JPH0223920B2 - - Google Patents

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION [Field of Industrial Application] The present invention relates to a traffic safety warning system installed at the edge of a road in order to prevent the occurrence of vehicle accidents at night.

[Conventional technology]

In recent years, accidents involving bicycles, cars, and other vehicles (hereinafter simply referred to as "vehicles") have been increasing due to drowsy driving at night, erroneous driving due to excessive speed, etc. These vehicle accidents occur frequently, especially at curve points on non-urban roads, and are thought to be caused by structural defects in the road itself, as well as the technical inexperience of the vehicle driver. . Therefore, as a measure to prevent these vehicle accidents, methods have been adopted such as installing road lighting at accident-prone areas and installing guardrails, visual guidance markers, etc. to clearly indicate road alignment.

[Problem to be solved by the invention]

However, installing road lighting, guardrails, visual guides, etc. at accident-prone areas requires a large amount of construction and equipment costs, and is difficult to install in non-urban areas, especially on mountain roads. ,
In places where commercial power wiring is not installed nearby, power for lighting equipment cannot be obtained.
The problem was that installation work could not be carried out.

The present invention was devised in view of the above problem, and uses a warning light powered by a secondary battery that is charged by a solar cell during the daytime to detect light rays projected from the headlights of a vehicle traveling at night. It lights up or flashes only at certain times for a specified period of time to call the attention of the vehicle driver, and also clearly indicates the edge of the road, contributing to safe vehicle driving, and in non-urban areas where commercial power supply wiring work is difficult. The purpose of the present invention is to provide a traffic safety warning system that not only can be installed on road sections, but also can be used as a power-saving device by turning on or blinking only when a vehicle is running on general road sections. .

[Means to solve the problem]

In order to achieve the above object, the traffic safety warning system according to the present invention uses a light-emitting device that is energy-saving, has high luminous efficiency, and can be used as a light-emitting part of a line-of-sight guiding light or other warning light installed near the edge of the road. In addition to using light-emitting elements such as long-life light-emitting diodes and light-emitting chips, a secondary battery that is charged by a solar cell during the daytime is used as a power supply device for the warning light, and the warning light is projected from the headlight of a vehicle while driving at night. The gist of the system is to receive a light beam from a headlight photodetector, and turn on or blink the warning light while a vehicle detection signal is outputted from the received light and for a predetermined period of time after the output disappears. .

Furthermore, the traffic safety warning system according to the present invention includes:
Measures are being taken to install them not only at curve points, but also at roadside edges such as points where accidents occur frequently on expressways and the like.

[Effect]

According to the above configuration, the headlight photodetector receives the light beam projected from the headlight of a vehicle running at night within a predetermined distance and a predetermined sensing angle range, and the voltage output of the headlight photodetector is used to detect the light beam. A vehicle detector signal is output from a gate circuit provided in a control circuit configured in a controller, and a warning light is turned on or blinks only while the output is generated and for a predetermined time after the output disappears. ,
Display a specified display to draw the attention of the vehicle driver,
At the same time, the road alignment at the edge of the road is clearly indicated.

〔Example〕

Embodiments of the traffic safety warning system according to the present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings.

FIG. 1 shows the arrangement of each device constituting the traffic safety warning system according to the present invention installed at the end of the road such as a curve point on a non-urban road. , 2 is a controller containing a control circuit, a secondary battery, etc., which will be described later, and 3 is a headlight photodetector. The headlight detector 3 is installed at a height of about 1.5 to 2.5m above the ground and is It has a function of detecting the light beam 6 projected from the headlight 5 of the vehicle 4 within a sharp light receiving angle range from a substantially horizontal direction. Also, 7 is a warning light,
Reference numeral 8 denotes a line-of-sight guiding light, which uses a plurality of light-emitting elements 18 such as light-emitting diodes and light-emitting chips, both of which will be described later, as a light-emitting part, and performs a predetermined display such as lighting or blinking according to the output of a control circuit 12 configured in the controller 2. It is something. These warning lights 7 and line-of-sight guide lights 8 are
It acts as a warning light that conveys predetermined information regarding road conditions to the driver of the vehicle.
However, it is of course not necessary to install both, and either one may be installed depending on the installation conditions such as the shape and structure of the road. Further, numeral 9 is a display board for displaying traffic slogans, driving caution messages, guide messages, etc., which can be attached as desired.

In general, the projected luminous flux of a vehicle's headlights is determined by vehicle operation safety standards, etc., to be approximately 500 cd to 1000 cd, for example, in the running beam of the left headlight, 2 degrees above it, ±3 degrees to the left and right sides, and the beam of light projected by the right headlight. The beam capacity is 10,000cd to 20,000cd when the beams are projected simultaneously.
The headlight detector 3 according to the present invention has the above-mentioned
It receives headlight light of 10,000 cd to 20,000 dc, and when receiving this from, for example, 100 meters in front, the illuminance reached is 0.8 lux to 1.5 lux or more. Therefore, even if it is taken into account that the central axis of the projected light beam is downward by about 1.5 degrees when driving around town, it will never be less than 0.1 lux to 0.2 lux.

On the other hand, the headlight photodetector 3 is configured to form a sharp acceptance angle as described above so as not to receive interference light other than the headlight light. It is configured to have a light receiving angle of about 3 degrees. Therefore, the interfering light, such as the illumination light from a street lamp illuminating the road surface, is set at an illumination angle that is nearly perpendicular to the road surface, facing approximately horizontally, and at an angle of about 3 degrees. The light incident on the headlight photodetector 3 according to the present invention, which has an acceptance angle of , is 0.01 lux or less, and there is almost no light component that becomes interference light.

Next, the principle of operation of the present invention will be explained with reference to FIG.

First, electric power generated by the solar cell 1 that receives sunlight is charged to the secondary battery 11 via the diode 10 for preventing backflow. A control circuit 12 configured in the controller 2 is configured to operate upon receiving power from the secondary battery 11.

Therefore, the output 13 from the solar cell 1 during night time
When the voltage is almost gone, the voltage decreases. On the other hand, a light beam 6 projected from a headlight 5 of a running vehicle 4 is collected by a lens 14 of a headlight photodetector 3, and photoelectrically converted by a photoelectric conversion element 15 such as a photodiode to generate an output voltage. The voltage is applied from the terminals 16 and 17 to the control circuit 1.
2 is input. The control circuit 12 controls the secondary battery when the following conditions simultaneously hold true: the input from the solar cell 1 has decreased, and the output from the headlight photodetector 3 has been generated at the terminals 16 and 17. 11 to the light emitting element 18,
Display warning light 7.

FIG. 3 shows an example of the configuration of the control circuit 12. As shown in FIG.

That is, the output of the solar cell 1 is detected by the level detection circuit 1.
9, while the output is being generated, it is determined that it is daytime, and when the output decreases below a certain level, it is determined that it is nighttime,
A predetermined input is given to the gate circuit 20. Furthermore, the light beam 6 projected from the headlight 5 of the vehicle 4 is
The photoelectric conversion element 15 performs photoelectric conversion, and the amplifier 21 generates an amplified output, which provides a predetermined input to the gate circuit 20 . In the present invention, the gate circuit 20 is configured as an AND circuit that takes a logical product, and outputs a vehicle detection signal when the input from the level detection circuit 19 and the input from the photoelectric conversion element 15 are both present. , is input to a delay timer circuit 22 provided as required. That is, the output from the gate circuit 20 can be generated for a predetermined period of time only when the headlight photodetector 3 receives the light beam 6 projected from the headlight 5 of the vehicle 4 at night. The delay timer circuit 22 generates an output only while the output from the gate circuit 20 is being generated and for a predetermined time after the output disappears, and as the vehicle 4 approaches, the headlight 5 of the vehicle 4 is activated. Even if the light beam 6 projected from the vehicle gradually becomes downward and cannot be received by the headlight photodetector 3, the warning light 7 can still provide an indication while the vehicle is passing. Note that it is also possible to adopt a structure in which the delay timer circuit 22 is not provided.

Reference numeral 23 denotes a pulse generator, which generates a periodic pulse output to the light emitting element 18 constituting the light emitting part of the warning light 7 and causes it to blink, for example, at a duty ratio of 1/10, 1 Generates pulse output at intervals of seconds, etc. This pulse generator 23 is
When simply lighting the light emitting element 18,
This is not necessarily necessary. However, by blinking the light emitting element 18, it is possible to further improve the ability to draw the attention of the vehicle driver to the warning light 7 and to attract the attention of the vehicle driver.

FIG. 4 shows an embodiment of a light emitting section of a warning light.

The light emitting part of the warning light includes a plurality of light emitting diodes 24.
are connected in series or in parallel on the board 25 according to the power supply voltage, and the lamp body 27 has a transparent part 26 on the front side.
It is housed inside. As a method of constructing the light emitting section, it is also possible to use a large number of light emitting chips instead of the light emitting diode 24 described above. When using light-emitting chips, it is possible to arrange a larger number of light-emitting chips than when arranging light-emitting diodes 24 on a board of the same size. It can be made thinner or smaller.

〔Effect of the invention〕

Since the traffic safety warning system according to the present invention is configured as described above, it can be easily installed even in road sections in non-urban areas where there is no commercial power supply wiring.
In addition to calling the attention of drivers of vehicles traveling on the road section, it is possible to contribute to safe driving of vehicles by clearly indicating road alignment such as road side edges, and to reduce construction costs and equipment costs. It can contribute to power saving.

[Brief explanation of drawings]

FIG. 1 is an explanatory diagram showing the arrangement of each component of the traffic safety warning system according to the present invention at the end of the road, FIG. 2 is a diagram of the operating principle, and FIG. 3 is a block diagram showing the configuration of the control circuit. FIG. 4 shows the structure of the warning light, with A being a front view and B being a longitudinal sectional view. 3...Headlight photodetector, 2...Controller,
7... Warning light, 12... Control circuit, 18... Light emitting element, 19... Level detection circuit, 20... Gate circuit.

Claims (1)

[Scope of Claims] 1. A traffic safety warning system installed near the edge of a road, comprising a headlight photodetector 3, a level detection circuit 19, a controller 2, and a warning light 7, comprising: The detector 2 inputs the outputs of the headlight detection circuit 3 and the level detection circuit 19, and outputs a vehicle detection signal by logical product of both.The warning light 7 is equipped with a light emitting element 18 as a light emitting part. A traffic safety warning system characterized in that a vehicle detection signal from the controller 2 is inputted and a predetermined display is performed.