Possibly the final part of my long-running series about car design (this time straddling the former 'I need an answer' and 'useless facts') is to question the reasons for the loss of the standard round shape of headlights till around the late 1960s, when manufacturers began experimenting with new shapes until around the late 90's, when all but a few exceptions became shaped to follow the lines of the car.

The last bastions of tradition were, not surprisingly German, with BMW and finally the VW Golf to lose their totally circular lights, and now only the odd Jeep, Ssanyong and Nissan MPVs remain with little round lights, though in my eyes the traditional face, made up of a wide chrome grille for a mouth with two big round eyes above, like the Ford Zodiac Mk2 was how a car should look from the front. As the 'grilles' post discovered, that was partly due to fashion, as some cars like Chryslers still make traditional grilles, though technology now basically allows air to be directed from a space under the bumper and leave little or no mouth smiling above it.

But changing round headlights for literally every possible shape they can get a filament into just looks deformed to me in many cases. The 'double bubble' design, for instance, seen in some Smart cars and Mercedes fuses two smaller lights into one just at the edge, looking like something from 'War of the worlds'. Some of the combined straight and round lights in the latest BMWs looks like an overenthusiastic student project that should have been rolled up and thrown in the bin by the tutor marking it. And technically, the cost of making unique lights for each car that need tooling individually, rather than a range of circular ones made by firms like Lucas (who were less than a mile from where I used to live) and could fit in just about every car known at the time has to be way more expensive than before. Apart from the vast assortment of new bulbs and reflectors available which may need focusing on a specific rear mirror shape, there were cars in the past that used these but was still encased in a standard universal guage round light to house it.

If anyone close to the industry knows what they have against circular headlights I'd really like to know. And the Japanese have rebelled against it by starting firms who cannibalise all the current ranges and slap 1950s fronts on them for people like me who prefer tham. And I bet their performance doesn't change an iota, all these changes I lament really do seem to me to be mainly for show rather than improvement or the altered versions wouldn't work as well. You can see the biggest range of modified cars here One firm there, Mitsuoka, only convert cars to look like older models. I just had to forgo buying one secondhand as they add £4000 to the price of the car for the alteration, which in the case of the one I saw added over twice its normal value. It was a Viewt, for those that look at the site, which is a Nissan Micra with the front of an S type Jaguar.

David,

Not sure if this site will interest you, as it is about lighting in the United States.

Lighting


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Agnes (JTJ)

I'm in total agreement with you, Sat. Remember the thread I made a while back about the Pickup my family was able to bring back to our family? Well, that pickup, a 1945 Chevy 1/2 ton (look them up. They're lovely little things!) was an art deco era auto, and you can tell just by looking at it's lines. I'm rather fond of art deco myself, and I just LOVE round headlights! I've already decided that when I get a chance, I'm going to take a picture of this truck from the front and make a piece of art deco artwork of it for my dad.

Now, as to the technicals, I have no clue. I suppose that as new options for headlamps became available, car manufacturers just did some experimenting with design for the sake of being able to. That is often the case. Also, I'm sure certain structures are more effective at lighting, thereby needing a smaller lamp, and with the whole energy efficiency trend (not a bad one, mind you) I wouldn't be surprised if that had something to do with shape changes. But those are just speculation. I really have no idea.

Part of the reason for dropping round headlights is the introduction of regulations to make cars safer for pedestrians. If you are struck by the front of a car it is better if it has a low front and a slope up to the windscreen. In this scenario you are scooped up and slide across the bonnet (hood) and, if the car is travelling fast, along the roof. This better than being hit by the flat front of a truck, when all the energy of the collision is taken in the initial impact - causing much greater injury to the pedestrian. I've read that Honda are experimenting with a mechanism that raises the bonnet a few inches if the vehicle is in collision with a pedestrian, which provides a springier surface for the person to land on.

Clearly, it's difficult to integrate round lights into the sloping front of a vehicle and still meet the requirements of the new safety standards. This is also why bull bars were banned (in the UK) as the victim becomes tangled in them causing geater impact injuries.

Ah, that's beginning to make sense. I did wonder why so many new cars looked more like little vans with 45 degree sloping fronts rather than cars with a boot at the back and a bonnet at the front roughly twice the length (like my Proton). It's interesting how non-performance/aesthetic considerations are becoming more and more part of car design, but clearly making them look like they were designed by a committee as a result. In fact, if safety and economy are going to become what dictates car design in the 21st century, I can see classic cars becoming worth many thousands as fewer and fewer people are able to own cars that actually look like works of art rather than dustbins on wheels (this is not an exaggeration, just look at most bins on their sides and imagine adding wheels- you've got a Daewoo Matiz for a start! ).