Ivy Hartman: SBTV.com is covering 2007 SEMA show in Las Vegas and with me is Deanne Moore of Baja Designs in Soltek Light Systems. Baja Designs is a name most off road racers, definitely know. Talk about the revolutionary invention that you’re talking about today at SEMA.
Deanne Moore: Well we’ve got a LED head light. It’s an off road indoor auxiliary headlight. Now LED technology, it’s been around for a long time and you’ve seen it in PL lights and everywhere else but this is some really revolutionary set. This is a forward headlight. This is the light that is approaching HID output and HID technology with; there are a lot of distinct advantages.
Ivy Hartman: Let’s talk about HID for the lay person who may not know or one of our viewers who may know what HID is.
Deanne Moore: HID stands for High Intensity Discharge. So that is a xenon filled gas bulb. It has am arc and those technical and I have talked to my engineers to give you the really technical explanation but xenon filled gas bulb, it fires an arc to light that and so there is no filament and it is actually very good light for off roads because there is no filament to burn out. LED is yet the next revolution.
Ivy Hartman: In addition to, well LED is great because it’s efficient, talk about it, you know, the efficiency of it and why you choose LED and mix it, better than maybe a what you were using before.
Deanne Moore: Okay. Well again, in LED, what you’re going to know from LED, tail lights is all that and the efficiency.
Ivy Hartman: Yeah.
Deanne Moore: And etc. When you’re in a headlight, you don’t get those types of advantages. You get some other very distinct advantages. We’ve got 18 LED’s in this light and that gives us one, an incredibly smooth pattern and when you’re off road and even when you’re on road because very, necessary when you’re off road. When off road, a lot of light towards this hot spot out there. We have the hot spot and bouncing around in front of you and that’s what your eye is looking at. Or you’ve got this sharp cut off and so you see light, really beautifully light down here and then up here, it’s completely dark but when you’re off road and the pitch of the car and everything’s moving, that’s what your eye is looking at. That’s very fatiguing, it slows you down, not exactly very safe so that is what you try to avoid off road and with HID, you could accomplish that to a very good degree but with 18 LED’s you get this pattern that is so beautiful and is so smooth. And while the other, very distinct advantages you get is the color temperature. LED color temperature is 5000 degrees Kelvin. That is sunlight at noon. That’s the optimal color temperature for the human eye.
Ivy Hartman: And well, we’re talking about temperature, that’s been one of the challenges of using LED, you know, trying to keep it cool and making sure that it’s also going to be, you know, nice and sturdy and so you partnered with Grote.
Deanne Moore: Yes.
Ivy Hartman: And talk about the design.
Deanne Moore: Okay so again, different temperature, we’re talking about the color temperature.
Ivy Hartman: Yes.
Deanne Moore: The light towers, talking about the color temperature, the thermal temperature of LED. Again, a little misleading for most people who think, ‘oh LED, you know there are nice and cool.’ Well that is true so you try to get into this forward lighting, a headlight and then you’re getting a lot heat up of there and Grote, these guys are the gurus of LED technology and they have built this beautiful, beautiful piece and you can kind of see all the heat sinking back here. This light we have it on in our booth at the SEMA show and it’s on for what? Nine, ten hours a day with absolute no air flowing and you can keep your hand sitting on top of the light that whole time. Again we are the engineer of this light to be Baja 1000, that car or type racing it can’t fill your zone and option. So most people may not need quite that level, for us, we are going to need that level and this is an over engineer product that absolutely won’t fail. 35000 hour bulb light as well.
Ivy Hartman: How has this light transform the off road racing industry?
Deanne Moore: Well it’s pretty new so we run it as a prototype last year. The guys around last year begged, ‘oh we are getting this again, right?’ Last year. And we do, we have some shots we could show of the light last year, it’s about two or three times in size. They manage to get this 50% of the size and weight with more light output and the main thing that we’ve got was this light again. The color temperature and that smooth pattern. That means that while you’re driving off road, you’re seeing everything that’s right in front of you. One of our racers said, ‘it’s like having the sun right in front of you no matter where the car is you’ve got this beautiful light. That means, they are able to drive and not get tired. They are able to drive faster and they are able to be safe.
Ivy Hartman: Talk about some of the successes of running a small business and developing a new product with a partner like Grote.
Deanne Moore: Well I mean one is it’s just a really fun industry. I’ve been an off roader all my life and to come into this kind of an industry at gets to work with you know, some of the biggest names, you know, Malcolm Smith is going to be in a car that has this particular light on at this year and this get to be friends with these people is really a lot of fun. It’s a great, great fun industry and it’s, for us, it’s terribly important to be on the leading edge of technology, that’s what we do best. That’s what we’re known for. That’s what Baja Designs is known for and that’s what’s Grote is known for. It makes this a perfect compliment and synergustic partnering that we have found Grote to work with us on those products.
Ivy Hartman: Talk about how you’ve reached that kind of rapport or reputation with branding, you know, yourself being known for leading cutting edge and technology as well as be witting person in for off road racing.
Deanne Moore: Okay. Well my husband who is the engineer, who develops all of our products. I just get to sit up here and be the voice of it all. He in 1995 was this first Baja 1000 on a motorcycle and like all good engineers, you know, Sonny he needed the light and there was nothing out there so he says, ‘well you know, people running with these puny little lights. Well that’s not good enough for an engineer developed this beautiful light. Pretty soon, all this factory offer a motorcycle teams are running our light. Then in 1998, HID technology was into infancy. Again, being the good engineer that he is, he said, ‘I’ve got to have this’ and we’ve opted the HID technology and that was about 3 years ago even, if he start to talking about saying, ‘we need to have an LED forward headlight LED’ and we started researching that industry, trying to find some good partners that we could work with to develop this technology and that was very difficult, very difficult because it’s again, we’re such a leading edge at this time that we couldn’t find anybody that was worthy of the kind of product that our customers accept.
Ivy Hartman: And you found Grote.
Deanne Moore: Until we found Grote.
Ivy Hartman: Talk about you, you’re talking about partnerships. Is the husband and wife partnership was this company?
Deanne Moore: Yes.
Ivy Hartman: And talk about how you guys make that a success.
Deanne Moore: Well it really is interesting because you know my husband is an engineer so all of you know what engineers are like, that’s their own little breed and I actually come from a sales and business consulting background so it’s a perfect merger for us and you know, it took a little while to get us, to get our roles all define and everything but really, it’s freed up his time to do all the product development. That’s what he wants to do and he leaves the running the business and doing everything else. You have the nuts and balls of it that’s my job and it works really well because we’ve got some great products.
Ivy Hartman: Thank you Deanne for being here and enlightening us to this revolutionary technology. I appreciate you being here. And keep it right here on sbtv.com for our complete coverage of the SEMA show 2007 in Las Vegas.
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