit M consists of a microcomputer IC, a quartz crystal and a restart circuit. The microcomputer IC contains sufficient circuitry to cause the crystal to oscillate and provide timing signals to the microcomputer. The restart circuit provides a restart signal when power is switched on, and also when the game start switch 12, is depressed, and consists of a pull-up resistor, capacitor (normally charged) and over-voltage protection diode and switch set-up to discharge the capacitor.

The microcomputer IC consists of a microprocessor, memory array, four parallel input/output ports, crystal oscillator circuits and timing circuits. It is used to control the whole unit to provide the mathematical calculations required as each game progresses and to maintain records of various values as required by the special keys on the dart board representation 4.

Claims (10)

1. A scoring device for a game of darts comprising display means for displaying a respective players score during a game, characterised in the provision of a keyboard in the form of a representation of a dart board, the keys of which are located in scoring positions of the representative dart board, and operating means whereby the score of said respective player is displayed in said display means in reponse to selective actuation of the appropriate ones of said keys corresponding to the scoring positions attained by said respective player during a multiple dart throw sequence in the game.

2. A scoring device as claimed in Claim 1 wherein said display means comprises a first display in the form of a pair of segmented displays for the scores to be diminished by each respective player, a second display in the form of a single segmented display for the score obtained by a player after a dart throw sequence, and said operating means includes actuating means for effecting subtraction of the score or accumulated score of a respective player from the score to be diminished of that respective player, in the appropriate one of said pair of segmented displays.

3. A scoring device as claimed in Claim 2 wherein said second display includes clear and recall switches for the score obtained by a respective player.

4. A scoring device as claimed in Claim 3 wherein said actuating means includes a score transfer switch for each respective player actuable in turn to reduce the score to be diminished by the score obtained, subsequent to a multiple dart throw sequence, by a respective player.

5. A scoring device as claimed in Claim 4 wherein a game-start switch is provided and actuatable to clear all previous totals in said first and second displays.

6. A scoring device as claimed in Claim 5 wherein an indicating light is positioned adjacent each said score transfer switch, each indicating light providing an indication of a respective players turn to perform a dart throw sequence subsequent to initiation of said game-start switch.

7. A scoring device as claimed in Claim 6 wherein a further single segmented display is provided indicating the score to be diminished throughout a game.

8. A scoring device as claimed in Claim 7 wherein said single segmented display is thumbwheel operable.

9. A scoring device as claimed in Claim 7 wherein said single segmented display is electrically operable.

10. A scoring device as claimed in Claim 1 provided with means for indicating a foul dart throw sequence.

1 A scoring device for a game of darts comprising a first display for the score to be diminished, a second display for the score obtained by a player after a single dart throw, an electrically operated keyboard in the form of a representation of a dart board, the keys of which are located in the respective scoring positions of the dart board and can be selectively actuated to provide electrical control signals automatically to register the score in said second display obtained by a player after a single throw and with successive actuation to thereafter accumulate the score of that player in said second display in a multiple dart throw sequence, and means for effecting subtraction of the score or accumulated score in said second display from said score to be diminished at said first display.