Sky High

Draganflyer Navigation Light Systems

Relative Posts
www.rcuniverse.com/forum/fb.asp?m=3615334

www.rcuniverse.com/forum/fb.asp?m=3619691

www.rcuniverse.com/forum/fb.asp?m=3629991

www.rcuniverse.com/forum/fb.asp?m=3639288

Sky High

Wiring Your Lights

I found this important info on the [link=http://www.flightlites.com]FlightLites[/link] website. It is important because if twisting the wires is not done, the pulse frequency of a strobe LED could interfere with your receiver and possibly crash your helo.

".......RC modelers are always concerned about glitches - stray signals that can interfere with the normal operation of your receiver and servos. For various reasons and under specific circumstances, a pulsed LED could theoretically induce an unwanted signal into the radio system. Twisting the wires effectively cancels out this interference and provides peace of mind to the modeler. It also makes the wires easier to route within the airframe."

Sky High

I spoke to the owner of [link=http://www.flightlites.com]Flight Lites[/link] and I will definitely be getting a custom LED harness for my helo. The strobes are true strobes and not just quick on/off blinks like alot of other companies that claim they have LED strobes. His light systems are controlled with a custom board soon to be end user customizable by PC. It currently allows up to 5 different lighting sequences assigning solids and strobes to single or multiple fixtures and in various orders of firing. Absolutely bad ass!! [sm=thumbup.gif] Thanks for that link Kuzer!

www.flightlites.com

Caladin

I have just made my own nav light system made from 4 hi intensity LED's a couple of resistors and some black drinking straw.

They are very bright and run of the main boards 5v regulated supply. They draw about 40mA in total which will only affect total flight time by a matter of seconds as the whole setup only weighs a few grams. I went for 2 white LED's facing forwards and 2 red LED's facing backwards. I know this is not normal for nav lights, but being a driver, my brain finds it easier orientate the DF with vehicle style coloured lights. (otherwise I am thinking port is ermm...red which is ...erm...left....no right..so that means the df is going...erm......down...bugger)

The obvious disadvantage of running of the main board is if you loose power and your DF goes down in the dark, then the lights wont help you find your baby. If any one is interested in more details, just let me know. (I would post full instructions here, but certain members would rip off my design and go into mass production and sell them on E-bay, as seems to have happened with my rotor blades)

Sky High

I can tell you first hand about that! If my lights had been powered by the board in the incident below, I never would have found it because the fuse popped from the rotors being jammed in the limbs and cut all power to the board.

Can you post a demo of your lights at work?


How independent lighting circuit saved my butt for my DF recovery! (2nd & 3rd links in this link)
www.rcuniverse.com/forum/fb.asp?m=3626629

Hunter850

My Feedback: (1)

Was doing some reading on another site and found some interesting info on Lipo alarms and Nav lighting.

http://www.tjtrc.com/LiPoV2.html

Might be of use to DF as well.

Sky High

Thanks for that link Hunter. That is really cool and could be very useful. I am still getting 13-15 minutes of continuous flight but have had some close calls shortly after my alarm goes off. A visual warning would be that much better than just the alarm on my phone.

My Flight Lites will be here tomorrow and I'll post the results.

Sky High

I just got my Flight Lites kit today! I flew with them this evening and they are kick ass! [sm=thumbup.gif] The solids are very similar to my original keychain LEDs as far as brightness and the strobes are very realistic! Not like the simulated strobe I was using that had two blink patterns instead of pulsing. They look just like real helo and plane strobes and the current controller has 5 different sequence profiles to choose from. Jeff Swayze at Flight Lites said there is another version to be available soon with around 20 or so profiles to choose from. Then later on this year a pro controller where we, the end users, can create our own custom profiles with our PCs. [sm=thumbup.gif] Another high intensity landing light controller will be released soon as well. The kit comes with a controller and 5 lights of any color of solids or strobes that you choose. Each light is custom made and terminated with a two pole micro plug. The kit is only $44 including postage and the delivery time was only 2 days! My keychain LEDs cost me $140! [>:] But, they are high quality LEDs with switches and served their purpose well until I found out about this kit. Now one switch turns on all of the new lights and no more $20 (5 x $4/2 pack) Energizer button cell batteries to power the others!

Important!: Unless you have an independent 5v power supply, you will need to get the multipin to 3 pin adapter from DFI in order to power the LED controller from the board. DFI will send one at no charge only if you request it. If you do have an independent power supply and it exceeds 5v, you will also need to order the Flight Lites voltage regulator or provide your own. If you're ordering this kit for your DF, you will also need to request custom wire lengths of at least 12" per LED. If you don't, you will get the standard 36" lengths and have 10 extra feet, that's right, 10 feet of wire to manage and carry onboard. My DF was his first application with this particular helo and by shortening the wire lengths, it saved 4.5g of weight! [sm=thumbup.gif]

www.flightlites.com

Nitrodan73

My Feedback: (12)

How much drain will this system draw from my batteries? I have a 2700 Mah receiver battery so I was wondering if this will cause too much draw and end up in a compromising position. I plan on using just a landing light and maybe a couple of strobes and I won't use them during the whole flight. Mainly on take off and landing. Will it still cause a problem?

Sky High

What do you fly Nitrodan73? It doesn't matter but I just wanted to know if you had a DF. Anyway, the Flight Lites LEDs only pull 25 mA per LED at 5v global, so with a 2700 mAh battery you're not going to even feel that draw. I use 1320 mAh packs and haven't noticed any falloff in power. However, I am having some custom harnesses made that will have at least 3 LEDs per array and with increased intensity, maybe 50 mA per LED, with as much as 8 arrays. I'm already taking power from the helo with the video camera and transmitter so the more powerful and number of arrays will change things with the power requirement and I don't want to take away from the helo power with that kind of draw. I am looking at a seperate power source for that system. I'm going to use 4-6 lipoly button cells in series.

Lipoly Button Cells - Part Number: KOK145T
http://www.fmadirect.com/detail.htm?...949&section=33

Sky High

Flight Lites also has UV LEDs. Now this ought to be interesting to paint the underside of the rotors with phosphorescent paint and point one UV LED for each rotor up under them. The light from the LEDs that I have now illuminate or shimmer off of the underside my rotors mostly because they are laminated.

Sky High

Here is a quick demo of the Flight Lites kit at work on the DF.

[link=http://www.jefcommunications.com/asx/helo/rcu/DFI/various/NAVLIGHTS.asx]Nav Lights Demo[/link]

Phodel

Good Show Sky! Looks cool! Any problems with videos and the NAV lights? What would you say is the total weight of the NAV lights setup is? Can you control the lights with the remote controller?

poorjohn6

Hi Sky. I tried to download and view your night video, but nothing happened. It did open another window, it just says done. What am I doing wrong?

Sky High

Howdy poorjohn. Are you an Apple or PC user? Sometimes Apples have issues with viewing these files. Just let me know and I'll send you a temporary link.

Moe3754

My Feedback: (14)

Sky High would it be possible to see how you got the power for the lights and how you connected them,have been talking with Jeff and am in the process of getting a set of lights for my DF but need to know how I can get power for them.Mike at spectrolutions told me I could buy one of the plugs for the camera port and get power that way he sells the plugs but you have to make them up yourself but he also has the schematics on the spectrolutions web site as to what is what on the plugs,and every time I order from Canada it takes a minimum of three weeks to get the stuff from them.[:@]

Caladin

I have had a few e-mails requesting information on my home made Nav Lights, so I have a description and a few pictures

Parts
2 x Hi Intensity 5mm LED red (16,000 mcd).
2 x Hi Intensity 5mm LED white (16,000 mcd).
Some stiff black 5mm tube (I used a good quality drinking straw) but cf tube would be good
2 x 50 Ohm resistors (I used 47 Ohm, it is slightly too low but gives a good brightness)
1 Plug to connect to the Draganflyer 5v supply (I used one which was originally made to connect to a PC mother board) which seems to fit well, otherwise you can

order one from Spectrolutions.
4 x Small cable ties
Some heatshrink sleeving.

Assembly
Cut the tubes to about 60mm length and make a small hole about halfway up each for the wire exit. Thread some wires through the holes and solder the resistors

and LED's according to the diagram attached. Connect a white LED, the resistor and the red LED in series, Take care to make sure the +5v goes to the anode via

the resistor, and then from the cathode to the anode of the other resistor. Make sure all connections are insulated from each other and drag the wires back through

the holes.
Each LED tube requires 5vdc to operate, so you have to connect the two assemblies in parallel and tidy up with heat shrink tube. Connect the plug and attach the

assemblies to the Draganflyer arms with the cable ties. See the pictures attached for more detail.

Good points
Very bright
Very light weight
Very low cost
Very low power drain

Bad points
Lights go out if the fuse blows (No help for recovery in the dark)
Hi intensity LED's are only very bright when viewed at +/: 30 degrees (so they do send out a cool beam of light) but they are less bright when viewed from the side.

I have been very happy with these lights, but they do not have cool strobes or sophisticated lighting patterns. I am sure there is room for improvement )
Happy flying

Caladin

Hmm some pictures

Sky High

I have seen LEDs mounted in tubes before but they were inverted facing into the tubes. Have you tried using a white tube with the LEDs facing inward to create a nice light bar or light tube? I'm going to try that and see how it looks from a distance. I don't think it would be bright enough to navigate with at a distance but several of them sure would look cool in the night sky.

Here is an example of what I am talking about.

Light Bars
http://www.rcgroups.com/forums/showp...6&postcount=27

Entire Thread (3 pages)
http://www.rcgroups.com/forums/showt...t=LED+Lighting

coptercaper

For all Do-it-yourselfers, where are you pruchasing the LEDs for the NAV LIGHT SETUP and what MCD range are you using?

Moe3754

My Feedback: (14)

Sky I received my Flight Lites yesterday and will install today I have to say they really are great and I cannot wait to get them put on today.Jeff at flight lites is really a great person to work with and he got my lites to me very quickly.I give Flight lights and their customer service a big [sm=thumbup.gif] and a big thank you to you for showing me the site.

Moe3754

My Feedback: (14)

My DF with it's new lights put on,the lights work great but it is raining here so I cannot try them out in flight,hopefully tomorrow.The small Lipo is how I power the lights and if my math is correct I should get two hours of time to power the lights and still be in a safe zone.

Sky High

That's got to be pure torture having that new setup and not be able to fly! [:@]


Where did you get that small Lipo, how many mAh and how much does it weigh?

What color lights and how many strobes did you get?

Bijoux

Then how come the packaging says the lights are LEDs and not "true strobes"?

Isn't there somewhere a company sells "true" model Xenon strobes? Can they get them that small?

Sky High

They are LEDs that strobe because the driver in the controller makes them pulse. There are several profiles to choose from for different strobe patterns and pulses. More powerful strobes, like Xenon, require much more power which means more battery, which means more weight. Our DF's can't carry much more weight than they already have for functionality and then the camera systems and transmitters. I have been zapped by a Xenon with the lens removed and it doesn't feel good if that's any indication of the power of their pulse.