Flexible light guide for vehicle display applications

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-9688191-B2
Application number	US-201414501210-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Sep 30, 2014
Priority date	Sep 30, 2014
Publication date	Jun 27, 2017
Grant date	Jun 27, 2017

Abstract

A vehicle display assembly including at least one flexible light guide in a path of illumination to illuminate predetermined different shapes, contours, areas and/or surfaces of the vehicle display assembly. The flexible light guide is silicon or other material suitable to provide flexibility to allow use of the same flexible light guide in different vehicle display assembly shapes and to be a light guide conductor. The flexible light guide is mountable adjacent to at least one light source within the vehicle display assembly to illuminate the predetermined shapes, contours, areas and/or surfaces of the vehicle display assembly visible to vehicle occupants.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A vehicle display assembly, comprising:
a housing for the vehicle display assembly having an outer edge;
at least one light source; and
at least one flexible light guide operably coupled to said housing and operably positioned to illuminate contours, areas and/or surfaces of said housing;
wherein said at least one flexible light guide has a U-shaped cross section defining an attachment portion for attaching to said outer edge of said housing.

2. The vehicle display assembly of claim 1 , wherein said at least one flexible light guide is silicon.

3. The vehicle display assembly of claim 1 , wherein said at least one flexible light guide is operably flexible to follow different shapes having equivalent size length such that said flexible light guides are operable to provide direct illumination of different contours, areas, and/or surfaces of various vehicle display assemblies configurations or shapes.

4. The vehicle display assembly of claim 1 , wherein said at least one light source is operably mounted to at least one side of the interior surface of said housing and said flexible light guide is operably positioned relative to said light source to illuminate the predetermined desired contour, area and/or surface of said vehicle display assembly.

5. The vehicle display assembly of claim 1 , wherein each of said at least one light source is a light emitting diode.

6. The vehicle display assembly of claim 5 , wherein said vehicle display assembly comprises a plurality of light emitting diodes, wherein the emitted light can be selectively changed between two or more colors illuminating the at least one flexible light guide.

7. The vehicle display assembly of claim 1 , wherein said vehicle display assembly comprises a plurality of said light sources.

8. The vehicle display assembly of claim 1 , wherein said vehicle display assembly is selected from the group consisting of instrument clusters, backlights, graphics, radio, multi-media, and communications displays, and combinations thereof.

9. The vehicle display assembly of claim 1 , wherein said at least one flexible light guide has no rigid portion.

10. The vehicle display assembly of claim 1 , wherein said at least one flexible light guide is fixed by pressure to said vehicle display assembly, wherein said at least one flexible light guide is pressed by and held in place between two or more rigid parts of said vehicle display assembly.

11. The vehicle display assembly of claim 1 , wherein no attachment fastener is used to connect said at least one flexible light guide to said housing that would pierce said at least one flexible light guide.

12. The vehicle display assembly of claim 1 , wherein the predetermined thickness and size of said at least one flexible light guide correlates to the predetermined size of said at least one light source.

13. The vehicle display assembly of claim 1 , further comprising a light diffuser operably coupled to said housing relative to said at least one flexible light guide to diffuse the light.

14. The vehicle display assembly of claim 1 , wherein said flexible light guide further comprises a plurality of ribs formed on said attachment portion for gripping said outer edge of said housing.

15. The vehicle display assembly of claim 1 , wherein said flexible light guide defines a plurality of notches spaced along at least one wall of said attachment portion of said flexible light guide.

16. A vehicle display assembly, comprising:
a housing having an interior surface;
at least one light source mounted to said interior surface of said housing; and
at least one flexible light guide that is silicon, wherein said flexible light guide is operably connected to said vehicle display assembly in a position operable to selectively illuminate contours, areas and/or surfaces of said housing;
wherein said at least one flexible light guide has a U-shaped cross section defining an attachment portion for attaching to an outer edge of said housing.

17. The vehicle display assembly of claim 16 , wherein said at least one flexible light guide is operably flexible to follow different shapes having equivalent size length and illumination path size such that said flexible light guides are operable to provide direct illumination of different contours, areas, and/or surfaces of various vehicle display assemblies.

18. The vehicle display assembly of claim 16 , wherein said at least one light source is operably mounted to at least one side of the interior surface of said housing and said flexible light guide is operably positioned relative to said light source to illuminate the predetermined desired contour, area and/or surface of said vehicle display assembly.

19. The vehicle display assembly of claim 16 , wherein the predetermined thickness and size of said at least one flexible light guide correlates to the predetermined size of said at least one light source.

Assignees

• Continental automotive systems inc

Inventors

• Bravo Solis Maria Nohemi
• Aceves Mendoza Monica Abigail
• Merchand Alvarado Humberto

Classifications

• B60Q3/10 Primary

  for dashboards · CPC title

• B60Q3/78

  for generating luminous strips, e.g. for marking trim component edges · CPC title

• B60Q3/64

  for a single lighting device · CPC title

• B60Q3/04 Primary

  Operations & Transport · mapped topic