JPH05101298A - Traffic signal - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To provide a traffic signal which is light-weight and has a long life and has such constitution that the traffic signal is seen well even at the time of shining of the sunlight into the traffic signal by constituting one indicator lamp of plural light emitting diodes (LED). CONSTITUTION:An indicator lamp 3 consists of plural LED groups 32 covered with a white transparent cover 31. In this case, an LED group 32R for read light emission, an LED group 32G for green light emission, and an LED group 32B for blue light emission are alternately arranged in this order on concentric circles on the surface of an LED attaching substrate 33. These LED arrays are driven by an LED driver 34, and driving is controlled by a control unit 35. Only LED arrays 32R for red light emission are driven in the case of red light emission, and LED arrays 32G for green light emission and LED arrays 32B for blue light emission are simultaneously driven in the case of blue light emission. LED arrays 32R for red light emission and LED arrays 32 for green light emission are simultaneously driven in the case of yellow light emission.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a traffic signal installed at a road intersection or the like.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art As is well known, a traffic signal installed at a road intersection or the like has a structure in which three indicator lights corresponding to display colors are horizontally arranged and are supported by columns. Has become. The indicator lamp of each color includes a colored light-transmitting cover corresponding to each color and a white light source lamp covered by the cover. In addition, each indicator light has a visor to avoid the sun.

[0003]

Although such a traffic signal is very commonly used, it has the following points to be improved. First of all, the lamp for the light source is burned out depending on its life, so that it needs to be replaced more frequently than other parts. In addition, since three indicator lamps, which are considerably heavy, are usually attached to the upper end side of the column, the installation work is not easy. Furthermore, although there is an eaves for awning, it has a drawback that it is difficult to know whether the light is on or not when the sun directly hits the cover.

An object of the present invention is to propose a traffic signal device having a new structure capable of solving the problems of the generally known traffic signal device.

[0005]

In order to solve the above problems, the inventor of the present invention pays attention to a light emitting diode, which has been attracting attention in recent years, and uses the light emitting diode to construct a traffic signal. We try to solve each of the problems at once.

That is, the traffic signal of the present invention is characterized in that the indicator light is composed of a plurality of light emitting diodes. Here, the traffic signal usually requires three-color display. To this end, the indicator light is provided with a plurality of first light emitting diode groups which emit light of a first color, and
The second light emitting diode group may emit a second color different from the second color. For example, by using light emitting diodes whose emission colors are green and red, when a blue light indicating passage is permitted, a group of light emitting diodes emitting green light is emitted,
The red light emitting diode group may be caused to emit light when the red color indicating the passage is prohibited is lit. In this case, if both of the light emitting diode groups are made to emit light at the same time when the yellow light that calls attention to traffic is lit, an emission color close to yellow as a whole can be produced.

In order to obtain a light emission color close to the light emission color of currently used traffic signals, the indicator light may be composed of a group of light emitting diodes which emit light in red, green and blue. In this case, when the blue light is turned on, the light emitting diode groups that emit the blue light and the green light are emitted. Further, when yellow is lit, a group of light emitting diodes that emit red and green light is emitted. When the red light is turned on, only the light emitting diode group that emits the red light needs to be emitted.

[0008]

Embodiments of the present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings.

FIG. 1 shows the overall construction of the traffic signal device of this example. As shown in this figure, the traffic signal 1 of this example
Has a structure in which only one indicator light 3 is attached to the upper end side of the column 2.

FIG. 2 shows the structure of the indicator lamp 3 and an outline of its drive control circuit. First, the indicator lamp 3 is composed of a plurality of light emitting diode (LED) groups 32 covered by a white transparent cover 31. In this example, LEs are concentrically formed on the surface of the LED mounting substrate 33.
D is arranged. In each concentric circle, red emission,
The LEDs 32R, 32G, and 32B for green light emission and blue light emission are alternately arranged in this order. These LED rows are driven by the LED driver 34, and drive control is performed by the control unit 35. Since the structure of the LED itself and its drive control system are known, detailed description thereof is omitted in this specification.

In the traffic signal 1 of this example, each LED row is driven as follows to display red, blue and yellow.
First, in the case of red light emission, the red light emitting LED row 32R
Only the light source is driven and emits light. Next, in the case of blue light emission, the green light emitting LED row 32G and the blue light emitting LED row 32 are simultaneously driven. As a result, a luminescent color that is very close to the blue display of the currently used traffic signal is reproduced. On the other hand, in the case of yellow light emission, the LED row 32R for red light emission and the LED row 32G for green light emission are simultaneously driven, and an orange light emission color close to yellow which is a mixed color thereof is obtained.

Thus, in the traffic signal of this example,
It has the following advantages over commonly used traffic signals.

Since only one indicator light is required, the weight of the traffic signal can be reduced. For this reason, the manufacturing cost of the support pillar or the like can be reduced accordingly.

Since the LED has a long service life and the lamp does not burn out, maintenance and inspection at intervals as in the past is unnecessary.

Low power consumption.

Since the light emitting source itself emits light of a fixed color, it is not difficult to see even if the cover is hit by the sun and the eaves need not be installed.

In addition, in the traffic signal of this example, three types of monochromatic LEDs are used so that three colors of light can be emitted. By doing so, the indicator lamp can be manufactured at a lower cost than in the case of using an expensive LED capable of emitting multiple colors, which emits light in a plurality of colors. Furthermore, in this example, the blue light is emitted from the green light emitting LED and the blue light emitting LED.
This is done by causing and to emit light at the same time. By doing so, there is an advantage that the emission color similar to the blue color of the currently used traffic signal can be reproduced as described above. In addition to this, the LED emitting blue light has a drawback that it has a lower brightness and is more expensive than LEDs emitting other colors, but if it does this, it has sufficient brightness that can be used as a traffic light. There is also an advantage that blue light emission can be performed, and the indicator lamp can be manufactured at a low cost as compared with the case of using a large number of blue light emitting LEDs.

In this example, the LEDs are arranged concentrically. As an LED arranging method, any method may be adopted as long as it is an arraying method in which LEDs of respective colors are distributed and arranged as evenly as possible.

Next, a description will be given of an example in which an indicator lamp of a traffic signal is constructed by using an LED lamp which emits multicolor light. FIG. 3 shows an indicator lamp configured by arranging two-color LED lamps in a matrix. In this indicator lamp 5, a large number of two-color LED lamps 5 are provided on the surface of the substrate 51 at the intersections of a large number of vertical and horizontal lines in the figure.
2 are arranged. As shown in FIG. 4, the lamp 52 of this example has a structure in which a red LED 52R and a green LED 52G are enclosed in one LED case 53.
In this case, in the blue display, only the LED 52G of each lamp 52 is caused to emit light. When displaying in red, only the red LED 52R of each lamp 52 is caused to emit light. When displaying yellow, both elements 52R and 52G are caused to emit light at the same time. With the traffic signal of this example, it is possible to obtain the same effect as the above-described example.

In this example, the LED lamp that emits two colors is used, but it goes without saying that an LED lamp that emits three colors may be used. Further, it goes without saying that the lamps may be arranged concentrically or spirally instead of in a matrix.

[0021]

As described above, the indicator light of the traffic signal of the present invention is composed of LEDs. Therefore, the weight can be reduced as compared with the conventional traffic signal. Further, when LEDs of different colors are used, there is an advantage that a plurality of colors can be reproduced with only one indicator lamp. Furthermore, since the element itself emits light, there is an advantage that the adverse effect that the emission color is difficult to see even if the sun hits is not caused.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is an overall configuration diagram showing a traffic signal according to an embodiment of the present invention.

2 is a configuration diagram showing a portion of an indicator light of the traffic signal of FIG. 1. FIG.

FIG. 3 is a configuration diagram showing an indicator light of a traffic signal according to another embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 4 is a configuration diagram showing an LED lamp that constitutes the indicator lamp of FIG.

[Explanation of symbols]

 1 ... Traffic indicator 2 ... Post 3 ... Indicator 31 ... Cover 32 ... LED group 32R ... Red LED 32G ... Green LED 32B ... Blue LED 33 ...・ LED mounting plate 34 ・ ・ ・ LED driver 35 ・ ・ ・ Control unit

Claims (5)

[Claims] 1. A traffic signal installed at an intersection or the like for traffic regulation, having at least one indicator light, and the indicator light is composed of a plurality of light emitting diodes. Traffic signal to do. 2. The indicator lamp according to claim 1, wherein
A plurality of first light emitting diode groups that emit light of a color and a plurality of second light emitting diodes that emit a second color different from the first color.
And a light emitting diode group of 1. 3. The drive control means according to claim 2, wherein the first color is green, the second color is red, and the drive control means controls drive of the first and second light emitting diode groups. Under the control of the drive control means, only the first light emitting diode group is driven when blue light indicating passage is permitted, and only the second light emitting diode group is driven when red light indicating passage is prohibited. The traffic signal device is characterized in that both the first and second light emitting diode groups are driven at the same time when the yellow light indicating a traffic warning is lit. 4. The indicator lamp according to claim 2, wherein
And a plurality of third light emitting diode groups that emit a third color different from the second color, the traffic signal. 5. The method according to claim 4, wherein the first, second and third colors are green, red and blue, respectively.
Further, it has a drive control means for controlling the drive of the first, second and third light emitting diode groups, and under the control of this drive control means, the first light source is turned on when blue light indicating passage is permitted.
And the third light emitting diode group is driven, and the second light emitting diode group is driven when the red light indicating the passage prohibition is lit, and both the first and second light emitting diode groups are simultaneously driven when the yellow light indicating the passage caution is lit. A traffic signal that is driven.