Lighting System Lighting System)
Headlights should illuminate the road in front of the vehicle without blinding uncoming traffic. Red lights protect it from backside. Lighting system most be part of body design. These are the conventional demands on the lighting system. The future wishes of clients are much more complex.
Head lamps should be switched on automatically (for example in tunnels). After changing Road Traffic Act the range control systm will suit the range of dipped beam to changing situations (for example motorway or bend). Crossroads should be recognized by the system. Anyway there will be more overall view around the car especially to the back by lighting and also by night with infrared camera or radar. Therefore the information can not only be transfered by mirrors but also by cable.
The consequences are systems of monitoring or projecting partly to the windscreen. Not all information will be only taken for driver's information. Some for example should directly influence the steering if the car slowly changing lane in order to avoid an accident. Already in production is fixing the distance to the vehicle in front - with max. 20 % braking possible.
Some of these ideas as for example the automatic switching or lighting the bend are already reality. One of the innovations in the last years was changing the lens material from glass to acrylic. The lens meanwhile is replaced with Clear acrylic too. It is resistant to road dirt and car-wash.
Inside the headlamps the reflectors changed, an additional lens was inside arranged and the halogen bulb changed to Xenon bulb. This installation takes a lot of space and there are plans to take only one and transport light via glass fibre to the place of the present headlamps. Design of car body will be glad about more possibilties of shaping.
Great demands will be made on the sensoric system. Now only realize a certain difference between dark and light it has to scan the surrounding in future. A lot of datas will have to be processed in very short time and the control system most be sure to tell the difference between lanes/vehicles in front and flashlight from oncoming traffic for example. May be one day these systems get to know the actual speed limit and force us to keep it.