JPS631681B2 - - Google Patents

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION The present invention relates to a vehicular lamp, and more particularly to a vehicular lamp comprising a housing having a reflective surface that emits light from a light source forward, and a lens disposed on the front surface of the housing. .

This type of vehicle lamp is used, for example, as a rear signal light for automobiles. However, in the case of a lamp equipped with a reflective surface, a phenomenon occurs in which when sunlight enters the lamp chamber through the lens during the daytime, it is reflected by the reflective surface and emitted to the outside of the lamp chamber again. Also,
A similar phenomenon occurs at night due to the incidence of external light such as street lights. For this reason, even when the lamp is off, it appears as if it were on, and there is a problem in that it is difficult to distinguish between when the lamp is off and when it is on. For example, FIG. 1 shows an example of a conventional structure. During daytime, sunlight, shown by the solid line, passes through lens a and enters lamp chamber b, and the reflection surface provided in housing c d, resulting in reflected light shown by a broken line. This reflected light has a regular reflection component and a diffuse reflection component, but in either case, the light reflected forward passes through the lens a again and is emitted to the outside. Due to this emitted light, even when the light is off, it looks as if the light source e is on. This difficulty in distinguishing between when the lights are on and when they are off is not only extremely problematic for signal lights that provide information by lighting, but also poses a problem in that visibility deteriorates for general vehicle lights as well. . Therefore, it is of course a problem in achieving the function as a signal light, and is also undesirable as a lighting device such as another indicator light.

The present invention improves the problems of the prior art as described above, and increases the ratio of lamp brightness between when the lamp is off and when it is on, making the difference between the two noticeable, thereby improving visibility. The purpose is to provide lighting equipment for vehicles.

Embodiments of the vehicle lamp according to the present invention will be described below with reference to the accompanying drawings.

2 to 5 show an embodiment in which the present invention is applied to a rear signal light for an automobile.

As shown in the figure, the vehicle lamp according to the present invention has a light source 3 disposed within a lamp chamber 4 defined by a housing 1 and a lens 2 disposed on the front surface thereof. Therefore, the lens 2 in this embodiment absorbs external light such as sunlight, and the light source 3
A smoke lens molded from colored (ret or amber, etc.) translucent resin such as acrylic resin or polycarbonate resin mixed with smoke material such as carbon black so as to have the necessary light transmittance for internal light from the lens. On the inner surface of the lens 2, there is a retroreflective element (hereinafter abbreviated as retroreflective element) 21 made of a right triangular pyramid that retroreflects external incident light, and a fisheye lens to satisfy the light distribution as a lamp. A plurality of sets of elements 22 are arranged in a regular band shape. The fisheye lens element 22, as shown in FIG.
Each strip is divided into a plurality of sections 22a to 22e, and corresponding to each section, a plurality of sections are provided on the inner surface of the housing 1 for making the light emitted from the light source 3 enter each section 22a to 22e of the fisheye lens element. A multi-zone reflective surface 11 is formed of zone reflective surfaces 11a to 11e.

The fisheye lens element 22 has each section 22a.
to 22e, the plurality of area reflective surfaces 11
The curvature of the spherical surface and the vertical and horizontal pitches are set in order to provide the necessary light distribution for the light from a to 11e.

A plurality of area reflecting surfaces 11 of the multi-area reflecting surface 11
A to 11e emit the light emitted from the light source 3 in a parabolic shape uniformly as a ray substantially parallel to the optical axis in a band-shaped direction, and each section 22 of the fisheye lens element.
It is formed so that the light is focused and incident only on each of the sections a to 22e. Therefore, although no light is incident on the retroreflective element 21, the light is condensed and incident on each section 22a to 22e of the fisheye lens element 22, so that no loss of light occurs.

To explain the light effect of the vehicle lamp of the present invention using FIG. 6, when the light source 3 is turned off, external light S such as sunlight enters the lens 2, and a part of it is reflected by the retroreflective element 21. It is retroreflected in front of the lens and does not enter the lamp chamber. Other external light then heads towards the fisheye lens element 22, but the incident light is attenuated by the smoke lens, and the attenuated light enters the lamp chamber 4 and is reflected by the multi-area reflector 11, and only a small portion of it is reflected. is emitted to the outside through the lens 2, but most of it is blocked by the retroreflective element 21 again, or absorbed or attenuated by the smoke of the lens 2.

In this way, in the present invention, a part of the external light S is cut by the retroreflective element 21, and the external light S entering the lamp chamber 4 is absorbed or attenuated by the smoke of the lens 2, and furthermore, the retroreflective element 21 cuts out a part of the external light S. A part of the light that is reflected by the element 21 and about to be emitted to the outside is cut off, and the remaining light is absorbed or attenuated by the smoke lens, so the amount of external light S that is reflected and emitted to the outside is reduced. can be significantly reduced.

On the other hand, when the light source 3 is turned on, the light emitted from the light source 3 is reflected by the multi-zone reflective surface 11, and all of this reflected light L enters the fisheye lens element 22, passes through the lens thickness, and passes through the smoke lens. The light is emitted forward with the necessary light distribution. At this time, the emitted light is slightly attenuated by the amount of light transmitted through the thickness of the smoke lens 2, but the required brightness can be maintained by appropriately setting the light transmittance of the smoke lens.

In the above embodiment, the retroreflective element 21 and the fisheye lens element 22 are arranged in a strip shape, but they may be arranged in a lattice shape.

The above embodiment shows an example in which the lens is composed of one smoke lens, but the lens is composed of two lenses, an inner lens and an outer lens, and the outer lens is a smoke lens, and the inner lens The retroreflective element 21 and the fisheye lens element 22 may also be formed. FIGS. 7 and 8 show an example of the two-lens configuration. That is, in FIGS. 7 and 8, 2a is an outer lens containing smoked material, 2b is an inner lens made of colored transparent resin, and in FIG. Elements 22a-2
In FIG. 8, a retroreflective element 21 is formed on the inner surface of an inner lens 2b, and fisheye lens elements 22a to 22e are formed on the outer surface. It is clear that these embodiments can also achieve the same effects as the embodiments shown in FIGS. 3 to 5.

As described above, the vehicular lamp of the present invention includes a housing having a reflective surface that emits light from a light source forward, and a lens disposed on the front surface of the housing. In addition to using a smoked lens containing a smoked material as the lens, the lens has a plurality of sections regularly formed with retroreflective elements and fisheye lens elements in a band shape or a lattice shape, and each section corresponds to a fisheye lens element. A multi-zone reflective surface is formed on the inner surface of the housing, and the light reflected from the multi-zone reflective surface is formed on the inner surface of the housing. Since the configuration is such that all of the light enters the fisheye lens element without entering the retroreflective element, when the light is turned off, the external light is reflected by the retroreflective element, and is absorbed or attenuated by the characteristics of the smoke lens, so that the external light enters the lens. To effectively prevent re-emission from a surface, and to obtain a high-brightness light distribution by using all the light emitted from the light source and reflected by a multi-area reflective surface as an effective luminous flux when the light source is turned on. This has the effect of increasing the difference in lamp brightness between when the lamp is off and when it is on, so that it does not appear as if the lamp is on when it is off, and good visibility can be ensured.

[Brief explanation of the drawing]

FIG. 1 is a sectional view showing a conventional example. 2 to 6 show the vehicle lamp of the present invention, FIG. 2 is a front view, FIG. 3 is a sectional view taken along line AA in FIG. 2, and FIG. 4 is a sectional view taken along line AA in FIG. 2. Line sectional view, Figure 5 A is a back view of the lens, Figure 5 B is C in A.
- C is a cross-sectional view taken along the line C, FIG. 7 and 8 are cross-sectional views similar to FIG. 4 showing other embodiments of the present invention. DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1... Housing, 11a-11e... Division reflective surface, 2, 2a, 2b... Lens, 21... Retroreflection element, 22a-22e... Division fisheye lens element, 3...
light source.

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. A vehicular lamp comprising a housing having a reflective surface that emits light from a light source forward and a lens disposed on the front surface of the housing, in which a smoked lens containing a smoked material is used as the lens, and , a plurality of sections of retroreflective elements and fisheye lens elements are regularly formed in the lens in a band-like or lattice-like manner, and the light from the light source is directed to the inner surface of the housing in correspondence with each section of the fisheye lens element. A multi-section reflective surface is formed of a plurality of section reflective surfaces for inputting light into the section fisheye lens element, and all of the light reflected from the multi-section reflection surface is reflected by the fisheye lens without being incident on the retroreflective element. A vehicular lamp characterized by being configured such that the light enters the element.