Kevin M. Wolford, Executive Director
Automotive Manufacturers
Equipment Compliance Agency, Inc. ,
1101 15^th Street, NW, Suite 607
Washington, DC  20005-5020

Dear Mr. Wolford:

This responds to your letter in which you requested clarification of certain issues pertaining to the requirements for replacement lighting equipment under Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard (FMVSS) No. 108, Lamps, Reflective Devices, and Associated Equipment. Specifically, your letter asked whether a manufacturer designing a lamp with a bulb using an indexed base, but which has a series of LEDs, would need to meet the requirements for a "single compartment" lamp or a "three compartment" lamp (i.e. , whether a bulb with several LEDs has a single light source or multiple light sources). You also asked whether it would be permissible under FMVSS No. 108 to develop a lamp with a red bulb that complies with the Economic Commission for Europe (ECE) standard for bulbs. I am pleased to have the opportunity to explain the relevant provisions of our standard.

By way of background, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) is authorized to issue FMVSSs that set performance requirements for new motor vehicles and items of motor vehicle equipment. It is the responsibility of manufacturers to certify that their products conform to all applicable safety standards before they can be offered for sale (see 49 CFR Part 571).

As you are aware, FMVSS No. 108 specifies requirements for original and replacement lamps, reflective devices, and associated equipment. The standard applies to passenger cars, multipurpose passenger vehicles, trucks, buses, trailers (except pole trailers and trailer converter dollies), and motorcycles. Paragraph S5.8.1 of the standard provides, "Except as provided below, each lamp, reflective device, or item of associated equipment manufactured to replace any lamp, reflective device, or item of associated equipment on any vehicle to which this standard applies, shall be designed to conform to this standard."

We would note that the substantive issues raised in your letter, regarding compliance of certain lamp designs with the requirements of Standard No. 108, have largely been addressed in prior interpretations. The first scenario presented in your letter involves a replacement lamp (non-headlamp) that includes a series of LEDs. You stated that the hypothetical replacement lamp is designed with an indexed base conforming to SAE J567, Lamp Bulb Retention System. Your letter, in effect, asked whether the LEDs, taken together, would be considered a single light source when determining photometric compliance with Standard No. 108 (thereby being subject to the requirements for one lighted section), or whether the LEDs would be considered individual light sources (thereby being subject to the requirements for three lighted sections).

As we explained in our December 30, 1992 letter of interpretation to Mr. T. Kouchi, lamps with LEDs are considered to have multiple light sources, with each LED constituting a single source. The letter goes on to state that "any device that contains more than three lighted sections, or LEDs, need only comply with the requirements prescribed for three lighted sections". We note, however, that in our December 21, 2005 letter of interpretation to Mr. Takayuki Amma (see enclosure), we stated that if a number of LEDs is wired such that failure of any one LED would cause the entire array of LEDs to cease functioning, we would consider the array of LEDs to be a single light source. Furthermore, each array of LEDs wired in this manner would be considered one light source for the purposes of determining number of lighted sections in SAE J588e, Turn Signal Lamps, which is incorporated by reference in FMVSS No. 108. For example, a turn signal lamp that is wired with two arrays of LEDs, operating in the manner described above, would be considered a two-lighted-section lamp.

As to the second issue presented in your letter regarding the permissibility of using a red bulb in a taillamp, such a configuration would be permissible under FMVSS No. 108. Under Table I and Table III of FMVSS No. 108 and appropriate SAE standards incorporated by reference, the color of the light from taillamps and stop lamps must be red (without specifying either bulb color or lens color). The color specifications that such lamps must meet in order to comply with FMVSS No. 108 are contained in SAE Standard No. J578c, Color Specifications for Electric Signaling Devices (February 1977), which S5.1.5 of FMVSS No. 108 incorporates by reference. The ECE regulation mentioned in your letter (E/ECE/324/Rev.1/Add.36/Rev.3/Amend.3) is not a substitute for SAE J578c.

On this point, your letter also questioned whether the interpretation as expressed in our October 5, 2000 letter to Senior Trooper W.L. Hill has been changed. It has not. In that letter, it was stated that we were not aware of any manufacturer certifying a taillamp with a red bulb and a clear lens under FMVSS No. 108. However, the response reflected our understanding that a red bulb/clear lens configuration was not economically feasible at that time, not that such a configuration is impermissible under the standard. Since then, we understand that some manufacturers are currently producing lamps with red LED bulbs and clear lenses that do comply with the standard.

Your letter also raised the separate issue of how the above principles apply to aftermarket manufacturers in light of our notice of interpretation published in the Federal Register on October 8, 2004, which interpreted paragraph S5.8.1 of the standard dealing with replacement lighting equipment (69 FR 60464). In response to several requests for reconsideration of that notice of interpretation, the agency published a revised notice of interpretation in the Federal Register on November 1, 2005 (70 FR 65972). We encourage you to read this latest notice of interpretation (see enclosure).

In that second notice, we have decided to adopt a less restrictive interpretation of S5.8.1, which, simply stated, requires that a lamp (or other item of lighting equipment) manufactured to replace a lamp on a vehicle to which Standard No. 108 applies, is permitted so long as the vehicle manufacturer could have certified the vehicle to the standard using the replacement lamp instead of the lamp actually used (including replacement headlamps using different light sources than the original equipment headlamps). In light of our revised interpretation of S5.8.1, we believe that there would not be a significant difference in the treatment accorded to original equipment manufacturers and aftermarket/replacement equipment manufacturers.

If you have further questions, please feel free to contact Eric Stas of my staff at this address or by telephone at (202) 366-2992.

Sincerely,

Stephen P. Wood
Acting Chief Counsel

Enclosures
ref:108
d.1/5/06