Koito say they’re now able to reduce the weight of their production headlamps by 30%. Starting with the new Toyota Crown lamp, Koito engineers have aggressively worked in four directions:
Lighting Science Group have introduced a new range of LED street lights called “PROLIFIC”. The company say they give more effective illumination with lower energy consumption and operating cost over the life of the lamps.
Following the meeting of their Board of Directors today, Valeo presented their results for the 3rd quarter 2009.
• Positive net income of €4m, following 3 consecutive quarters of losses
Koito were the first to produce LED headlamp with the Lexus LS 600h, and the setmaker are continuing with new LED headlamp launches on the Toyota Prius, Lexus HS250h and Lexus RX450h.
Driving Vision News visited Koito and spent a day with management to better understand their strategy and their results. This week we present the range of LED headlamps and Koito’s targets for the future.
First go: LS600h headlamp launched in May 2007
Low beam
Low beam is produced by 3 projector optical modules, each equipped with a 4-emitter light source array. All three projectors move together for AFS functions. There’s also a reflector with one 4-emitter and one 2-emitter light source array, for a total of 18 emitters and 50w consumption per side of the vehicle.
High beam
High beam is produced by a projector system making 2 functions, visible high beam and IR light for night vision. An IR-pass filter is shifted into the beam path for situations in which visible-light high beam cannot be used, according to the same principles as the cutoff shield shift in a BiXenon or BiHalogen projector.
Second generation: Toyota Prius, Lexus RX450h and HS250h launched May 2009
The Toyota Prius and RX 450h headlamps are presented in the pictures below:
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At the Tokyo Motor Show, Stanley presented their LED headlamp, just launched in June 2009 with a volume of 200 vehicles per month.
Last week at Tokyo motor show, Nissan’s new Leaf was shown for the first time. The car will be built in Japan and in Smyrna, Tennessee, USA and will go on sale in late 2010. Nissan expect to sell about 150,000 Leaf electric cars
Verena Kloos is headed to BMW’s Munich studio where she will be responsible for context design and advanced development. Since 2004, Kloos, 48, has been president of the automaker’s DesignworksUSA studio
Globo-Welding is a patent-registered joining concept by Leister, specially suited for the welding of complex 3D-plastic components. The Globo-technique is suitable for series production
The U.S. Federal Highway Administration will conduct a study to better understand and prevent motorcycle crashes. 5,300 motorcycle riders died in America in 2008, accounting for 14% of all traffic fatalities; 96,000 were injured.
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