Study and implementation of the LED headlight driver with auto-start function in specific location
Conventional automatic headlight devices determine whether to switch vehicle headlights on or off according to the brightness of the environment. These devices cannot automatically switch on headlights during daytime unless the headlights are required in specific road conditions (e.g. mountainous or foggy areas), thus compromising the safety of road users and drivers. This study develops a light-emitting diode (LED) headlight system that integrates the global positioning system (GPS) and a controller area network (CAN) bus communication interface. This system uses the GPS system to analyse the geographic location and then determines whether to switch on the LED headlight. To reduce the system complexity, a CAN bus is used to limit the number of control wires required. The LED headlight driver also uses an interleaved boost converter that has low conduction losses and input ripple currents, which improves the conversion efficiency of the headlight drivers and extends the battery lifetime. The feasibility of the proposed technology is verified using experimental results.