2WD Semi-Recumbent Recycled-Parts Cargo eBike: "CrazyBike2"

[amberwolf]

I managed to not run over my feet, whcih is good.

The headlight worked beautifully, and I can actually DETAIL on the road in the spot, about 3 carlengths in front of me, and still see the area between the spot and me, plus some beyond it. The sidelighting of the spot clearly lights up the road's full width plus sidewalks, on typical non-major roads. On major roads with multiple lanes per side, I can see the full lane I'm in plus some on either side.

Only downside is it's still halogen, still incandescent, so it's using 50W of power for all that light, where I'm sure an LED version would be a tenth of that. But the other smaller lighter halogen was also 50W, for a lot less useful lighting (was a big cone of light).

Weight distribution isn't bad, but it does feel different both when slowing down and when turning. Pretty sure all this weight that far back is harder on the rear tire, which almost feels wallowy even at the higher pressure Iv'e got it at now (about 65psi). I'm afraid to inflate this cheap thing any higher with this weight on it; the tube or stem will probably blow.


The Volgood pack seems to be working ok, but it seems to sag more at a lower current load than the Vpower pack does. It also starts off at least a volt lower than the Vpower pack. I'm not sure if regen is actually less with it or not, but it feels like it.

 

[Solcar]

You got some good changes to the bike done there.

 

[texaspyro]

Do you have an inverter on the bike that can do about 15 watts or so?

 

[amberwolf]

At what voltage?

I don't at the moment, other than one at about 19V which is boosting the pack voltage for the CFL taillight, but I have a lot of various chargers/etc that will run off pack voltage, acting as DC-DC.

Currently the 12V system runs off it's own aged NiMH pack.

I actually have a 12V charger at something like 18A from (IIRC) GCinDC that needs to be fixed, that I intend to use as a DC-DC, but have yet to ahve time to sit down with it and do the repair.

 

[texaspyro]

At what voltage?

120VAC for driving some rather nice LED bulbs... I don't know what minimum voltage they require (or if they need AC... some of the dimmable ones do). I toss some in your goodie box...

I know that you can get some small 100 watt or so 12V to 120VAC inverters for cheap at you favorite Chinese Political Prisoner Slave Labor Tool Stores...

 

[liveforphysics]

I love Amberwolf and his machines.

Things don't get more genuine.

New lighting system looks like it works great!
As always, much respect to you my friend!

 

[amberwolf]

Thanks! The car headlight works pretty well as a lighting source, my only complaint is the power usage (and heat). :lol: Still, I'm sorely tempted to put a few more cells in that NiMH pack and bring it up to 15-18V and see how bright that light is then. Probably wouldn't last very long, though.

120VAC for driving some rather nice LED bulbs... I don't know what minimum voltage they require (or if they need AC... some of the dimmable ones do). I toss some in your goodie box...

Really? Well, thanks! much appreciated--I can definitely use them--however I betcha that inside the unit, teh LEDs are run off their own DC-DC or AC-DC, and I could either modify that or bypass it and make a constant-current supply for them out of a lower-voltage DC-DC.

Even if they're potted solid, there are ways of removing the potting if I have to. Even "dead" potted modules of various types have turned out to be easily fixable with a little solvent of the right type (liek brake fluid, in a couple of cases) and/or a bit of heat and a dremel and a dental pick and a LOT of time and patience.

I know that you can get some small 100 watt or so 12V to 120VAC inverters for cheap at you favorite Chinese Political Prisoner Slave Labor Tool Stores...

Even cheap there is too much for me these days. Working on fixing that, but haven't maanged it yet. I already wasted too much money on stuff I haven't used yet or not used enough to be worth what I paid for them, including replacing some fo teh tools I lost when I moronically left my toolbag on the side of the road a few months back.

 

[amberwolf]

I dozed off and forgot earlier while typing the above post taht i have a new problem on the bike, in the steering tie rod. I noticed it as I got off the bike at work but had no mind power or toosl to try to do antyhign wtih it, so had to hope it held ti ll i got home, and it did. it may well ahve been this way fro days and i Just didnt' see it, though I have tried to rememer ot always check the tie rod since the first failure of it I had way back when.

I guess it ocuuld have happened during one of my slight dozings while on the road in the last few weeks, even though I didn't crash or hit anythign i could've hit the edge of a pothole and not known it, but enough force thru the wheel, fork, then rod to bend the bolt at the threads. suspension of the fork is crap so it bottosm out on practically anythign. That's why I wanted to use that other fork back on the DeathRAce in april, which ended up causing the shimmy thatresulted in my crash that fractured my leg and messe dup my ankele. i still wanna use that other fork but I have to make the welder work again so I can redo the headtube angle or height so it does't change the geometry like it did. Dunno when that wll happen.


I dunno if the pic clearly shows it, but the eyebolt is bent at the threads at the rear end, toward the left side fo the bike. I will have to straigthen it some and then thread it further into the tie rod so it is past the weakened point, tjem readjust the front pivot on the fork's steer tube to realighn steering straigth.


The front end looks fine still:




It's not an unexpected problem--when you make a tie rod out of two old eyehooks that used to hold up a swing-bench-seat on a porch, plus a bit of tubing from the handle of an old weedeater, and a couple of nuts and washers, and some rollerskate bearings, you can't have perfection forever. :lol:


On the ohter hand, the "new" batery boxes are working well, and I still haven't run over my feet with them. Gotten used to the handling differences already. Kinda wishing I could take the cargo pods off and see how well it does hard turns now at speed, but I have been using both of them almost every day I'm out so I can't risk leaving htme off and being unable to take various finds and donations home.

 

[texaspyro]

The one bulb that I opened was potted in silicone... not many solvents will handle that without damaging the parts.

I did try some of the 120VAC bulbs on DC... they light up down to around 24V, but the current is rather low even at 60V so light output is low. I do have some MR-16 12V/6W bulbs that put out around 250 lumens... roughly a 25 watt bulb.

I bought a lighter-plug 100W inverter for 15 bucks at Harbor Freight...

 

[amberwolf]

Well, $15 can be two weeks' worth of dinner for me, depending on what sales I catch and what I cook with it. Or it can be almost a week's worth of dog food.

I have a regular car inverter somewhere around here, but it needs repair. Old Jensen "300W" unit. Also a Kensington "100W" unit, again needing repair. No idea what's wrong with either, have to find them first.

If they run on DC at all, might be easier to just series a few laptop adapters with my pack (like I already do with a 19V unit for my CFL taillight to significantly add to it's brightness).

If they only run on AC, I can see about fixing the old inverters, or using some of their good parts to build a basic from-scratch unit, depending on the quality of power those bulbs need).

The silicone potting I'd just have to work away at with a razor, penknife, and/or a pick, if it came down to it.


The biggest issue I have had with all of the lights I have used so far is that none of them except the actual vehicle headlights give me a proper lighting of the road--the others all have far too much close-up light spill, and too little spotligthing of the road ahead. None of my lensing experiments worked for the CFLs because the source is too large and diffuse, and the only reflectors and lenses that will work for them are over a foot across or more (some much more!).

At least with an LED source, I ought to be able to use a much smaller lens/reflector assembly to narrow the spot quite a bit, to at most a few degrees, and then add close-up lighting via separate ligths if necessary.



Regarding my tie-rod problem, for now I did the above--bent it back, threaded it further in, and readjusted the pivot points at the handlebars and fork to realign everything. But I think that the problem is going to come back, because the rear end of the tie-rod now strikes the left side of the frame during hard left turns even more now, since it is almost 1/4" further back under the same conditions.

The only ways to fix this require redesign of the steering or the frame around that area, neither of which is practical for CrazyBike2, but which will definitely be different on the new bike (whcih still needs a name). I'll just have to keep an eye on it.


FWIW, if my welder was working, I'd be tempted to just weld the thread-in eyebolts to the tie rod, including a little plate to gusset them nice and solidly in there.

 

[Solcar]

I kinda like Justin's approach of having a tie rod extend from near the end of one side of a handlebar to the end of the other one on the same side, fore or aft. It might get in the way more, yet it would suffer from the effects of play in the linkage less and benefit from the lever action of the width of the handlebars, and therefore not need to be nearly as strong. I saw how he did that in his cross-Canada ride video.

 

[amberwolf]

After I saw his, I considered changing mine, but it was already working so I didn't.

I have considered it for the new bike, though; if I had more than just two rod-end-bearings (bushings, actualy) I would do this, using two rods, one on each side. Having a non-full-width "handlebar" up front would give me more places to mount front lighting/etc., too, which is a consideration as I am probably going to use twin headlights on it.

Two would be nice because I could never have a steering failure like I did on CrazyBIke2 in the beginning (twice), because there'd always be two (smaller) tie rods holding it all together.

But I need a form of rod-end-bearing/heim-rose joint because the angles are not matching like they are on CrazyBike2, unless I go with a shorter drive-pivot bar from the steering column to to the tie rod, down low along the top of the frame similar to CrazyBike2's.

But that's all about the new bike, not CB2, which would either need a revamp of the steering and frame, or adding a handlebar up front on the fork, as well as rose-heim style joints for the tie rod because of hte angle difference.

 

[amberwolf]

In digging for some other stuff, I found my other horn that goes with the one already on the bike, so I installed it; but pressing the horn button just gets a click from them; apparently the 12V NiMH pack is either too low a voltage, period, or it is too far discharged to provide enough current without sagging too far.

So I also decided to add two cells to the pack to make it a 12-cell, which makes it nominally 14.4V, instead of 12V. I'm thinking I might ought to take one of those cells out, though, and make it an 11-cell, for 13.2V nominal, so I don't burn out the lighting with it, but maybe it'll be fine on 14.4V anyway. I seem to recall most automotive systems are at least 13-14V with the engine running?

But this presents a problem for charging: The Tenergy charger is only up to 10-cell. Just for giggles I hooked it up and it does start a charge, but it terminated pretty early on, less than 20 minutes in. If I power cycle the charger, I can get it to restart the charge but only for a short time again.

If I do take it down to 11-cell, maybe it will charge longer or possibly fully. But it might not. So....


I remembered that Venom RC charger, which can do up to 20-something NiMH cells. But it needs a hefty 12V+ supply to run it, and both of the ones I have (other than fully charged SLA) are still unrepaired. I thought I'd try my hand at fixing them, but I failed at both, and need to sit down and troubleshoot them when I am not so tired.
http://www.endless-sphere.com/forums/viewtopic.php?p=464670#p464670
http://www.endless-sphere.com/forums/viewtopic.php?p=464669#p464669

 

[bobale]

I seem to recall most automotive systems are at least 13-14V with the engine running?

If alternator is correctly working, with the engine running it should charge the battery to 14.4V.

 

[amberwolf]

Cool. Then I shouldn't have much of an issue with 12 cells vs 10, since the 50W headlight will drag down the voltage to about that under load.

Of course, I have to get one of the charging solutions working, first. It did charge partway but after maybe half an hour or so it just started flashing the light, turning the charger on and off, as if it hadn't detected a pack attached. Disconnecting and reconnecting makes it start again, but only for a few minutes.

So for now I've got it charging with one of the Sorenson lab supplies, at a low current, but it is not a permanent solution, as it will take quite a while to recharge each time, and it will have to be charged every time I am not using the bike.

So my best solution for now is to keep one of my larger SLA charged up and use it with the Venom to charge up the NiMH, until I can repair one of the 12-14V supplies.

 

[amberwolf]

Crossposted from the Venom charger repair thread:
http://www.endless-sphere.com/forums/viewtopic.php?p=464985#p464985

FOr now I'm running this off an SLA I topped off over the last few hours; it seems to be working, but it doesn't have a way to tell it how many cells except for discharge, so I assume it's simply going to watch the voltage change to know when to end it. I guess I'll have to watch it manually to be sure.

I started charge at 3A about 15 minutes ago, and am monitoring thru a Turnigy Watt Meter, to compare accuracy of the two. So far, at the least the current is questionable, as it reports 3.0A in the Venom, but only 2.45 on the TWM (whcih I know is reasonably close to accurate, enough to trust this reading). Voltage appears identical on both.

I have no idea if the temperature sensor will work, becaue I'm using the one in the pack, a two pin, connected to two of the three pins on the Venom. Not enough info on there to tell me if it's even the same *type* of thermal sensor it expects, and ntohgin int he menus to alter the settings for that, other than the overtemp cutoff point, which defaults to 52C.

After 21 minutes it reported FULL at about 0.7Ah put in (per the TWM), about .9Ah per the Venom. Venom showed 17.3V, while TWM showed 16.4V. I checked with a separate DMM for voltage, and got 16.4V. I dunno about the Venom's accuracy there--it's not even consistent with itself!

Anyway, I have no idea if it's actually charged fully or not; I suspect that the two addon cells are not, because it never went thru the heating/balancing stage at all. I'm gonna have to charge those two sticks separately just to be sure.

If I put my 50W car headlight on there, it is absolutely definitely brighter, and whiter light, than with 10 cells. It also uses more like 68W, per the TWM.

The voltage does drop to about 14.2V, then when I disconnect the headlight it's back up to about 15.9V. I did not yet measure each 2-cell stick under load (but they are all within a couple hundredths of a volt when measured without a load).

Turn signals and brake light bar operate ok at this voltage, too. LED bar appears about the same brightness (it might have a regulator in it), but the turn signals are notably brighter, and consume more current--3.4A vs 2.8A per pair.

Oh, and the horn still doesn't work, so I have to figure out what I screwed up there.

 

[amberwolf]

Another thing I've been meaning to do for a long time is to add a charging port, so I don't have to disconnect the pack from the controller/CA when I charge. I pondered putting the charge port at the CA end of things, so I could monitor charge as regen, but there's no good place to mount the connector for it, and I wanted to use an old panel-mount XLR port from a powerchair with a sliding cover over it, rather than the andersons I currently have on it.

Anyway, I ended up mounting it temporarily on the edge of the existing hole in the leftside battery case:


It's hard to see because of the reflective tape causing the camera to darken the pic, but it's kinda hard to see at a glance anyway, just cuz it's all black. Easier to see with the chrome XLR plug on the charger end next to it:


Works fine; tested by topping off the Vpower pack. I don't generally monitor recharging, anyway, so it's not terribly important that it's not at the CA connection. If I move this all to the new bike, i'll be redoing all that anyway.


Also, since I figure I used up at least 2 or 3Ah on the NiMH pack for lighting on day-before-yesterday's ride, I thought I'd recharge it and see what happens. So I set up the Venom on the SLA again, monitoring with the TWM again.


This time I set the Venom to it's max of 7A charging, but the TWM only shows a max of 5.2A. Voltage is also off by as much as 2V, lower on TWM. Measuring voltage drops on the cabling doesn't show more than a couple tenths of a volt, which doesn't reconcile with either the voltage or current differences. I guess the Venom just isnt' anywhere NEAR accurate.

TWM showed about 5Ah put back in; teh NiMH did finally get a little warm, but only barely. So it is not really balancing yet. I might have to drain the original 10 cells down to whatever level the 2 addons are at, then try again, or manually charge those two and use the 10-cell charger on the originals, ot get them all more or less balanced.

 

[auraslip]

I love the color on that venom. I think I want my next bike that color.

 

[amberwolf]

Oddly enough, it reminds me most of the green paste I have to scrape and wash off the bottom of the weedeater whenever I do the yard. :lol:

 

[amberwolf]

Since I've been testing the Volgood pack repair, the Vpower pack has just bascially been sitting on the bike but not being recharged for that time, and it has not had any groups going low, so I think I've found all the really bad cells for now. More will rpobably fail later.

The Volgood pack is working fine now, so far.

I have noticed one problem with the bike since putting the battery pods under/beside the seat: the seat now has a slight wiggle side to side, because the clamps securing it no longer pass diagonally around it's horizontal side-to-side base and the horizontal front-to-back cargo rail, but instead are on the horizontal side-to-side cargto rail interconnect. I need to see if they can be tightened any further, but probably not, and I will need to come up with a bolt-thru solution intead.

 

[amberwolf]

Today I decided that since the full-brightness headlight isn't always needed, I'd set it up as switchable between low beam and low+high beam, *and* wire it into the 12V system's connectors rather than having it's own separate ones.


Simplifies things and lets me conserve power when really bright isn't needed. High beam + low beam takes a bit over twice as much current as just low beam.

I took a bracket that used to hold a pair of bolt-on power diodes from an old linear power supply, and removed the diodes, mounted the switch in a center hole (where it used to have a tab for the common diode case connection), and bent the bracket to allow easy zip-tie to the handlebars, while having lots of clearance behind the switch contacts to prevent shorting to the bars.


One of the diodes was used between the high-beam and the low-beam switch contacts, so taht when it is switched to high beam, power is *also* provided to low-beam, but not the reverse.


Just to ensure shorts to the bars can't ahppen regardless, I used a piece of thick slick plastic from the top of a retail disposable clipstrip, where the price tag would go, and bent it in a V, inserting it in the bracket behind the wiring. Friction holds it in place.


Wire used was part of an old extension cord someone donated a while back, which had had one end hacked off, I think.

Now I can independently turn on each of the lights on the bike, finally.


OH, and the horn works again now, with both of them, and it's friggin' LOUD, too (at least, when tested int he living room :lol: )

Was just the ground wire from the frame to the 12V line, not properly secured.

 

[amberwolf]

I added a camera mount to the handlebars, finally, after pondering how to do it for more than a year. Unfortunately I can't take a picture of it with the camera on there, as I only have the one camera. I tried using a mirror to take a pic, but I keep getting light reflections that make the pic useless, or it autofocuses all blurry (and it doens't have a manual focus mode). So all I can post is a pic of the mount itself, and some pics and videos from it mounted in that position, which is about equal to the middle of my ribs, just to the right of center, when i'm seated comfortably on the bike.

The first video is the first minute or two of my ride home from work at night, but it ran out of memory on my tiny 1GB memory stick, since I had recorded the ride *to* work as well, and that was almost 900MB. So the ride home only got about 70MB of data before it ran out of space, even with the card cleared out before I left.

[youtube]jNzS0iXdfNw[/youtube]

It's pretty crappy video because it will not just stay in one focus mode, it keeps trying to autofocus at every change in what's in front of me, especially when it involves brighter lights (like car lights). I also need a windsock over the mic, or at least a piece of tape over the hole. Forgot that this time around.



The daylight ride to work from earlier that day is better, because it tends to stay focused on my headlight assembly's backside, and so it isn't so bad. At least it isn't constantly changing.


[youtube]E5jisNiBSgg[/youtube]

You can hear the scrape of my right side cargo pod on the pavement in both videos, on the right turn onto the street just before it cuts out in the night video, and in the first parking lot in the daylight vid.

It also feels like I'm crawling along at maybe 10MPH there, but it's 20MPH on all the longer stretches. At one point in the day vid, as I'm accelerating in the leftmost lane about to head into the left turn lane, you can hear the motor whine reach a higher louder pitch, and that's when it gets to about 20.5MPH or so, letting me know I need to let off the throttle a bit.

A couple of times you can kind of hear the front wheel lose traction during startup from stops, then grip and I start moving. It only does that when there's a fresh charge on the battery--after that there's just not enough juice to do it.

At Cheryl, I had to stop for the light (where you see the red motorcycle do a U-turn), and you see me pull over to the right really quick after the light, and even a little before it, because that yellow Hummer was right on my tail, and I wasn't sure he was even going to stop for the light at all. He did, but he gunned it as soon as the light changed, and would have run me over if I'd still been in front of him.


I'm considering a pole-mount from the back of the seat, to be about at my eye level, or maybe even just over my head height, just to the right of my head. Not sure if I can build one secure enough to not worry about losing my only way to take pictures. :?

 

[amberwolf]

I made a thread for all the videos:
http://www.endless-sphere.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=32477
and have added a couple more, will continue to add mroe as I can recorrd the rides.


I forgot to post it, but last week sometime, the rear wheel started rubbing, and it turned out a spoke had snapped at the hub, on the drive side. After about an hour looking for my freewheel remover before finding it, I got the freewheel off and replaced the spoke with a similar but not identical one from my salvaged-spokes collection off old wheels. Retensioned the wheel up and retrued it as best I could in the 20 minutes or so I could spare for it, then put it back together on teh bike.

While taking the wheel off, though, I found that the derailer's rear hanger bolt was msising the nut tha fits into the dropouts behind the axle. That was really annoying, because it took another half hour or so to find another one that fit the bolt needed for this derailer. I was going to just change the whole derailer, since this one is broken anyway, but I can't find the ones that are complete spares, just ones already on my other bikes and a bunch in a box for parts to fix others with. So I put this one back on, and it'll have to do till i get round to sorting more bike parts to fix it with.


Tonight, the rubbing started again...but no broken spokes yet, and I have to work early AM, so no fixing it tonite. Maybe after I get home in the afternoon.

 

[amberwolf]

The rubbing was gone today. :?

But my front tire was low pressure, enough to have noticeable squish at the bottom. I was leaving for work before I noticed it, so I had to ride to work that way. Then I forgot about it after I got there (had no time to do anything yet anyway, before work). Got off work and was already riding away when i felt the squishyness, and then I was in traffic, and exhausted, so I just kept riding till I got home. Forgot by the time I got home, too, and only remembered when i went to do some pondering....

I havent' found antyhign stuck in the tire causing the lowness, but it might've already come out, and just been plugged up by the chunky Slime.


Anyway, the pondering I went to do wasa bout the disc brake on motor cover bolts plan. I have been hunting my stuff for whatever metal plate I have large enough to make a disc, since my original plan to find and modify an actual disc from some other vehcile has not panned out (nobody is willing to give or sell a used disc at all, guess I can't blame them; new ones are too expensive especially for repurposing like this).

I can't find an old stainless steel shelf I had, that might have been just a large enough diameter to make this from, and was definitely thick enough.

So this old plate that was the bottom of a retail stand is the next best thing I've got.


I drew up the basic idea on the bottom of the plate, traced off the hubmotor cover and an old saucepan that was the closest thing to the right diameter I had handy, short of making up a compass.

Ideally, I'll cut this out so it leaves me the maximum amount of plate left as a single piece for other things later on, but it has two finger sized holes in it for it's normal retail use, that I don't wnat to end up in the disc itself.

Dunno when I'll get it cut out and the surface "machined" to remove all the paint, and provide a surface for braking friction. My lathe isn't large enough for doing this, so I'll just have to be careful with a flapdisk and then sandpaper, with it already attached to the motor cover and spinning it on the wheel to help keep it all even.

 

[amberwolf]

The wheel rubbing started again, this time with an obvious broken spoke, drive side again. Probably are several damaged ones that are ready to break; I'll have to see if I can figure out which they are and replace them all now, so I don't have to keep taking the wheel off over and over again.



Unexpectedly, on the ride home, my front wheel started sounding and feeling funny. I pulled over, and all I could tell is that one spot felt bulgy, and crooked, on the entire tread area *and* sidewalls, as if the whole thing was about to herniate. I didn't have much choice but to keep going home, another mile and a half or so, but I just kept the speed down a lot, maybe 13-14MPH at the fastest. (I've never had a blowout in front at any kind of speed, and I'd rather not find out what it's like in traffic).


By the time I got home, it looked like this:

You can see the shiny tire liner thru the 1/4"-wide tear in the tread, and the whole tire looks crooked at that point, as if the rim was bent (but it's not).

I have a feeling that if it weren't for the liner, the tube'd've herniated out the slit, and been torn on the road surface, and I'd've been walking home, as I didnt' have a patch kit with me (my previous set was lost with teh old toolkit, and i only recently ran across my main box of tire stuff, not gotten to putting any of it in the new toolkit).

Fortunately I have a whole other tire just like this one that used to be on DayGlo Avenger's rear wheel, and though it is also well-worn it isn't on the ragged edge like this one.


Unfortunately I have to be at work at 8AM tomorrow morning, so I have to do the the tire change, and if possible the spoke fix, tonight after I get done with my dinner (posting this while cooking and eating it) and feeding the dogs and stuff. All the other fun stuff and chores will probably get skipped until tomorrow evening.



Which is very sad, because this interesting and mostly unexpected donation box showed up, as I was about to ride off--the postman came up just then, so I took it to work with me rather than dealing with opening up the house and exciting the dogs for no reason. :lol:

Naturally it had to be inspected first:


Then it's contents had to be examined by the customs agent:
View attachment 3
to be sure no nummies were being smuggled in past her.

The main items in it are destined for the new bike, but will be tested on CrazyBike2 first. In the lower right are a set of Methods' LVC/HVC boards from here:
http://www.endless-sphere.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=31&t=32460
3x 6s and 1x 5s. They will be for a "new" pack to be discussed at a later time. They also have the cables/connectors to wire it up, though I'll have to do some snipping and crimping on the battery ends of them to put the connectors the future pack will need.

To the left of those is a reflector, a switching unit board (dimmer/CC source/etc) and an LED, which looks to be intended as a headlight. If it's what it says on the envelope, it ought to be a nice one: "Cree P7 1000 Lumen 1Amp". I just have to figure out a mounting/housing for it, figure out the wiring on the little board, and wire it up and see if it works (and fix it if it doesn't). I have a couple old flashlights that it might fit in. Well, and decide how to mount the LED to the reflector, which is also intended as a heatsink for it, AFAICT.

In the upper left corner is a pair of automotive relays, which I presume are intended as the HVC relays for those boards.


There's a couple of used soldering irons, one Weller gun-type and one RadioShack soldersucker type, with a new tip for the latter in the package above it, and a cone tip for a Weller (not the one in there) that might fit the RS iron, too, or one of several assorted brands I have here that have bad tips (including a small old Weller). Havne't plugged them in yet.

An Extech meter, similar to the one I've used on these projects before, but a better model, rounds up the list. I turned it on and verified it works on continuity tester mode thru it's leads, and thru a short found on the 5s LVC/HVC board (see below), but that's all so far.


Everything in there ougth to be pretty useful, most of it immediately. So--thank you, Methods!



The only thing I noticed right away on any of it, while I was looking over the HVC/LVC boards, was a place on the 5s board where a strand off teh HVC relay signal wire had wandered over to touch the 12V pad next to it. Should be easy to fix once I get that far. Verified it is actually shorted with the continuity function of the Extech meter; the other boards dont' read a short there. Pardon the blurry pics; best I could get the camera to do.


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