The oldest employee of car lighting supplier Hella will undoubtedly look back nostalgically on the time when there were only meetings about whether the diameter of a lamp should be 14 or 16 centimeters. Today the company deals with much more complicated matters such as 'micro-optics' and 'cylindrical lens arrays'. You will soon encounter the latest invention on cars.
Hella has developed something they call FlatLight. Where you used to be able to count the individual diodes of an LED headlight, the individual light sources in this lamp are no less than 15 micrometers small. That is 0.015 millimeters, which fits 33 times in a grain of salt. The lamps are also only 5 millimeters thick, allowing designers to be very creative with them.
Why lighting can look different
One FlatLight panel can take on all colours. This way you don't have to install a separate turn signal, but you can also make an existing panel that normally turns red flash orange. This also allows car manufacturers to create very different designs. Also, the taillights are not red when they are turned off. The new technology can be used in both headlights and taillights.
This year, the first car manufacturer will unveil a model with the FlatLights as rear lights. You can see what that might look like in the video below. There will also be an 'international premium manufacturer' that will use the front lamps on five models. These cars will be unveiled in 2025. Hella does not announce which manufacturers will use the lighting.
A full headlight from FlatLights is probably not going to happen anytime soon. Headlights must have a specific light pattern and must also be able to be aimed. As Hella now tells it, the new technology is really intended for rear lights (which can be made entirely of micro optics) and indicator lights and daytime running lights in the nose.
Reminiscent of the OLED lighting from BMW, among others
By the way, light elements that change color are nothing new. BMW has had OLED taillights for a while, for example on the M4 CS that you see above. The lower strip of red elements can also provide orange light when the driver indicates direction. That seems to be the case, anyway. Hella's invention is technically different from OLED.
Other lighting changes
Car manufacturers are increasingly doing more with lighting. For example, BMW offers luminous grilles, many new cars have a strip between the headlights and doors project slightly onto the ground when you get in. Volkswagen goes one step further and will soon come with luminous logos on the nose. The new Touareg already has a luminous logo on the back.
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