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Today’s discussions about high intensity discharge (HID) headlamps are often reduced to a simple discussion about glare. Glare is an important aspect when talking about the performance of automotive headlamps. It is not completely understood today and more research has to be done. Nevertheless a more “global” view may be very useful to characterize the pros and cons of HID headlamp technology. This paper describes a direct comparison of latest serial production cars with both tungsten halogen (TH) and HID headlamps. The results of the performed driving tests in real traffic and visibility distance measurements show that HID headlamps provide many benefits regarding different aspects of traffic safety. Moreover the results illustrate that drivers clearly tend to prefer HID headlamps.

Accident statistics show that motorcycling is still a pretty dangerous mode of locomotion. Since the last 15 years motorcyclists' fatalities experienced just a creeping decrease compared to car drivers'. In-Depth Motorcycle Studies displayed that in more than two thirds of motorcycle accidents the main contributing factor is a car. With these accidents basically taking place in urban areas (more than 50%) with a lot of distraction and at pretty low speeds - at intersections above all - one can conjecture the low visibility of powered two wheelers (PTW) to be an important cause. This is fortified by actual statistical research naming 10.5% of all motorcycle accidents to be conspicuity related 1 . With ECE-R87 compliant Daytime Running Lights (DRL) as a regulatory defined conspicuity aid, the impact of DRL usage on PTWs was to be investigated.