Adaptive driving light system
A driving light system for a vehicle, including: an array of lighting modules for illuminating a lighting zone in front of a vehicle, each module including: a light emitter unit for emitting a light beam along a light path to illuminate a segment of the lighting zone; and a directional light sensor unit adapted to detect reflected light from reflective surfaces in the path of the light beam, and at least one controller for automatically controlling the brightness of each emitted light beam as a function of light detected by one or more of the directional light sensors.
1 . A driving light system for a vehicle, including:
an array of lighting modules for illuminating a lighting zone in front of a vehicle, each module including:
a light emitter unit for emitting a light beam along a light path to illuminate a segment of the lighting zone; and
a directional light sensor unit adapted to detect reflected light from reflective surfaces in the path of the light beam, and
at least one controller configured to automatically control the brightness of each emitted light beam as a function of light detected by one or more of the directional light sensor units while the light emitter unit remains on, and
wherein the at least one controller is further configured to dim the emitted light beam by a fixed amount if a sensor reading of the one or more sensor units increased at greater than a predetermined rate.
2 . The driving light system according to claim 1 , wherein the lighting modules are arranged to illuminate segments extending laterally across the lighting zone.
3 . The driving light system according to claim 1 , wherein each light emitter unit includes:
one or more light sources housed in an emitter housing.
4 . The driving light system according to claim 3 , wherein each light emitter unit further includes either one or both of:
an optical element to focus light from the one or more light sources through a lens along the light path, and
a heat sink to cause heat to flow away from the light emitter unit.
5 . The driving light system according to claim 1 , wherein each directional light sensor unit includes:
a light sensor housed in a sensor housing.
6 . The driving light system according to claim 5 , wherein each directional light sensor unit further includes:
a collimator for focusing the reflected light on the light sensor.
7 . The driving light system according to claim 1 , wherein the light sensor unit is mounted in each lighting module below the light emitter unit, when in use, to avoid heating of the at least one controller and light sensor unit by the light emitter unit.
8 . The driving light system according to claim 3 , wherein each directional light sensor unit includes a collimator for focusing the reflected light on the light sensor, and wherein
the emitter housing and sensor housing of each lighting module are integrated, or
the emitter housing and sensor housing of a plurality of lighting modules in the array are integrated.
9 . The driving light system according to claim 8 , further including:
one or more mounting brackets for mounting the lighting modules to the vehicle.
10 . The driving light system according to claim 1 , wherein the at least one controller is configured to perform any one or more of:
(i) automatically controlling the brightness of the emitted light beam from each lighting module as a function of light detected by the directional light sensor unit from said each lighting module;
(ii) dimming the emitted light beam by a fixed amount if the sensor reading is greater than a predetermined threshold;
(iii)
(iv) brightening the emitted light beam by a fixed amount if the sensor reading is less than a predetermined threshold;
(iv) automatically controlling the brightness of the emitted light beam from each lighting module as a function of light detected by the directional light sensor unit from one or more other lighting modules in the array of lighting modules; and
(v) dimming the emitted light beam from said each lighting module by a fixed amount if the sensor reading from said each lighting module is greater by a predetermined threshold than the sensor reading from the one or more other lighting modules.
11 . The driving light system according to claim 1 , further including:
a modulator for modulating the light beam emitted by each light emitter unit in a different manner,
wherein one or more of the light sensor units are adapted to determine the particular light emitter unit from which the light beam was emitted.
12 . The driving light system according to claim 11 , wherein the modulator is configured to apply one of the following modulations to the light beam emitted by each light emitter unit:
applying a different Pulse Width Modulation (PWM) frequency for each light emitter unit;
applying a different PWM phase for each light emitter unit;
periodically inserting a burst of unique frequency PWM into the light beam emitted by each light emitter unit;
periodically inserting a unique code into each light emitter unit; and
periodically inserting a uniquely timed burst of an identified pattern into each light emitter unit.
13 . The driving light system according to claim 1 , wherein each lighting module includes a separate controller.
14 . The driving light system according to claim 1 , wherein the at least one controller includes a central controller to automatically control operations of each of the lighting modules.
15 . The driving light system according to claim 14 , wherein the at least one controller further includes a plurality of distributed controllers, each lighting module including a separate one of the plurality of distributed controllers, wherein the central controller and the plurality of distributed controllers respectively function as master and slaves.
16 . The driving light system according to claim 15 , further including a broadcast serial network facilitating communication between the central controller and the plurality of distributed controllers.
17 . The driving light system according to claim 16 , wherein the central controller and the plurality of distributed controllers communicate via a LIN bus serial communications protocol.
18 . The driving light system according claim 1 , wherein the at least one controller is configured to adjust a predetermined threshold in response to a manual user input.
19 . The driving light system according claim 1 , wherein the at least one controller is further configured to adjust the brightness of the emitted light beam from one or more of the lighting modules from one or more preset brightness levels in response to a manual user input.
20 . The driving light system according to claim 1 , wherein the at least one controller is further configured to engage or disengage automatic light beam brightness control in response to a manual user input.