Mercedes-Benz’s recent patent filing with the European Patent Office may seem minor at first glance, but it reveals a thoughtful innovation aimed at seamlessly integrating vehicle sensors without compromising the car’s design. The German automaker proposes a new viewing window on the windscreen, featuring a specially formulated film that allows sensors to communicate effectively while remaining virtually invisible to the human eye. This clever solution eliminates the unsightly protrusions and design interruptions often caused by external sensors, maintaining the sleek and premium aesthetics Mercedes-Benz is known for.
Sensors Can Be Unsightly
We’ve all seen the unsightly bulges and protrusions in vehicles’ grilles and other exterior parts that contain the sensors necessary for modern cars to work. Whether it’s the radar cruise-control module, external cameras, or a receiver or sender of radio-frequency (RF) of infrared data, modern cars have more of them than ever. They are often downright ugly, and detract from a vehicle’s styling. Integrating these unobtrusively is important for premium automakers such as Mercedes, for whom a premium aesthetic is part of the brand.
A Sensor Viewing Window You Don’t Even Notice
To this end, Mercedes has developed a special colored windscreen coating that looks opaque to the human eye and seamlessly integrates into the existing black surround of the windscreen glass. This viewing window can be placed anywhere the engineers want to locate communication equipment such as the sensors and receivers for traffic information, toll payment, or vehicle-to-vehicle communication. The special coating is formulated to let through the necessary wavelengths to allow such equipment to work, but giving it a black appearance like the rest of the windscreen surround, so you can’t see it.
This is a purely cosmetic product, and serves only to improve the sleek looks of an executive car by hiding some of the exterior sensory equipment from view, so it doesn’t spoil the vehicle’s appearance. Mercedes says that it allows unhindered sending and receiving of data, as if the screen is clear, with the only difference being that it’s hidden and invisible to the human eye.
