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BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
Lamp or light bulb displays to provide the effect of lights that appear to
move or travel along a path are well known in the art and are used
extensively. This type of lighting is often referred to as "marquee"
lighting. In the prior art, such marquee lighting includes lamps mounted
in a permanent display.
Strands of lights for displays and as ornamental accents such as Christmas
lights are well known. Likewise, miniature lamps mounted on a flexible
tape are known, for example, see U.S. Pat. No. 3,894,225 wherein a row of
miniature lamps are wired between two strips of flexible tape and the
lamps are inserted in holes in the tape and connected to wires to provide
a continuous, stationary light effect. The structure and circuitry of U.S.
Pat. No. 3,894,225 lack any capability for making the lights appear to
move.
The present invention relates to a means for providing discrete lights on a
length of flexible base strip including a printed circuit thereon which is
arranged for connection to a control circuit for effecting a moving or
traveling light display. The term "printed circuit" as used herein refers
to the type of circuit, known in the art, which is comprised of conductive
strips printed, etched, pasted, laminated, etc. onto an insulating base
material. Note that the flexibility of the base strip of the invention may
be varied for different applications, and may comprise a tape or ribbon
with a high degree of flexibility such as indicated in FIG. 1.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The present invention is comprised of a flexible tape having printed
circuitry formed thereon. The printed circuitry is of modular
construction; that is, it is formed as discrete repetitive units along the
length of the tape. Lamps or lights in the form of light emitting diodes
(LED's) are electrically and selectively connected to the conductive lines
of the printed circuit. An electronic control circuit segmentally pulses
or triggers each of the four lamps in a module, to give the visual
appearance that the lights are moving along the length of the tape.
DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
FIG. 1 is an isometric view of a flexible tape, in accordance with the
invention, connected to the power source and electronic control circuits;
FIG. 2 is an electrical block diagram showing the connection of the lamps
in the associated circuit;
FIG. 3 is a length of tape in pictorial plan view to show the printed
circuit;
FIG. 4 is a length of tape showing the construction of the tape which
comprises discrete modules formed in a continuous tape;
FIG. 5 is a drawing showing the positioning of the LED's in the tape, and
the layers or laminates forming the tape;
FIG. 6 is an isometric view showing the connection of the tape to the
terminal socket as would be used in the power supply and control circuit
housing shown in FIG. 1;
FIG. 7 is an isometric view of a printed circuit tape showing the socket
for connecting separate modules shown in FIG. 4 to one another; and,
FIG. 7A is a cross sectional view taken along the lines 7--7 of FIG. 7 to
show the construction of the connecting or splicing terminal.
DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION
Refer now to the various figures described above. In FIG. 1, the flexible
lighting strip or tape 11 includes light emitting diodes or LED's 13
mounted along the length of the tape. A flexible electronic printed
circuit, generally labeled 15, is deposited or formed in any suitable
known way, as one laminate layer of the tape, see particularly FIGS. 3 and
5. The LED's 13 are inserted in spaced holes 16 (see FIG. 3), as will be
explained, and are soldered and electrically connected to printed circuits
15. The tape 11 may be any useful length, say 15 to 20 feet, and in one
embodiment, the tape lighting strip 11 is approximately 3/4 inch wide and
approximately 1/16 inch thick, and the LED's are positioned at 3/4 inch
spacing along the length of the tape.
As best seen in FIG. 5, the lighting strip 11 includes the printed circuit
15, such as of copper, deposited on a suitable non-conductive base 17,
such as of Mylar.RTM.. A coverlay or overlay of any suitable
non-conductive plastic film 19 covers the printed circuit 15. In one
application, the coverlay 19 comprises a sprayed-on film to provide an
insulating and protecting cover for the printed circuit. The Mylar.RTM.
base 17 is in turn adhered to a double-sided tape 21; that is, a tape
which has adhesive on both sides thereof. The bottom surface of tape 21
has a protective sheet 23 on the outward side or surface; and as is well
known, when the sheet 23 is removed, the tape 11 can be adhered to the
desired surface.
For certain applications, an adhesive tape 21 is not practical and the
flexible strip 11 can be affixed to the desired surface such as by
staples, or by providing suitable mounting holes in the strip.
Refer now to FIGS. 3 and 4 which shows the modular construction and the
printed circuit 15 which is formed on tape 11. Note in FIG. 3, that the
tape 11 includes two identical printed circuit modules 15A and 15B each
with holes 16 positioned for mounting four LED's 13. The modules 15A and
15B repeat throughout the length of the tape 11 as indicated in FIG. 4 by
the notations 15A, 15B, 15C . . . 15N. As is known, the LED's 13 each have
two connecting terminal leads 18, and these are inserted through the
respective positioning holes 16 and connected to two separate printed
circuit conductors, see FIG. 3.
An important feature of the invention is the above described printed
circuit construction, which comprises identical modules formed in a
continuous strip or tape.
Further, each of the modules 15A, 15B, 15C . . . 15N includes terminal
connectors 26 on either end of the module. Note that the insulative
coverlay 19 is not formed or placed over the connectors 26 to thus permit
surface contact between the connectors and the associated sockets, as will
be explained. It will be appreciated that the tape 11 can be cut at a
position across the terminals 26 and the edge or cut may be connected to
the socket 30 positioned in the electrical control circuit housing 32. The
structure of socket 30 will be described hereinbelow.
Refer to FIGS. 7 and 7A, which are provided to show that the tape 11 can be
effectively spliced at any position along the terminals 26 of the tape by
the shown socket means 35. For example, assume some of the LED's in module
15B of FIG. 4 are defective. Accordingly, in order to remove module 15B,
the user can merely cut the length of tape 11 across the terminals 26 on
either side of module 15B (see FIG. 4) and remove module 15B. Next, the
end of module 15A may be inserted into one side of the socket 35 and the
end of module 15C may be inserted into the other side of the socket 23 as
indicated in FIG. 7A to provide an electrical connection from module 15A
to module 15C, and the tape 11 can continue to operate satisfactorily.
The structure of socket 35 is clearly seen from the isometric view of FIG.
7 and the cross sectional view of FIG. 7A. Socket 35 comprises essentially
a rectangular box having openings 36 at opposite ends to thereby receive
and make electrical contact with the terminals 26 on opposing ends of the
printed circuit modules 15A and 15C of tape 11. A center barrier 38 in
socket 35 positions the opposing ends of the modules 15A and 15B. A number
of spring biased inverted U-shaped metallic bridges 39 with curved ends
(one bridge only being shown in FIG. 7A) are mounted in spaced positions
across the width of socket 35 in position to make electrical contact with
the surface of respective terminals 26.
Socket 30 shown in FIGS. 1 and 6, is similar to socket 35 except that
socket 30 only has to accomodate, or receive, one end of a module 15.
Accordingly, the back end of socket 30 is closed and the back end 39A of
the metallic bridge extends downwardly through the bottom of the socket
(see FIG. 6) to make contact with the associated electronic circuitry, as
is known.
FIG. 2 shows the details of the power supply and control circuits 32 of
FIG. 1. A power supply 32A includes a step-down transformer connected to
an A.C. source and provides a rectified operating voltage of approximately
12 volts to the remaining circuitry of FIGS. 1 and 2.
An adjustable clock 32B provides pulses at a selected repetition rate of
from 1 second to 50 milseconds. The clock pulses from clock 32B are
coupled to a sequencer 32C which is connected through four leads generally
labeled 32D to respective amplifier drivers labeled 32E to drive LED's 13.
The LEDs are connected in respective parallel circuits and have a common
lead.
In operation, the sequencer 32C drives the LED's 13 sequentially, i.e.,
driver A drives the associated LED's 13 during a first time interval,
next, driver B drives the associated LED's in the succeeding time
interval; and so forth. As stated above, the operation of the four LED's
13 of each module 15 (see modules 15A and 15B in FIG. 3) in time sequence,
gives the appearance that the lights are moving along the length of the
tape 11.
Note that, for example in FIG. 4, the power supply and control circuit 32
connections can be made to the left end of the tape 11 and the lights made
to appear to travel toward the right; and the circuit connection can be
made to the right end of the tape 11 and the lights made to appear to
travel toward the left.
While the invention has been particularly shown and described with
reference to a preferred embodiment thereof, it will be understood by
those skilled in the art that various changes in form and details may be
made therein without departing from the spirit and scope of the invention.
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