The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Feb. 16, 2010
Filed:
Nov. 23, 2006
Trong Tran, Erlangen, DE;
Andreas Kraus, Neuhaus, DE;
Trong Tran, Erlangen, DE;
Andreas Kraus, Neuhaus, DE;
Diehl Aerospace GmbH, Uberlingen, DE;
Abstract
A control circuit () for driving a gas discharge lamp, in particular a fluorescent lamp (FL), having a controllable converter () for converting a DC voltage to an AC voltage and having two feed lines (), which are connected on the AC-voltage side to the converter (), and between which the gas discharge lamp can be connected, an inductor (L), a first capacitance (C) and a first controllable switching element (T) being connected in series in the feed lines (). The feed lines () are connected to one another via a second switching element (T). A control unit (ST) controls the switching elements (T, T, T) in synchronism with the AC voltage of the converter () and is designed such that the second switching element (T) is opened after a closed phase for the purpose of starting the gas discharge lamp at such a point in time that the AC voltage at the inductor (L), which is set in the resonant circuit including the inductor (L) and the parasitic capacitance (C) of the second switching element (T), and the AC voltage of the converter (), approximately in-phase in terms of their extrema, are added to give a starting voltage. Furthermore, provided is a corresponding method for driving the gas discharge lamp.