Spark gap switch
AssigneeGTE Products Corporation
InventorBoyd G. Brower
Life of this patent
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Abstract
A flashlamp unit for individual and sequential firing of flashlamps includes a pair of flashlamps connected in an electrical circuit with a radiation-responsive N/O arc gap switch in series connection with one of said pair of flashlamps and including an arc gap having a radiation-responsive material thereover and therebetween.
Claims8
A flashlamp unit comprising:
- a pair of high voltage flashlamps connected to an electrical circuit and arranged to fire individually and in sequence;
- a radiation-responsive N/O switch connected into said electrical circuit in series connection with one and external from and adjacent the other one of said pair of flashlamps and positioned for radiation impingement from said one of said flashlamps, said flashlamp unit characterized by the improvement wherein said radiation-responsive switch is in the form of an arc gap having a radiation-responsive material thereon and therebetween said gap with radiation from said one flashlamp converting the radiation-responsive material and arc gap combination from an electrically non-conductive to an electrically conductive state.
In a self-sequencing multilamp array having a printed circuit board connected to a high voltage potential source coupled to a first flashlamp and to a plurality of series connected radiation-responsive switches and flashlamps with each of said radiation-responsive switches positionally located adjacent a previously energizable flashlamp, said array characterized by the improvement wherein each one of said radiation-responsive switches includes the combination of an arc gap and a radiation-responsive material thereof and therebetween said arc gap whereby radiation from a flashlamp converts an adjacent radiation-responsive material and arc gap combination from an electrically non-conductive to an electrically conductive state.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.