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:
Nov. 10, 2015
Filed:
Jul. 30, 2014
Ford Global Technologies, Llc, Dearborn, MI (US);
Sebastian Bummel, Cologne NRW, DE;
Michael Alberti, Duesseldorf NRW, DE;
Martin Scheck, Pulheim NRW, DE;
Thomas Oeltjebruns, Dormagen-Straberg NRW, DE;
Frank Aust, Neuss, DE;
Ford Global Technologies, LLC, Dearborn, MI (US);
Abstract
A system for controlling the exterior lighting of a motor vehicle has a switch unit having a rotary switch which can be rotated clockwise and counter-clockwise to sequentially activate a plurality of operating modes of the vehicle lights. The rotary switch is a continuously adjustable rotary encoder, and a plurality of indicator lights are arranged around the rotary encoder, each of the operating modes is respectively assigned a mode indicator light. The operating mode selected by the rotary encoder is displayed by the corresponding indicator light. The rotary encoder has a plurality of latched positions that correspond to the plurality of indicator lights.