BMW X6 Vantablack - blackest car in the world

KUALA LUMPUR: At this year’s Frankfurt Motor Show, BMW would showcase the X6 Vantabalck edition. The said car is built under the collaboration of Surrey NanoSystems (the inventor of the Vantablack material) and BMW.

Those who aren’t aware of what Vantablack is? It is known as the world’s blackest of black material that absorbs about 99.96 percent of visible light. This, in turn, gives the object it covers a two-dimensional look that the human brain interprets as a hole or void.

The Vantablack VBx2 variant was originally developed for scientific and architectural applications. It can be sprayed on a surface with a coating of 1 percent total hemispherical reflectance (THR). Till date, it is considered as the super-black material with a small amount of reflection from each angle.

The BMW X6 is the only car in the world to be coated with the Vantablack VBx2 paint, and it is contrast with the vehicle’s design highlights like its standard lighting systems and the optional Iconic Glow kidney grille. The end product is sure attention-grabbing.

It was in 2014 when the first-gen Vantablack was introduced and back then it was capable of absorbing 99.965 percent of light. The first two syllables in Vantablack is actually an acronym - Vertically Aligned Nano Tube Array, i.e., a matrix made of carbon.

Each carbon nanotube measures 14 to 50 micrometers in length, and the diameter is 20 nanometers makes it almost 5,000 times thinner than a human hair. If aligned vertically, a billion of nanotubes can be easily fit in one sq centimeter with any light falling on the surface, getting absorbed and conclusively converted into heat.

Initially, this technology was developed for covering space-born components. Vantabalck is also suited for application on softer material like aluminum. When coted on optical components it enables observation of distant galaxies and faint stars.

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