As one of the leaders in today’s automotive and motorcycle advancements, BMW is again pushing the envelope of technology and blurring the lines between science fiction and reality.
The German manufacturer prides itself on state of the art safety features on both cars and motorcycles, most notably the introduction of ABS for motorcycles in 1988 and their semi-active chassis which was released in 2012.
More notably are BMW’s recent updates in motorcycle lighting technology which include BMW’s adaptive headlight technology for the 2010 BMW K1600GT and GTL models, which uses ride height and pitch sensors to automatically level the headlight.
Also, the 2012 BMW R1200GS which was the first motorcycle to feature an LED main headlight with integrated daytime running light.
For 2014, BMW has announced the introduction of Organic LEDs (OLED) which are claimed to be a vast improvement over the inorganic LED lighting that is currently being used.
BMW explains this is “the inorganic LEDs we currently encounter in many application areas operate with a semiconductor crystal embedded in a conical recess that acts as a reflector. The luminous intensity achieved in this way is not constant across the entire angle of radiation, however. This means that the light from an LED lamp always seems less bright to the human eye the more it is seen from the side.”
“On the other hand, BMW Organic Light permits a lamp unit to be created whose luminous intensity is almost constant across the entire radiant angle.”
While BMW is optimistic about the use of OLEDs in the next few years, it is uncertain that there will be a significant improvement over current technology.
According to BMW, while OLEDs create a “highly three-dimensional lighting effect that viewers find very attractive,” they lack the luminous density of traditional LEDs, requiring a combination of the two in order to be effective.
Source: BMW Group
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