BMW leads the way with flashing brake light safety advance

Brake warning system for 2016 BMW models

The dynamic flashing brake light system seen on BMW’s cars will be transferred to the German marque’s motorcycle fleet on six 2016 models.

The two-stage warning system alerts following traffic when the bike brakes hard or makes an emergency manoeuvre by initially flashing its brake lights when decelerating from more than 31mph. Stage 2 automatically engages the hazard warning lights when the bike is almost at a standstill, below 8.7mph.

The two sets of flashing lights remain on until the bike is up to a minimum speed of 12.4mph.

Here is a short video demonstrating the system:

BMW will introduce the dynamic brake light system as an option with ABS Pro, the system engineered by BMW to increase safety and stability when braking mid-corner and was introduced as a retro-fit feature last year. It uses input from the bike such as roll rate, yaw rate and wheel speed which is already collected by the Dynamic Damping Control (DDC) and the Dynamic Traction Control (DTC) units.

ABS Pro is an option with Ride Modes Pro for the 2016 models R1200GS, R1200GS Adventure and S1000XR. Meanwhile, the K1600GT, GTL and Exclusive models will have it fitted as standard.

Steffan Rau, BMW Motorrad,  Development Light Systems, explains, “Until recently this safety feature was only available in cars but now BMW motorcycles are the first manufacturer to integrate it into the motorcycles.”