saramos

I do not have an electrical background, but wanted to make my own navlites. I did some searching on the net and found a circuit design for a two LED flasher. I modified the circuit for a single LED flash and added non-flashing wingtip lights and landing lights.

The Circuit

R1, controls the brightness of the strobe light.
R2 and C1 controls the time the strobe light is on.
R3, R4 and C2 control the time the strobe light is off.
R5, limits the volt on the diode.
R6 controls the brightness of the wing tip lights.
R7 controls the brightness of landing lights. The LEDs have a high enough rating to work without a resistor when wired in series, but I found them to be warm to the touch, so I added it.
Q1 and Q2 do the switching of the strobe.
As I stated before, I modified a dual LED flasher circuit I found on the net. I simply replaced one of the LEDs with a Diode I had.

Parts List and Pricing

R1 300 ohm .50 (Q 10)
R2 8.2 k .50 (Q 10)
R3 6.8 k .50 (Q 10)
R4 68 k .50 (Q 10)
R5 300 ohm .50 (Q 10)
R6 150 ohm .50 (Q 10)
R7 22 ohm .50 (Q 10)

D1 1N4148 .75 (Q 15)

Q1 2N3904 .75 (Q 5)
Q2 2N3904 0

C1 10 nano .10
C2 10 nano .10

LED 1 White 3000 mcd 20ma 3.5v 2.00
LED 2 Green 3000 mcd 20ma 3.5v 2.85
LED 3 Red 2000 mcd 20ma 2v 1.00 (Q 2)
LED 4 White 10,000 mcd 100ma 5v 2.50
LED 5 White 10,000 mcd 100ma 5v 2.50

9v battery clip 1.50 (Q 3)
Solderable Perf Board .75
4 pin board mount female phone jack 1.00 (Q 5)
4 pin crimp-on modular phone plug 2.50 (Q 10)

Total 15.55


I purchased most items at All Electronics.
The two 10,000 mcd white LEDs I got at Frys

I did not include the price of wire (I used 22 gauge), solder or tools
or shipping if you order online. I am fortunate to live near both stores.
When I made mine, I used 4 pin handset plug and jack. I don't recommend using the handset plug and jack only because finding a crimp tool for it is problematic.

The other items that I did not price out, was the cost of shrink tubing as I had bought a variety pack from All Electroincs about a year ago. I cover the entire circuit board in some larger diameter shrink tubing too.
I cut it off for the photos. It might be possible to use a rubber coating or some type of RTV to cover it. I suppose one could make some type of enclosure too.


Scott

saramos

Here are some photos.

Photo 1 shows the top of the board The jack connects to the wingtip and landing lights. The black and white wires go to the strobe LED.
Photo 2 is the bottom.
Photo 3 shows the connector for the wing lights.
Photo 4, the insulation on the wire I purchased was too large to fit into the modular plugs, so I spliced them to a short section of phone cord.
Photo 5, from left to right, strobe, port led, starboard LED, and the two Landing Light LEDs. Note, I added the brightness (power) limiting LED between the two landing light LEDs. The resistors for controlling the brightness can be added before, between, or after the LEDs, as long as they are in series. LEDs in parallel will require thier own resistors. When wiring LEDs, you need to be sure that you don't exceed the power rating of the LEDs. These are all running from a 9 volt battery and will need resistors, or enough LEDs in series to prevent them from burning out.
Photo 6, I took about a dozen snapshots, but couldn't seem to catch the strobe while lit.

If you haven't worked with LEDs, I suggest doing a search to learn more about working with them. Here's a couple of links.

http://www.uoguelph.ca/~antoon/gadgets/gadgets.htm
http://discovercircuits.com/

Scott

rwright142

Pretty cool, thanks for sharing. Why did you choose the phone jack?

saramos

I chose the phone jack for a couple of reasons. They were readily available when I went looking for parts. I could get all the lights connected with a single plug. And when I saw them, I thought I might be able to mount the board on the fuse and plug on the wing and break off the clip on the plug in such a way that they would connect and disconnect as I placed the wing on. Just one less item to fiddle with when mounting the wing to the plane. I've considered making up a similar setup for servos. I got the idea after seeing air connectors designed to engage and disengage retract air lines when mounting the wing.

Scott

RCKen

My Feedback: (9)

saramos,
While a phone plug works great here for stuff like this, I wouldn't trust them for critical controls with your servos. The phone jack connectors could be subjected to vibrations that could cause intermittent, or even failing, connections which could result in loss of control of the plane.

Ken

JPGale

Ken is correct here, phone jacks (rj11 and rj45 IIRC) type of connectors are not for use in a heavy vibration environment, they are designed for easy of removal, now for the lights it is excellent as there is no control needed. The standard servo connectors are good enough for the vibrations in our models (note in full size helicopters the connections are made alot more secure if you guys want to know more I will go into specifics).

I will say this however, the soldering looks very good, I would ensure that anywhere where some solder has penetrated the heat shrink material is covered with standard electrical tape. You made a very nice job here, trust me I have seen alot of hand soldered items and this is very good for someone who clams not to be an electrical person.

James

saramos

Thanks for the complement on my soldering. I actually was a little unsure about my workmanship, not having any handwork to really compare it to. This is the most complicated soldering job I've done. Most the rest of my soldering is limited to splicing wires and soldering connectors. Electronics has always been one of the many fields I've wanted to learn about, but have not (yet) gotten into. This is one of the reasons why I enjoy this hobby, particularly building. It allows you to expose yourself to many different fields, trades and techniques.

Thanks for the heads up on the potential of problems with vibration. True, it would be a disaster to have interference to the servos. It would be nice to find some type of connector that could be mounted to the fuse and wing, and have easy registration and durability. It can be a hassle to try and balance a wing and connect wires with the wind blowing, and getting all the wires tucked in and not pinched in the wing saddle or getting tangled in the servo linkages.

Scott

rcp2005

My Feedback: (10)

Thanks for the details. Really a big help.....................

rcuman

Radio Shack has blinking LEDs so that you do not have to create the circuit for them. They are a little expensive but it will cut time on having to build the circuit. I have a Associates Degree in Electronics and I had to build many circuits to make LEDs blink. Now they have these and I am glad I do not have to build a ciruit anymore.

saramos

Can you adjust both the on and the off times as well as the cycle? In order to simulate a strobe, I designed the circuit to be on 10%, off 90% of the cycle. If this can be done with a white blinking LED with at least 3000 mcd, that could cut the parts count.

Scott

rcuman

Nah they just blink. I thought it was impressive that they have such a thing though. They also have the high intensity LEDS for flashlights. The are pretty bright. I picked two up and hooked it up to a 3v power supply to test out. You could probably land at night with these things. I have not looked for this type of stuff for 8 yrs. Things have come a long way in electronics.

saramos

The 10,000 mcd LEDs I use for the landing lights are very bright. They are rated at 100 ma at 5v.

Scott

rcuman

Thats Awesome! The highest I could find was 3000mcd but they were still very bright.

jetpack

My Feedback: (1)

I'm planning a 1/2A scale stick and tissue Citabria and wanting to add LED's.

Here's some simple diagrams I've found that might help someone. They helped me, I haven't a clue on curcuits.

What is stumbling me on the project is the power supply. I am undecided to use my 4.8V flight pack or go with a seperate battery. There's not much room for added weight with this one, so I am kinda lost.

I wanted a front landing light in the nose, red and green wingtip lights with strobe, tail lamp and a glowing instrument panel.

I can make a "light box" for the instruments and backlight them.

Having everything contained seperate in the wing for just the wingtip lights and the strobes would be nice, no wires to connect when the wing goes on, and a seperate curcuit for the fuse.

I'm hoping someone can take a look at what I want for lights, and the diagrams and help me come up with a simple, lightweight solution.

I cant see why everything can't be powered by a couple of watch batteries???

I considered incandescent bulbs for the steady lights and LED's for the strobes. Would this be a good idea or not?

Tango Juliet

Some years ago I had purchased the RAM brand of Nav lights and landing lights for a TF C-182 that I was building. The project got put on hold (and still is) so I never used the light system. A few weeks ago I had pulled them out of their packaging to play with them a little and see how well they worked for a future scrath build project. Well, they didn't work! I don't know if the circuitry was damaged somehow during all the storage and moving. Like a few others, electronics is not one of my strong suits. I can solder wires together cleanly, but beyond that I'm clueless. I guess the reason I'm responding here is because I too would like a simple setup for lighting a night flyer. A seperate NiCD battery pack is the way I'd like to power it. KISS with pictures please!

I just saw today (7/5) a website, rc-lights.com, that has a plug and play system available. Has anyone used this, and what were the results?

beachyboy429

installed pics?