Ramsey injected a rare gas into a vacuum glass tube, and then connected two metal electrodes sealed in the vacuum glass tube to a high-voltage power supply, and attentively observed whether the gas could conduct electricity.
Suddenly, an unexpected phenomenon happened: the rare gas injected into the vacuum tube not only began to conduct electricity, but also emitted extremely beautiful red light. This magical red light surprised Ramsey and his assistant. They opened the door to the neon world. Outdoor lighting decoration of neon lights, figure 1 Ramsey named this rare gas that can conduct electricity and emit red light neon. Later, he continued to conduct experiments on the characteristics of other gases conducting electricity and emitting colored light, and successively found that xenon can emit white light, argon can emit blue light, helium can emit yellow light, and krypton can emit dark blue light ... Different gases can emit different colors and colors, just like a beautiful rainbow in the sky. Neon lights are also named after this.
The method of making neon lights is to use soda-lime silicate glass with low melting point as the lamp tube, design different patterns and characters according to the needs, process them with a blowtorch, then sinter the electrodes, vacuum them with a vacuum pump, and fill different rare gases according to the required colors. Modern neon lights are more exquisite, and some bend glass tubes into various folding shapes to make more touching graphics; Some paint fluorescent powder on the inner wall of the lamp tube to make the color more colorful; Some neon lights are equipped with automatic igniters, which make the lights of various colors fade away and complement each other, making the night in the city colorful. Neon lamp outdoor lighting decoration-Tianjin Haihe landscape map Neon lamp has been enduring for a hundred years since it came out in 19 10. It is a special electric light source of low-voltage cold cathode glow discharge, which is different from other arc lamps such as fluorescent lamp, high-pressure sodium lamp, metal halide lamp, mercury lamp and incandescent lamp. Neon lamp is produced by cold cathode glow discharge of low-pressure inert gas filled into glass tube under high-voltage electric field. The light color of neon lights is determined by the spectral characteristics of inert gas: neon lights filled with neon gas emit red light; Fluorescent neon lights are filled with argon and mercury. They emit blue, yellow and other colors. Both neon lights emit light by stimulated radiation of working gas atoms in the lamp tube.
high efficiency
Neon lights rely on the tips of electrodes at both ends of the lamp to ignite the rare gas in the lamp tube under high-voltage electric field. Unlike ordinary light sources, tungsten wires must be burned to a high temperature to emit light, resulting in a large amount of electric energy being consumed in the form of heat energy. Therefore, under the same electric energy, neon lights have higher outdoor lighting decoration, as shown in Figure 3.
low temperature
Neon lamp can work in the sun, rain or water because of its cold cathode characteristics, and the lamp temperature is below 60℃ when working. Because of its working characteristics, neon light spectrum has strong penetrating power and can still maintain good visual effects in rainy or foggy days.
Low energy consumption
In the era of scientific and technological innovation, the manufacturing technology of neon lights and the technical level of related parts are also constantly improving. The application of new electrodes and new electronic transformers has greatly reduced the power consumption of neon lamps, from 56 watts per meter to 0/2 watts per meter.
long life
Under the condition of continuous operation and uninterrupted power supply, the life of neon lamp can reach more than 10000 hours, which is difficult for any other electric light source to achieve.
Flexible and varied
This is a case of advertising supplies today.
Neon lamp is made of glass tube, which can be bent into any shape after firing, with great flexibility. By choosing different types of lamps and filling different inert gases, neon lights can get rich and colorful light.
Strong dynamics
Neon screen is composed of normally bright tube and dynamic luminous scanning tube, which can be set to skip scanning, gradient scanning and color mixing and color changing scanning. The scanning tube is controlled by a scanner programmed by a microcomputer chip. The scanning tube is turned on or off according to the programmed sequence, forming a flowing picture, which looks like a rainbow in the sky, like a galaxy on the earth, and more like a dream world. Fascinating and unforgettable. Therefore, neon lamp is a kind of advertising form with less investment, strong effect, economy and practicality.
Neon lamp is a kind of cold cathode glow discharge tube, its radiation spectrum has a strong ability to penetrate the atmosphere, its color is bright and colorful, its luminous efficiency is obviously better than that of ordinary incandescent lamp, its line structure is expressive, it can be processed and bent into any geometric shape to meet the design requirements, and its colorful patterns and characters are welcomed by people through electronic program control.
Neon lights are bright, beautiful and dynamic, which can't be replaced by any electric light source, and occupy a dominant position in the continuous emergence and competition of various new light sources.
Because neon lamp is cold cathode glow discharge, the life of a qualified neon lamp can reach 20000-30000 hours.
With the rapid development of China's economy, the varieties and specifications of neon lights have been basically serialized, which can be used for many purposes, and the quality is gradually approaching the international level. With China's accession to the WTO, the gap between them will become smaller and smaller, and it will certainly catch up with the international advanced level in the near future. However, under the condition of market competition, there are indeed a few manufacturers who lack integrity. In the case that some users don't know the performance and quality of neon lights, the inferior products produced and manufactured are dumped on the market at low prices, which affects neon lights. Neon material effect Neon lamp is a low-voltage cold cathode glow discharge lamp. Its structure and composition provide a guarantee for normal glow discharge, and the working medium in it provides the possibility to obtain the required light color.
Neon lamp consists of lamp tube and high voltage transformer. The lamp tube consists of a glass tube and an electrode chamber. The electrode chamber consists of electrodes, mica plates (or porcelain rings) and electrode leads. The glass tube is filled with working gas, and part of the inner wall of the glass tube is coated with fluorescent powder. There are two kinds of high-voltage transformers: magnetic leakage transformers and electronic transformers, which are essential components for lighting neon tubes.
1. glass tube
The glass tube has three main functions: filling working gas, connecting two electrodes and transmitting visible light. There are three kinds of common neon glass tubes: exposed tube, pink tube and color tube.
2. Electrode
The electrode is used to emit electrons and collect electrons and positive ions, and is made of metal with high melting point and easy to emit electrons.
3. mica sheet (or collar)
The main function is to support the electrode, insulate heat and reduce cathode sputtering on the inner wall of glass tube. The supporting electrode can prevent it from moving, loosening and contacting the glass tube; Thermal insulation can prevent the glass tube from bursting; Reducing cathode sputtering on the inner wall of glass tube can prolong the life of lamp tube.
4. Electrode leads
Through it, the electrode can be connected to the external circuit, and the material with good conductivity and thermal expansion coefficient similar to that of glass should be selected. The electrode leads are mainly made of Dumex wire.
5. Working gas
Working gases are mainly inert gases, neon and nitrogen are the most commonly used working gases. Neon gas is mostly filled in bare tubes and made into red neon lights. Hydrogen and mercury are mostly mixed in powder tubes to make neon lights of other colors.
6. Phosphors
The inner wall of the glass tube is coated with different kinds of phosphors, which can be easily mixed with hydrogen and mercury to make neon lights of various colors.
7. High voltage transformer
It is a steady current device connected in the circuit of neon lamp tube, which forms a complete neon lamp with the lamp tube. Glow discharge has the following characteristics in electrical performance: first, it needs higher ignition voltage and lower working voltage; Second, it has negative volt-ampere characteristics, which makes the discharge unstable. Using magnetic leakage high-voltage transformer or electronic booster transformer, the lamp can be supplied with a voltage as high as 15}V, which makes the lamp ignite and glow. When the gas starts to discharge, the voltage will immediately drop to a constant value to maintain the normal glow discharge of the lamp in a stable state.
fluorescent lamp
1. According to the specifications, it has the thickness of 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 12, 15,120mm.
2. According to the glass material:
(1) sodium glass tube (or lime glass tube) This kind of glass tube has poor stability, and it is easy to deteriorate, pan-alkali (weathering), burst and poor fastness after being wetted. About 80% of this material is used in China.
② Lead glass tube (also called red lead glass tube) is superior to sodium glass in thermal performance, mechanical performance, electrical performance, chemical stability, vacuum performance and optical performance, and its weather resistance and service life greatly exceed that of sodium glass. This kind of lead glass tube is widely used in the world, and the usage in China has reached about 20-30%. Manufacturers who pursue good quality choose lead tubes as neon lights. Lead glass is divided into heavy lead glass, medium lead glass and light lead glass according to lead content.
(3) Color glass tube, which has been filled with dye when drawing the glass tube, and the produced glass tube becomes a color glass tube.
3. According to the fluorescent powder materials coated in neon tubes: ① Most neon tubes used are sprayed with "ordinary fluorescent powder", which is relatively cheap and can generally meet the requirements of various colors. ② "tricolor" phosphor (also called rare earth phosphor) has better brightness, chromaticity and freshness than ordinary phosphor.
4. The process of spraying phosphor is divided into water coating and glue coating.
① Water coating is to spray the mixed fluorescent powder of alcohol and ketone on the inner wall of the lamp tube and let it dry naturally. (2) The viscosity and fastness of glue coating are much better than that of water-coated powder tube. Most advanced countries use trichromatic glue coated with lead-containing glass tubes to make neon lights, and some manufacturers in China also use this kind of neon lights.
Outdoor lighting decoration of neon lights and billboards
transformer
1. Neon leakage transformer (also known as inductance transformer and iron core transformer) is characterized by good reliability, high brightness of load lamp, consistent light color and long service life, but its disadvantage is that it is bulky. Most outdoor neon lights in foreign countries and Shanghai use this transformer. The specifications of induction transformers are: 3KV, 6KV, 9KV, 12KV, 15KV, 18KV. The famous brands of neon lamp inductance transformer are Yiya and Tonghui.
2. Electronic transformer (also called electronic converter of high-frequency cold-start tubular discharge lamp (neon lamp) or neon lamp power supply) has the advantages of light weight, convenient manufacture and saving metal materials. At present, the quality of electronic transformers produced in China is stable and has a certain scale, and some enterprises also export them in batches. However, the brightness of electronic transformers produced by many units is not up to its due brightness, so it is a bit dwarfed when used outdoors. There are two kinds of electronic transformers, DC and AC. Due to unidirectional conduction, DC electronic transformers usually have a bright end and a dark end. Because the output frequency of electronic transformer will be affected by the length of load lamp, in the same neon lamp, the phenomenon of uneven lamp color will also appear because of the different length of each lamp. In order to reduce the cost, some manufacturers are unwilling to use high-quality electrical components with simple processing technology, poor reliability and short service life. The specifications of electronic transformers are: 40W, 60W, 80W, 100W, etc. There are still four meters, six meters, eight meters, 10 meters, 12 meters. It is also possible to actually produce electronic transformers that meet the requirements of neon lights, but the price will be close to that of induction transformers. In order to compete at low prices and gain market share, some manufacturers sacrifice the brightness, reliability and life of neon lights to gain market profits.