LED light unit and method of producing an LED light unit
AssigneeGoodrich Lighting Systems GmbH
InventorsAnil Kumar Jha, Christian Schoen, Andre Hessling von Heimendahl
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Abstract
An LED light unit comprises a support portion, a light source having at least one LED, the light source being arranged on the support portion and having a source-side light intensity distribution (LISS), and a refractive optical element having an inner surface and an outer surface, with at least one of the inner surface and the outer surface being non-spherical, the refractive optical element being arranged over the light source and being attached to the support portion.
Claims11
An airplane rear navigation LED light unit, having a desired light intensity distribution (LIdes,ver, LIdes,hor), emitted from the airplane rear navigation LED light unit in operation, wherein the airplane rear navigation LED light unit comprises:
- a support portion,
- a light source, the light source being arranged on the support portion and having a source-side light intensity distribution (LISS), wherein the light source is one single LED, and
- a refractive optical element, spaced from the light source and having an inner surface and an outer surface, with at least one of the inner surface and the outer surface being non-spherical, the refractive optical element being arranged over the light source and being attached to the support portion,
- wherein the desired light intensity distribution (LIdes,ver, LIdes,hor) is an airplane rear navigation light intensity distribution and is defined by at least two cross-sectional light intensity distributions, the at least two cross-sectional light intensity distributions comprising a first desired cross-sectional light intensity distribution (LIdes,ver) in a first cross-sectional plane, which is a vertical cross-sectional plane, and a second desired cross-sectional light intensity distribution (LIdes,hor) in a second cross-sectional plane, which is a horizontal cross-sectional plane, wherein the first desired cross-sectional light intensity distribution (LIdes,ver) is an envelope curve enveloping light intensity values required for airplane rear navigation lights by FAR 25.1393 and wherein the second desired cross-sectional light intensity distribution (LIdes,hor) is an envelope curve enveloping light intensity values required for airplane rear navigation lights by FAR 25.1391,
- wherein the inner surface and the outer surface of the refractive optical element are shaped such that they jointly transform the source-side light intensity distribution (LISS) into the desired light intensity distribution (LIdes,ver, LIdes,hor), and
- wherein the inner surface and the outer surface of the refractive optical element are continuous and differentiable between the first and second cross-sectional planes.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.