A Proper Impedance Model of CCFL(Cold Cathode Fluorescent Lamp)

Applied to the Display Unit

Kim Cherl-Jin1, Yoo Byeong- Kyu2, Yoon Shin-Yong3 , Baek Soo-Hyun4
1
2

Department of Electrical Engineering, Halla University, Kangwondo, Korea

Department of Electrical Engineering, Halla University, Kangwondo, Korea
3
Department of Electrical Engineering, Dongguk University, Seoul, Korea
4
Department of Electrical Engineering, Dongguk University, Seoul, Korea

AbstractThe Cold cathode fluorescent lamp (CCFL)

are used to illuminate the liquid crystal display(LCD). Ballasts are required for CCFL because the lamp need high
starting voltage and behave negative dynamic resistant
characteristics in the desired region of operation. In this
paper, the lamp impedance model is proposed, and this
model is established from some equations and measured
electrical characteristics of CCFL. The validity of proposed
lamp model is verified from the simulation and experimental
results.

I. INTRODUCTION
Most recently, CCFL(Cold Cathode Fluorescent
Lamp) has applied to the BLU(Back Light Unit) of display equipments widly, caused by some advantages such
as small size, high efficiency and long lifetime.
The electronic ballasts are suitable for CCFL driving
essentially, as CCFLs are needed high starting voltage
over 1200[V], steady state voltage of 400~800[V] and
driving current of 5~6[mA].
Generally, the gas discharge lamps such as CCFL
have negative dynamic resistive characteristics until gas
discharge occurrence. And instability condition is present
when supplied to high voltage more than ionization voltage in discharge tube.
Therefore suitable simulation model is needed for
flexible design and easy grasp of circuit performance of
electronic ballast with discharge lamp by computer simulation. It is important to understand the lamp impedance
model from the interrelation of voltage and current in
CCFL, for proper driving circuit design especially.
In this paper, the lamp impedance model is proposed,
and this model is established from some equations and
measured electrical characteristics of CCFL. The validity
of proposed lamp model is verified by simulation and
experimental results.
II. CONCEPT OF THE CCFL MODEL
Fig.1, 2 show the measured static V rms I rms dimming characteristics of the CCFL. As show in Fig.1 and 2,
the V rms I rms dimming characteristics show the negative impedance characteristics of a CCFL in higer dimming levels and shows positive impedance characteristics
in lower dimming levels.
To express these two different dimming characteristics
of the lamp, we employed the following equation for the
curve-fitting of this V rms to I rms curve:
Vrms = A0 + A1 EXP( A2 Irms) A3 EXP( A4 I rms)

Fig. 1.

V rms I rms

characteristic of CCFL

Fig. 2. The equivalent CCFL resistance

Equation(1) was derived empirically so as to fit the

curve well, because the polynomial formula is not enough
to fit these characteristics in wide dimming ranges as
shown in fig.2. In equation (1), the first term shows the
base value of the curve, the second term shows the negative impedance characteristics at higher dimming levels,
and the third term shows the positive impedance characteristics at the lower dimming level area respectively.
The equation parameters ( A0 A4 ) are derived easily
by using the method of least square. TABLE I shows each
parameter value A0 A4 fitted to the V rms to I rms curve
of Fig.1

(1)

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TABLE I
Model parameters for equation (1)

Parameter
A0

value

A1

1500

A2

750

A3

370

A4

130

500

Fig. 3. Integration circuit for RMS calculation

If we consider the lamp as a resistor at high frequency

operation, the equivalent lamp impedance Rla is simply
obtained by the following equation:
Rla = Vrms / I rms

(2)

From equation (1) and (2), we can obtain the equation

(3).
Rla = [ A0 + A1 EXP( A2 I rms )
A3 EXP( A4 I rms )] / I rms

(3)

Then we can obtain the equation (4) for the instantaneous lamp voltage V(t ) using the instantaneous lamp

Fig. 4. PSpice lamp model circuit of CCFL

current I (t ) as in the following

Therefore the square root of the voltage value V A

V(t ) = Rla I (t )

should be the RMS value of the current I (t ) . By using this

= {[ A0 + A1 EXP( A2 I rms )

A3 EXP( A4 I rms )] / I rms } I (t )

(4)

The basic concept of the developed lamp model can

be expressed as shown in equation (4), where the instantaneous lamp voltage V(t ) can be obtained as a function
of instantaneous lamp current I (t ) and RMS lamp current

RC integrating circuit to calculate the RMS lamp current,

the lamp model equation (4) can be applied to the PSpice
model circuit as shown Fig.4.
In the model circuit, H1 is a current controlled voltage
source, G2 is a voltage controlled current source with
square function, E2 is a voltage controlled voltage source
with the equation (3), and E3 is voltage controlled voltage
source.

I rms .

IV. OPERATION CHARACTERISTIC OF

RESORNANT CIRCUIT

III. PSPICE MODEL DERIVATION OF CCFL

In the PSpice model circuit, the RMS value of the
lamp current can be obtained by using the RC integrating
circuit as shown ing Fig.3. The current source value I S is
defined as the square of instantaneous lamp current I (t ) ,
and then the voltage value of V A is calculated as a function of the simulation time T as in the following equation
(5):

Fig. 5. LCC resonant inverter

VA =

I (t ) 2 dt / T = I rms 2

Here, R = 1 , T >> C

(5)

In this study, we make up the resonant inverter with

LCC series-parallel feature. Fig.5 is shown LCC resonant
inverter with CCFL equivalent circuit. Fig.6 is show operating mode of CCFL resonant inverter.

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The steady state analysis is done with PSpice simmulation program, and the equivalent model is as Fig.7, and
Fig. 8.

(a) MODE I

(b) MODE II

(c) MODE III

(d) MODE IV

Fig. 6. Operating mode of LCC resonant inverter

1)

MODE I: Voltage source Vdc is supplied to

the resonant circuit, then inductor current i L
is increasing gradually according to the ratio
of Vdc / L for M 1 turn on. Here, C is
equivalent capacitance of C S and C P .

2)

MODE II: When M 1 becomes turn-off, current loop is formed through diode D2 by
phase delayed current as figure.

3)

MODE III: When M 2 become turn-on after

mode2, the stored energy in resonant circuit
release through the current path as Fig.6(c).

4)

MODE IV: When M 2 become turn-off, as inductor current i L folw through diode D1 to
voltage source Vdc , the regenerative circuit is
formed.

As mentioned above, electrical power supplying to the

Rlamp is available according to the periodical repetition of

(a) Steady state voltage and current waveform

(b) Starting voltage and current wave form

Fig. 8. PSpice simulation wave form

B. Experimental results
The following parameters, those are applied to the experimental inverter, represented in table II, III.

M 1 , M 2 operation. Here, the supplied voltage to Rlamp

TABLE II
Circuit Parameters and component values
used in the experiment

become sinusoidal waveform by resonant tank circuit.

Parameter

Value

Switching frequency

51.75 kHz

Input voltage

310 V

Lr

9 mH

Cs

5000 pF

CP

1650 pF

V. SIMULATION AND EXPERIMENTAL RESULTS

A. Simulation results
And the LCC resonant circuit using the PSpice simulation is as Fig.7.

TABLE III
Specifications of CCFL used in the experiment

Fig. 7. LCC resonant circuit using the PSpice simulation

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Specification

Value

Length

135 mm

Outer diameter

1.8mm

Typ. current

6 mA

Typ. voltage

410 Vrms

REFERENCES
[1] J. A. Donahue and M.M.Jovanovic, The LCC inverer as a cold
cathode fluorescent lamp driver, in proc, IEEE APEC'94, 1994,
pp.427-433
[2] U. Mader and Dr. P. Horn, A Dynamic Model for the Electrical
Characteristics of Fluorescent Lamps IEEE Industry Applications
Society Annual Meeting, pp. 1928-1934, 1992.
[3] Louis Rovert Nerone, Design of a 2.5-MHz, Soft Switching, ClassD Converter for Electrodeless Lighting, IEEE Trans, On Power
Electronics. Vol. 12, No3, May 1997
[4] L. R. Nerone, A mathematical model of the class D converter for
compact fluorescent ballast, IEEE Trans., power electron. vol.
10,PP 708-715, Nov las. 1995.
[5] T. Liu, K. J. Tseng, and D. M. Vilathgamuva, A PSPICE model for
the electrical characteristic of fluorescent lamps, in Proc. IEEE
PESC'98, 1998, pp. 1749-1754.

(a) Steady stage voltage waveform

(b) starting voltage waveform

Fig. 9. Experimental waveform

Fig. 9. (a) represents the CCFL output waveform in

the steady state condition, and (b) represents the CCFL
output waveform in the starting condition respectively.
From the Experimental results, Resonant frequency to
switching frequency ratio is about 1.08 and starting voltage is 412[V]. Hence, we can get good agreement between experimental and computed simulation results.

VI. CONCLUSION
Circuit simulation plays an important role at a preliminary design stage. Without component models any
circuit simulation packages become futile.
When accompanied with electronic ballast, it is useful
for analyzing the steady state behavior of the CCFL. The
proposed model is suitable only for comprehending the
steady state phenomena of CCFL.
In this paper, the lamp impedance model is proposed,
and this model is established from some equations and
measured electrical characteristics of CCFL. The validity
of proposed lamp model is confirmed by simulation and
experimental results.
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
This work has been supported by KEPRI (I-2004-0-0740-00), which is funded by MOCIE(Ministry of commerce,
industry and energy).

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