LED light sources get more and more popular for automobile and other signal illumination. The control and integration level into body electronics however is still in the same manner as known from the filament bulb technique. Up to now no adaptation of the environmental brightness (day/night) or fog condition takes place to balance the level of brightness of signal lighting due to the actual requirement. Regularly - especially in turn over seasons - it can be read in press releases that no control device or sensor has been applied to automatically dipping the rear fog light. Another fact is that classical controllers and switches do individually their work without making benefit of synergy effects. By the SensorLED invention, a light source is now used for dual operation. Besides the main function (emission of light) the invention allows to measure environmental brightness in a second function. The same optical design of the signal light is integrally used for light emission and for sensing purposes. So for example a central high mounted stop light (CHMSL) can work in dual operation. Herewith a new systemblock occurs and develops advanced functions within automobile and other signal lighting without additional sensor needs (self erasing rear fog light, day- /night-control of signal lighting, automatic parking light, active reflex reflector, etc.). Embedded into the body electronics architecture under synergy aspects, this new systemblock is capable to fully substitute the current controller unit for self dipping mirror units. Thereby the overall cost will decrease measurable by an additional increase of operational safety of the full system. For the covering abstract see ITRD E123380.
Abstract