[Miss Mercedes]

The long awaited 453 facelift is to be unveiled at the Frankfurt Motor Show soon. Awesomely, smart has released a couple sketches of what to expect:

Looks like they're rounding out the front end and updating lighting front and back. I think they're going full LED front and back.

2020 marks the year smart goes electric worldwide, so no gassers will wear the new clothes. I know we won't get these cars here, but I fully expect some people to definitely retrofit the facelift parts!

If these spy shots are any clue, the rear end only gets lighting treatments.

I definitely want to see if they do any interior changes and/or performance changes!

 

[Miss Mercedes]

That's really ....umm...minor. I'm surprised they bothered to camouflage it at all! The top sketch looks like a small PT Cruiser, one of the ugliest cars ever!

I'm just hoping they finally do away with the halogen reflector housings. It was so weird to me that smart went "upmarket" while downgrading in lighting technology. If these new units are LED I see a retrofit in my future!

 

[Miss Mercedes]

Properly designed OEM LED modules are no worse to oncoming drivers than halogen. Keyword is "properly designed", unfortunately.. US headlight standards allow for some really bad OEM headlights that blind or may as well be candlesticks in the night. So when you get blinded by LEDs, don't blame the tech, blame the manufacturer (or installer if aftermarket).

Here's a decent article citing an IIHS investigation on how bad our headlights are..

https://jalopnik.com/why-so-many-of-todays-headlights-suck-1768222130

Recently got to drive a top spec Civic, Honda did a spectacular job at designing LED modules that look no brighter than halogen, but actually see a long distance.

 

[Miss Mercedes]

That's definitely true! LED technology itself is really cheap nowadays, but automakers design the modules so that if one LED dies you have to replace the whole thing. Oof.