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This paper discusses the optical design of motor vehicle head lamps using the new federal visual optical aim requirements. Methodology for using filament images from a head lamp reflector to create the required sharp gradient for visual aimable lamps is presented. The paper discusses hardware tolerance factors which would degrade a sharp cut-off, and methods are reviewed for accounting for and designing robustness against the tolerance factors. Hardware results are shown for designs using the techniques described in the paper.

Distributive lighting systems utilizing high intensity discharge (HID) light sources and optical fiber light pipes are capable of delivering a large luminous flux to head lamp assemblies. The challenge is to design an efficient lamp package that angularly distributes this flux to meet legal and customer requirements for head lamp photometry performance. In this communication we: 1) review photometry guidelines which make the design of die low beam lamp package challenging, 2) outline the basic relationships between the optical design parameters, 3) illustrate solutions to the design optimization problem with three low beam head lamp design approaches, and 4) present photometry results and a computer rendered road simulation for prototype distributive lighting low beam head lamp hardware.