Detroit NAIAS 2010 auto show closed two days ago. This week, Driving Vision News publishes all the lighting and driver assistance information from this show in the report “North America International Auto show 2010”.
Overall, European and Japanese automakers with their suppliers are the prime movers at the cutting edge of lighting and assistance system technology.
North Americans, producers and consumers alike, tend not to have much interest in lighting or driver assistance but they are beginning to experiment with the LED-illuminated light guides that have been on the market since BMW launched their now-familiar “Angel Eyes” circular light guide rings last decade.
Korean automakers, in particular, are quickly bringing lighting advancements down from the top sectors to more generally affordable cars, paying attention to styling so that even basic lighting technology has an up-to-date look. For instance, there is a proliferation of technique to make bulb-type signal lamps appear similar to more costly, advanced LED lights. Optical techniques that first appeared on expensive European cars are quickly adopted on Korean vehicles, often with good execution at lower cost. It can only be a matter of short time before the first Korean LED headlamps appear.
For the executive summary and the complete NAIAS 2010 report with 135 close shots on selected head and rear lights covering 67 car models from the main car makers, go to www.drivingvisionnews.com
PS: Don’t miss next week Editorial by Kamislav FADEL, Automotive Lighting R&D Director