JPH04253183A - lighting control device - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To provide an illumination control device which allows slave units to be manufactured into a small shape at a low cost and attains wiring saving and construction saving. CONSTITUTION:A main operation panel 2 concurrently transmits the illumination load control information and the address information calling a terminal unit 5 as transmission signals. The terminal unit 5 converts the illumination control information contained in the transmission signal from the main operation panel 2 into the control signal for controlling illumination loads 7. The illumination load 7 dim-controls a lamp or turns the lamp on or off based on the control signal.

Description

[Detailed description of the invention]

0001

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a lighting control device that is operated by a wall switch or remote control and controls a large number of lighting loads.

0002

[Prior Art] Conventional lighting control devices of this type include devices in which a lighting load is connected to a terminal device, which is a slave device, from a main operation panel via a signal line from the main operation panel, which is a parent device; In lighting control equipment, the terminal unit itself controls the power and dims and blinks the lighting load, so the terminal unit requires a large-capacity power control element, which also requires heat countermeasures for the terminal unit. This poses a problem in that the terminal device becomes larger and more expensive.

Another conventional example is Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 64-8648.
As shown in No. 1, there is a four-wire dimming device with an independent dimming control line, and a dimming signal terminal and an on/off terminal for control. Although the dimming signal terminal is smaller, the wiring becomes more complicated due to the on/off terminal.
Further, in the case of fine-grained control, the number of terminals doubles and the response time becomes slow.

On the other hand, as another conventional example, Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 1986-8
In this conventional example, an on/off terminal is provided between the dimming signal terminal and the lighting load to turn on/off the dimming signal, and the terminal is small and inexpensive. However, it has the same drawbacks as the above conventional example. Furthermore, in a fail-safe type dimming lighting device as seen in Japanese Patent Application No. 1-105184, the output is maximized when the dimming signal is turned off, so when applied to such a conventional device, There is also the inconvenience of not being able to turn off the lights.

[0005]

The above-mentioned conventional devices have drawbacks such as large terminals, expensive or complicated wiring, and slow response times due to the increase in the number of terminals. The invention as claimed in claim 1 has been made in view of the above-mentioned problems, and its purpose is to enable the handset to be manufactured in a small size and at low cost, and to achieve reduction in wiring and construction. It is possible to provide lighting control equipment.

Another object of the invention is to provide a lighting control device that can reduce response time even during detailed control in addition to the above object.

[0007]

[Means for Solving the Problems] In order to achieve the above object, the invention according to claim 1 provides a power source, a lighting load supplied with power from the power source and controlled by an input control signal,
A base unit that transmits a transmission signal including lighting load control information, and a slave unit that receives the transmission signal from the base unit and outputs the control signal to the lighting load based on the lighting load control information of the transmission signal. and the control signal includes both a dimming signal and an on/off signal for the lighting load.

[0008] In the invention as set forth in claim 2, each of the lighting loads is constituted by one discharge lamp fixture, and one discharge lamp fixture is made to correspond to one slave unit.

[0009]

According to the present invention, the slave device that receives a transmission signal containing lighting load information from the parent device converts and creates a control signal to be applied to the lighting load from the received lighting load information. A lighting load to which this control signal is input performs an on/off operation or a dimming operation depending on whether it is an on/off signal or a dimming signal.

0010

[Examples] The present invention will be explained below with reference to Examples. Figure 1 shows the overall configuration, and in this system, AC power supply 1
Power is supplied from the power supply line 3 to the main operation panel 2 as a parent unit and each lighting load 7, and each terminal unit 5 as a slave unit is connected to the main operation panel 2 via a signal line 4, and the signal line 4 to the main operation panel 2 to turn on/off the lighting loads 7 individually or in groups.
A wall switch type terminal device 8 that turns off or dims the light is connected.

As shown in FIG. 2, the terminal device 5 has an address setting section 11 that sets individual addresses, and processes the content of the lighting load control information transmitted from the main operation panel 2 via the signal line 4. It consists of a transmission signal discrimination processing section 12 and a dimming on/off signal conversion section 13 that converts into a control signal suitable for controlling the lighting load 7 consisting of, for example, a discharge lamp fixture. The terminal device 8 transmits operation information of the operation switches SW1 to SW3 to the main operation panel 2, and the main operation panel 2 creates lighting control information for the corresponding terminal device 5 based on this operation information. ing.

The main operation panel 2 has a transmission function that simultaneously transmits lighting load control information and address information for calling the terminal device 5 as a transmission signal, and the terminal device 5 receives the transmission signal and transmits it to the transmission signal discrimination processing section. 12, the address setting section 11
The self-address set in the above is compared with the received address information, and the dimming/on/off signal converter 13 performs control for the lighting load 7 from the lighting control data included in the transmission signal from the main operation panel 2. It is converted into a signal and output to the connected lighting load 7 via the control signal line 6. The lighting load 7 controls the dimming of the lamp or turns the lamp on/off based on this control signal.

[0013] The lighting load control information may be composed of on/off control information and dimming level information, or it may be provided with a meaning such that only the dimming level is considered as the minimum level of the dimming level. It's fine if you did it. For example, dimming on/off
As shown in FIG. 3(a), when the dimming ratio is shallow, the output of the off-signal converter 13 has a small pulse width τ/T, and finally reaches τ=0 as shown in FIG. 3(d), that is, the direct current It becomes a 0V signal.

Furthermore, as the dimming ratio becomes deeper, FIG. 3(b)
), the pulse width τ/T increases, and finally, as shown in Fig. 3
As shown in (c), the signal is output so that τ=T, that is, a DC "H" signal. All these output signals become control signals, which are converted in the lighting load 7, for example in the ballast of the discharge lamp fixture. In other words, with an inverter-type ballast, these signals can be converted into frequency signals and controlled by frequency dimming or the like.

FIG. 4 shows an example of a lighting load 7 using a ballast that dims and controls on/off a discharge lamp using the output signal of the dimming on/off signal converter 13 shown in FIG. , the output signal of the dimming on/off signal converter 13 in the terminal device 5 shown in FIGS. The oscillation frequency of the inverter circuit 15 changes according to the frequency signal of the F conversion circuit 10, and the dimming level of the discharge lamp 17 to which the output of the inverter circuit 15 is applied via the choke 16 changes in accordance with the change in the oscillation frequency. Here, for example, when the pulse width τ/T is small, the oscillation frequency is set low,
When the pulse width τ/T is large, it is set to be high.

In the case of the output signal shown in FIG. 3(c), since the output DC level of the integrating circuit 9 is higher than the voltage level of the reference voltage section 19 of the comparator 18, the output of the comparator 18 goes to "L" level. Due to this reversal, the oscillation control circuit (not shown) in the inverter circuit 15 stops oscillating, the output from the inverter circuit 15 disappears, and the discharge lamp 17 goes out.

The voltage level of the reference voltage section 19 is shown in FIG.
Since the level is set slightly lower than the level of the output signal shown in c), the outputs of the comparator 8 are all "H" when the outputs shown in FIGS. 15 continues to oscillate, and the lighting load 7 maintains the lighting state. That is, in this embodiment, the output DC level of the integrating circuit 9 is lower than the voltage level of the reference voltage section 19.

The signals in FIGS. 3(a), 3(b), and 3(d) all serve as ON signals for the lighting load 7, and the signal in FIG. 3(C), which is higher than the reference voltage section 19, acts as an OFF signal. . It should be noted that a pulse signal that is separate and independent from the dimming on/off signal shown in FIG. 3 may be used, or another signal, such as a change in pulse frequency, may be used to distinguish the dimmed lighting state from the lights-out state. .

In particular, as in this embodiment, if the output of the lighting load 7 is made large when the output of the integrating circuit 6 is small,
If a disconnection or short circuit occurs on terminal 5 or later, 10
The output will be 0%. This will work as a so-called fail-safe function. FIG. 5 shows another embodiment as a whole, and in this embodiment, unlike FIG. 1, the terminal device 3 and the lighting load 7 are
It corresponds to one-to-one, and one terminal device 5 controls one discharge lamp fixture.

[0020] In this way, each discharge lamp fixture can be set to a different dimming level, and fine control can be performed for effects such as near a window or in a conference room. Generally, such a configuration is expensive, but since the terminal device 5 itself performs both dimming and on/off control, and does not directly control the power supply, the cost is low. Overall, cost is not a particular issue.

It should be noted that the inverter type ballast for the lighting load 7 shown in FIG. 4 is just one example, and does not need to be based on frequency changes. Furthermore, any method such as directly inputting a pulse signal to a switching element to control the output may be used.Also, in the above embodiment, the power line 3 and the signal line 4 are wired separately, but a so-called power line transfer method may be used. When transmitting a transmission signal, the power supply line 3 can also serve as a signal line, and the transmission method is not particularly limited to the embodiment shown in FIG.

[0022]

Effects of the Invention The present invention provides a power source, a lighting load that is supplied with power from the power source and is controlled by an input control signal, a base unit that transmits a transmission signal including lighting load control information, and a slave unit that receives a transmission signal and outputs the control signal to the lighting load based on the lighting load control information of the transmission signal, and the control signal is connected to the dimming signal of the lighting load and on/off. Since it is equipped with both signal and signal functions, there is no need to install separate terminals equivalent to slave units for dimming and on/off, and this simplifies wiring. Since the slave unit only needs to send a control signal to the lighting load, the slave unit itself can be made small and inexpensive.

[0023] Furthermore, in the invention as claimed in claim 2, each of the lighting loads is constituted by one discharge lamp fixture, and one discharge lamp fixture is made to correspond to one slave unit, so that the above-mentioned effects can be achieved. In addition, it has the effect of allowing fine dimming control.

[Brief explanation of the drawing]

FIG. 1 is a circuit block diagram showing an entire embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a circuit block diagram of the terminal device in FIG. 1;

FIG. 3 is an explanatory diagram of an output signal of the dimming on/off signal converter in FIG. 2;

FIG. 4 is a circuit block diagram of the lighting load of FIG. 1;

FIG. 5 is a circuit block diagram showing the entirety of another embodiment of the present invention.

[Explanation of symbols]

1 AC power supply 2 Main operation panel 3 Signal line 4 Power line 5 Terminal 6 Control signal line 7. Lighting load 8 Terminal

Claims (2)

[Claims] Claim 1: a power source; a lighting load to which power is supplied from the power source and controlled by an input control signal; a base unit that transmits a transmission signal including lighting load control information; and a base unit that transmits a transmission signal including lighting load control information. a slave device that receives the lighting load control information of the transmission signal and outputs the control signal to the lighting load based on the lighting load control information of the transmission signal, and the control signal is connected to the dimming signal of the lighting load and the on/off signal.
A lighting control device characterized by having both an off signal and an off signal. 2. The lighting control device according to claim 1, wherein each of the lighting loads is constituted by one discharge lamp fixture, and one discharge lamp fixture is made to correspond to one slave unit. .