Rear end light up revisited

When last I approached the subject of converting turn signal to brake, I was unaware rear turn signals in the UK had to be yellow.  My bad.  So, stop me if you've heard this.....

I've looked around and finally found a hack that might work in the UK as well.  What this does is leave the yellow flasher as that -- a yellow flasher.  However, when the actual turn signal is not being used, a separate short length of red led in the housing glows red giving you a full time full red rear end.  Hit your turn signal and the yellow flasher acts as it should, flashing yellow by cancelling out the led.  Looks to be a pretty simple mod.  Note that this is simply making your amber turn signals run red when not signaling but they do flash yellow.

A little further on in the article (around post 25 or so), there's mention of how to have the converted red running light actually glow brighter with brakes applied courtesy of an added amount of resistance and a diode.  I will be doing this mod soon as I like more light on the back of the bike ALL the time.


it's got to be a common wiring setup for Suzie's too.




http://www.vulcanforums.com/forums/73-wrench-heads/28093-diy-kuryakyn-triple-whammy-my-vn900-about-$5.html

Neat idea - unfortunately, it'd probably fail our MOT test due to "Check that the illumination of the lamp is not affected by the operation of any other lamp" - basically, the brake light has to remain constant all the time the brake is in operation.  I fitted indicators which incorporated brake/tail/indicators - had a right dispute with the first tester, who gave me an advisory.  Next one checked it & saw no reason for failure as it complied with the "At least 50% of light sources in a lamp must illuminate".  Not sure how you'd stand if you also ran a separate tail light which illuminated independently of the indicators though.


Again, brilliant idea, but would fall foul of our Draconian regulations - sure that some non-UK riders will take you up on it.  Keep the ideas coming though !!

I have these on the back of my Beemer, never had a problem with MOT


  Lite Buddys

Long as the indicator (or vice/versa) doesn't cancel out the other, it's not a problem. My first tester was just being a dick. I think the problem for us with the ones Mick is showing is that the indicator would cancel out the brake light - unless I'm mis-understanding

Hey katsd.


The way it is set up is as two separate circuits.   1. The normal yellow flasher sequence and,  2. one that keeps red leds on as running lights behind the yellow signal lenses.  I guess the led's have no problem showing as red thru the yellow lenses.  When the turn signal is activated (the bulb actually lights up), the red led is cancelled.  When the 'off' part of the flash cycle happens, the red led's re-light.  hence a yellow/red/yellow/red/yellow/red sequence for as long as the signal is flashing.  When the signal is turned off, the led's stay red as a continual running light (connected to a constant-on hot wire) and is not controlled by, nor has any effect on your tail stop light, you simply have a red rear end (careful where you say that!  lol)


A second part of this is that if you add optional resistance to it and connect it to the brake light wire as well, the led's will glow less brightly in normal running light mode, and glow more brightly when brake is applied, still cancelling to allow the yellow flasher sequence when required and not affecting the normal tail light function.   Hope this makes it a bit clearer.

Incidentally, all this is based on what I've read on the Vulcan site.


If this isn't legal in the UK don't do it, it's just an idea that if the turn signals are what need to be yellow, they are.  However, if the rear yellow lights double as running lights and are required to stay yellow all the time, they are not.  The turn signal lights on my Vulcan are yellow, but they are not required to be in Canada.  If they were I wouldn't do it.  However, I do want more red on the back of the bike at night.
 

Anyway, as in past projects, I'll post the tut as I do the mod if you like.


regards

Mike

Right - I think I get it now.  So if you fit the (red LED) strips inside the indicator housing, which then act as additional tail/brake lights, but still leave the original separate brake/tail housing, then effectively they would comply as the original brake light unit would remain constant during operation - it would only be the secondary brake lights (the LED strips) which would flash.  The tester could argue that "Each lamp must emit an amber light, except vehicles first used before 1 September 1965 where both front indicators may be white and both rear indicators red" & you are now displaying a red indicator.  However, it'd be relatively simply to fit a small socket connector into the LED wiring harness so it could be unplugged for the MOT.  

Wouldn't work for me as I've done away with the original tail/brake unit & fitted Highsider Colorado combo units, but if still had separate indicators, I'd be doing that.

Good posting Mike

As my front DRL's are close to my indicators I wired them through a relays etc. so that they went out when the indicators came on, but they flashed on/off which I did not like, I also thought my MOT man would not be impressed so I wired in a small circuit (see my other thread).
You could do the same with the rears as well so that when the indicator comes on it operates the relay through a diode but also charges a capacitor, then when the indicator goes off, the capacitor slowly discharges keeping the relay open (and the DRL off) for a couple of seconds, by which time the indicator has come back on, recharging the capacitor and keeping the relay open. When the indicator is turned off the capacitor discharges completely, dropping the relay and the DRL comes back on. I have just drawn the circuit below so you get an idea what it would look like.