The LED is in the "light" field, and the lights illuminate the stage!

With the expansion of the LED lighting industry, major LED manufacturers are exploring new blue ocean markets. Many manufacturers have seen the broad development prospects of LED automotive lighting, and have accelerated the layout of automotive LEDs, such as Taiwanese manufacturer Li Qing. Lianjia has successfully cut into the LED lamp module supply chain and become a supplier of lamp manufacturers. Taiwan's LED packaging factory Yiguang has also actively entered the automotive field in recent years, and its revenue share has gradually increased; The supplier of the meta chip is the beneficiary of the main LED car lighting.

According to the manufacturer data of the Association, the sales volume of new energy passenger vehicles reached 27,500 in March 2017, an increase of 67% from February and a year-on-year growth rate of 76%. The popularity of new energy vehicles will definitely drive the penetration of LEDs in automotive lighting.

When the BMW i8's laser headlights are lit, you may not think that there was no headlights when the first car was born. What is the history of car lights? This issue of Xiaobian will take you into the world of car lights, and explore the three lights of the car lights.

The automotive lighting system is not only an important part of the vehicle safety system, but also an organic component of the body shape, which plays an important role in the engineering research and development and design process.

With the deepening of the brand strategy, automobile manufacturers have adopted the luminaire modeling to highlight the brand design features, and gradually make the lamps become the core elements of the brand image.

According to the function, automotive lighting fixtures mainly include two types: automotive lighting and automotive signal lights.

The position and function of the car lighting according to its installation include: headlights, fog lights, license plate lights, instrument lights, ceiling lights, work lights.

Car signal lights include: turn signal lights, hazard warning lights, width lights, tail lights, brake lights, and reverse lights.

The evolution of automotive lighting has gone through more than a century of technological precipitation, starting with the first kerosene lamps, halogen lamps in the electrical age, xenon headlights, LED light sources, and now the latest laser headlights.

1, halogen headlights

The halogen lamps used in automobiles today are upgraded versions of incandescent lamps, but halogens are added to them. Halogen lamps increase brightness and have a long life.

When you drive at night, if you find that the light is yellow, it is a halogen light. Halogen lamps are not as conspicuous as xenon lamps, but normal lighting needs are still met.

2, Xenon headlights

The abbreviation for xenon lamp is HID, which is a form of lamp that will be used in high-end models.

The xenon lamp has higher brightness, which is three times that of the halogen lamp. It is more energy-saving. It has different light-emitting principle from the halogen lamp. There is no filament. The high-voltage positive and negative electric stimulation of the xenon in the bulb reacts with the rare metal. When you feel that someone else's car is shaking, but in rainy and foggy weather, the penetrating power of the xenon lamp will drop, and the effect of the illumination is not as good as the halogen lamp.

Xenon lamps are favored by many consumers because of their high brightness and easy identification.

3, LED headlights

After the LED lights were popularized in offices, homes, etc., they were finally used on cars.

LED headlights, energy saving and environmental protection, energy consumption is 1/20 of halogen lamps, low cost, long life, not bad, in fact, is a light-emitting diode, using solid semiconductor chips as luminescent materials, photon emission caused by carrier recombination Glowing.

Nowadays, many cars use LED lights to make daytime running lights and position lights. It is very power efficient, has a long service life, and is the brightest of the three lamps. Therefore, many models will choose it as a light.

4, laser headlights

The laser headlight source is generated by laser diodes, and its application range is wider. Laser diodes are used in measurement, electronics, communication, medicine, processing and other industries.

Laser headlights have most of the advantages of LED headlights, such as fast response, low brightness attenuation, small size, low energy consumption, long life and so on.

Compared to LED headlights, laser headlights have advantages in terms of volume. The length of a single laser diode component can already be 10 microns, which is only 1/100 of the size of a conventional LED component. This means that as long as the designer is willing, the tradition The size of the car's headlights can be greatly reduced, which may revolutionize the design of the various elements on the front of the car.

The laser lamp has the characteristics of fast reaction speed, energy saving, small volume, long life and low brightness attenuation, which is also the inevitable trend of future car lights.

Its illumination range is 600 meters, which is incomparable to the other three types of lights. And now BMW and Audi have launched models with laser lights.

Four car lights performance comparison

LED automotive lighting industry chain

1, the chip

Because automotive LEDs have high requirements on chip power and reliability, and the advanced layout of major international chips and packaging manufacturers, the current LED chip manufacturers in the market mainly rely on Lumileds, Osram, Nichia, etc., especially High power chip for automotive headlamps.

2, the package

In the packaging process, the COB package can meet the high system integration requirements of automotive lighting source modules, and thus the share of automotive LED devices is increasing. Currently, automotive LED device suppliers are based on Career, Nichia, and Lumileds. It is dominated by major international companies, especially for headlamps.

Taiwanese companies such as Yiguang and Tongliang are also actively expanding their markets. The main packaging companies in the mainland, Mulinsen and Guoxing Optoelectronics, have also begun to deploy the automotive LED market, mainly in the taillights and other fields.

China's major LED packaging companies are also making efforts in the automotive lighting market through various means, trying to gradually break the monopoly situation, but still install the main, and the market share is small, it will take time to enter the pre-installation market.

3, LED light source module

The LED light source module for a vehicle includes one or more LED chips, mechanical and optical components, and a driving module, a connector, a heat sink, etc., and has a high degree of integration.

The internationally renowned manufacturers such as OSRAM, Toyota Synthetic, Otaru, Lumileds, and Cree have started research and development of LEDs for hand-cars in the 1990s. In recent years, they have invested heavily in research and development, forming a complete series of automotive LED light sources. Production system.

At present, there are only a handful of LED automotive light source module manufacturers in China. BYD has its own complete industrial chain. Therefore, the lamp modules in its brand models are self-produced. Taiwanese manufacturers such as Li Qing actively cut into the automotive lighting field, and the main headlights in the mainland. Factory cooperation, layout of the pre-installation market.

4, the lights

In the lamp part, because the supply chain of the lamp manufacturer and the car manufacturer is relatively closed, especially the headlights of the car have higher thresholds in terms of heat dissipation, reliability and brightness. The largest market share of LED car lighting is the traditional lamp manufacturer. Such as Xiaoyan, Haila, Valeo, Stanley, etc., these manufacturers and most of the international first-line car manufacturers supply relationship is relatively fixed, so it is difficult for Chinese car factory to cut into.

Despite this, China's headlights are still actively looking for entry opportunities, starting with lower interior lighting, and gradually turning to fog lights, taillights and other applications, and finally developing high-margin headlights.

At present, the largest local lamp factory, Xingyu, has successfully entered the supply chain of FAW-Volkswagen, FAW Toyota, Chery and other car manufacturers.

The five largest lamp manufacturers in China and their development and operation mode

summary

From the earliest acetylene gas lamps to several generations of LED lamps, due to cost, technology, demand and other reasons, the LED lamp assembly rate in the domestic supporting market is not very high, but its advantages have been recognized by many car companies and users. LED lighting is the trend of the times.

Under this trend, almost all well-known car manufacturers have been involved in the technical field of this product. Therefore, in the blue car of LED car lighting, who is ups and downs, we will wait and see!