In our last post about Audi’s laser light technology for high beams in automobiles, we quoted Audi’s light chief Stephan Berlitz saying that laser light is “at a point where LED were about 10 years ago.” That was to say that it has a lot of promise, but is still pretty far into the future in terms of being commercially viable.
For those of y’all who haven’t read up on laser lights (although there is a pretty brief video in the link above) Audi is experimenting with shooting a blue laser onto phosphorous which converts into soft white light that projects further than any other type of lights we put in cars (xenon, halogen, LED, etc.) Plus, since it’s just a tiny beam of blue laser, it doesn’t need nearly as much energy to illuminate as LED—the previously coolest light on the block—does. The only problem is that lasers are currently more expensive.
Well, it turns out that BMW wants to make this a race with Audi, a race to see who can get laser lights into a production car first. BMW has set a goal to offer laser lights as an option in the i8 Plug-In Hybrid before 2015. It’s an ambitious goal, and certainly provided good motivation for Audi to get things moving faster. Audi’s response?
Not only will the 2014 R18 E-tron Quattro Le Mans get laser lights in time for its debut race in April, but also that Audi would beat BMW to market. Of course, no date has been given as yet, so as long as Audi’s is even a day earlier to market than BMW, the company will have fulfilled its pledge. A bigger obstacle is that the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration hasn’t passed the regulations to approve auto laser lights in the U.S.
This shows that Audi is the kind of place that values lawyers just as much as engineers, for without the lobbyists and proper legal inroads, all the fanciest doo-dads are just props for the next Star Wars film.
In the meantime, we’re pleased to see Audi’s other developments regarding head lights, like the camera that detects up to eight oncoming vehicles and spares their eyes from being blinded by the Audi’s lights. Hopefully we’ll see both technologies united and in production by this time next year.