The COtTBL



suzyj

suzyj

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Mar 22, 2004
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Hi guys,

Thought I'd share some pictures of my new Completely Over the Top Bike Light, or COtTBL.

http://www.atnf.csiro.au/~sjackson/bikelight/

At its heart is a 3W Luxeon-III emitter, with narrow Fraen collimating lens and Luxdrive driver circuitry.

The switch at the back toggles between off, high beam (3W) and low beam (1.5W). It's able to be powered by anything from 5V to 15V or so. The driver just takes the appropriate power from the battery.

It runs for about 5 hours 40 on high beam, or 12 hours low beam from my stick of five 3Ah Sub-C NiHM cells, and should run for about 20 hours high beam or 40 hours low beam on my Li+ pack.

It's bright - really bright. At a guess (though I have no instruments with which to confirm this, it's brighter than my 5W vistalite light.

Regards,

Suzy
 
"suzyj" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
>
> Hi guys,
>
> Thought I'd share some pictures of my new Completely Over the Top Bike
> Light, or COtTBL.
>
> http://www.atnf.csiro.au/~sjackson/bikelight/
>
> At its heart is a 3W Luxeon-III emitter, with narrow Fraen collimating
> lens and Luxdrive driver circuitry.
>
> The switch at the back toggles between off, high beam (3W) and low beam
> (1.5W). It's able to be powered by anything from 5V to 15V or so. The
> driver just takes the appropriate power from the battery.
>
> It runs for about 5 hours 40 on high beam, or 12 hours low beam from my
> stick of five 3Ah Sub-C NiHM cells, and should run for about 20 hours
> high beam or 40 hours low beam on my Li+ pack.
>
> It's bright - really bright. At a guess (though I have no instruments
> with which to confirm this, it's brighter than my 5W vistalite light.
>
> Regards,
>
> Suzy
>
>
> --
> suzyj
>

Very neat Suzy. Why the wide piece of aluminium in the middle? Is that for
maximum heat transfer to the casing?

Marty
 
suzyj said:
Hi guys,

Thought I'd share some pictures of my new Completely Over the Top Bike Light, or COtTBL.

http://www.atnf.csiro.au/~sjackson/bikelight/

At its heart is a 3W Luxeon-III emitter, with narrow Fraen collimating lens and Luxdrive driver circuitry.

The switch at the back toggles between off, high beam (3W) and low beam (1.5W). It's able to be powered by anything from 5V to 15V or so. The driver just takes the appropriate power from the battery.

It runs for about 5 hours 40 on high beam, or 12 hours low beam from my stick of five 3Ah Sub-C NiHM cells, and should run for about 20 hours high beam or 40 hours low beam on my Li+ pack.

It's bright - really bright. At a guess (though I have no instruments with which to confirm this, it's brighter than my 5W vistalite light.

Regards,

Suzy
Click to expand...
DROOL!!!! Thats the nicest looking bike light I've seen.

OK So when does the producion run begin??

I want one!! Yet again SuzyJ has made a simply stunning piece of equipment sleeker, smoother and more operable than any before..

OK Cause I guess your not going to go into production, a few simple questions.

The casing and internal steel bits (headsinks?) - did you turn them or are they off the shelf bits?

What was the end cost?

Tom (in awe)
Do you have drawings?
 
That's awesome Suze!!!

But no lugs! what went wrong? :D

Any chance a non-engineering/electrician like moi could build one?

F "Lost at the mention of electrical jargon..." D
 
"suzyj" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
>
> Hi guys,
>
> Thought I'd share some pictures of my new Completely Over the Top Bike
> Light, or COtTBL.
>
> http://www.atnf.csiro.au/~sjackson/bikelight/
>
> At its heart is a 3W Luxeon-III emitter, with narrow Fraen collimating
> lens and Luxdrive driver circuitry.
>
> The switch at the back toggles between off, high beam (3W) and low beam
> (1.5W). It's able to be powered by anything from 5V to 15V or so. The
> driver just takes the appropriate power from the battery.
>
> It runs for about 5 hours 40 on high beam, or 12 hours low beam from my
> stick of five 3Ah Sub-C NiHM cells, and should run for about 20 hours
> high beam or 40 hours low beam on my Li+ pack.
>
> It's bright - really bright. At a guess (though I have no instruments
> with which to confirm this, it's brighter than my 5W vistalite light.

Very sexy - did you do the work yourself? If so, please post instructions!
;^)

Have you seen Crash Carden's effort?

http://www.michaelcarden.net/luxeon/luxeon3.php

Nowhere near as sexy, but a good how-to. I really must do some myself this
year. Halogen is just too retro!

Tony F
for old hat (s-o-o-o last century) home made halogen lights, and Blue
Mountains mtb rides, see:
http://www.thefathippy.com
 
Thanks for the compliments. In response to the questions, the aluminium bits are turned from round stock, so it's kinda difficult to do without a lathe. I made the center piece (where the luxeon mounts) fairly thick for two reasons. Firstly I wanted plenty of contact area between it and the side of the case tube, for good heat conduction, and secondly making it 16mm thick meant that the hole for the mount was exactly in the middle, which suited my sense of aesthetics better than having the front longer than the back.

It's probably a little heavier than it needs to be. I'm toying with the idea of putting the case tube in a lathe and taking a millimetre or two off it's radius. At the moment it's 38mm dia, but it would still work fine if it were only 35 or even 34mm diameter, and would be about 50g lighter.

Alas no steel, and no lugs. Aluminium conducts heat better than steel. I did polish it up a bit though so it wouldn't look completely out of place next to my polished stainless stem lugs though.

Total cost was in the neighborhood of $120. Maybe $20 or $30 for the luxeon, same for the lens, and $50 odd for the Luxdrive thingy, which I highly recommend. The metal was all scrounged, so that doesn't count.

Michael Carden and Poiters lights were what provided the necessary kick to get me to start.

If anyone is interested, I can send them a (mostly accurate) CAD drawing.

Regards,

Suzy
 
suzyj said:
Hi guys,

Thought I'd share some pictures of my new Completely Over the Top Bike Light, or COtTBL.

http://www.atnf.csiro.au/~sjackson/bikelight/

At its heart is a 3W Luxeon-III emitter, with narrow Fraen collimating lens and Luxdrive driver circuitry.

The switch at the back toggles between off, high beam (3W) and low beam (1.5W). It's able to be powered by anything from 5V to 15V or so. The driver just takes the appropriate power from the battery.

It runs for about 5 hours 40 on high beam, or 12 hours low beam from my stick of five 3Ah Sub-C NiHM cells, and should run for about 20 hours high beam or 40 hours low beam on my Li+ pack.

It's bright - really bright. At a guess (though I have no instruments with which to confirm this, it's brighter than my 5W vistalite light.

Regards,

Suzy
Click to expand...

Very Nice!
Superior workmanship in the housing, as I'd expect from you.
Did you build your own driver or purchase a puck?

I disagree that it's 'completely over the top'. I would say it's close to the perfect AUDAX (main) light. A 3W luxeon should be plenty of light for road riding & with a half power option is 'PBP' ready. ;)

I'd like to know how the narrow lens goes in a road test. I've thought about converting my Cateye Daylights to Luxeon 3W.
 
OK. light-101 time for pig-ignorant dutchy! :rolleyes:

What is all this talk of Luxeon?

3W/5W/10W is wattage a strength measurement or a duration thingy?

could you list the parts you used? maybe in order form front-to-back of light... :rolleyes:

cheers

FD
 
"suzyj" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
>
> Hi guys,
>
> Thought I'd share some pictures of my new Completely Over the Top Bike
> Light, or COtTBL.
>
> http://www.atnf.csiro.au/~sjackson/bikelight/
>
> At its heart is a 3W Luxeon-III emitter, with narrow Fraen collimating
> lens and Luxdrive driver circuitry.
>
> The switch at the back toggles between off, high beam (3W) and low beam
> (1.5W). It's able to be powered by anything from 5V to 15V or so. The
> driver just takes the appropriate power from the battery.
>
> It runs for about 5 hours 40 on high beam, or 12 hours low beam from my
> stick of five 3Ah Sub-C NiHM cells, and should run for about 20 hours
> high beam or 40 hours low beam on my Li+ pack.
>
> It's bright - really bright. At a guess (though I have no instruments
> with which to confirm this, it's brighter than my 5W vistalite light.
>
> Regards,
>
> Suzy
> --
> suzyj
>
Very nice Suzy. I would suggest putting one of those little rubber caps on
the switch to aid in keeping water out of the switch.

If you want to see a really over the top light, check out this 500W,
generator powered jobby!!!

http://home.arcor.de/schymik/Lampen/Lampeta.htm

Ride On,

Gags
 
suzyj said:
Thanks for the compliments. In response to the questions, the aluminium bits are turned from round stock, so it's kinda difficult to do without a lathe. I made the center piece (where the luxeon mounts) fairly thick for two reasons. Firstly I wanted plenty of contact area between it and the side of the case tube, for good heat conduction, and secondly making it 16mm thick meant that the hole for the mount was exactly in the middle, which suited my sense of aesthetics better than having the front longer than the back.

It's probably a little heavier than it needs to be. I'm toying with the idea of putting the case tube in a lathe and taking a millimetre or two off it's radius. At the moment it's 38mm dia, but it would still work fine if it were only 35 or even 34mm diameter, and would be about 50g lighter.

Alas no steel, and no lugs. Aluminium conducts heat better than steel. I did polish it up a bit though so it wouldn't look completely out of place next to my polished stainless stem lugs though.

Total cost was in the neighborhood of $120. Maybe $20 or $30 for the luxeon, same for the lens, and $50 odd for the Luxdrive thingy, which I highly recommend. The metal was all scrounged, so that doesn't count.

Michael Carden and Poiters lights were what provided the necessary kick to get me to start.

If anyone is interested, I can send them a (mostly accurate) CAD drawing.

Regards,

Suzy
Click to expand...


Thats what I want !
What a wonderful piece of work. Printed the pics and put them under my pillow.
Have wanted to do similar but dont have any workshop/lathe and the big put off is that would have to buy all the bits from all over Oz. The Pack n Post total would be more than the electronics. No one stocks anything in Townsville and "on back order" just means not flamin interested.

Where/ how did you source all the internals or was it a chase all over town for you too. Could you do a suppliers list please.

Would it run OK from a 6v, 4 aH SLAB ? Using that and converted Kmart Krypton bike light. Its very bright and since making some reflective anklets and bracelets I find that cars dip their high beam at a reasonable distance, not blind me.

To diverge - if you want to make reflective anklets go to "safety shop" and buy the shiny plastic coated reflecting tape, not the dull silver looking one, the rain ruins it. Can buy 50mm wide tape by the metre for about $6-7 . From Kmart etc get a packet of jeans size press studs and go for it. The moving legs and hansignals can be seen way off even with low incidental light.

Need a retail therapy fix in the BIG smoke.

Hugh
 
suzyj said:
Hi guys,

Thought I'd share some pictures of my new Completely Over the Top Bike Light, or COtTBL.<snip>
Click to expand...

I just spent some time on your site looking at your frame building efforts as well. Utterly, spectacularly gorgeous stuff. I don't know if I'll ever take oxy torch in hand and have a go, but if I ever do, you'll have to take at least partial responsibility for inspiring me to play with hot things and sharp things. I'd seen pics of the built up fixie before, but I didn't even know the tourer existed. Lovely, lovely work.
 
HughMann wrote:

> Have wanted to do similar but dont have any workshop/lathe

TAFE?
In NSW $300 for the year gets you 4 hours access each week and they will
even teach you how to use it.
 
"tony f" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
>
> "suzyj" <[email protected]> wrote in message
> news:[email protected]...
> >
> > Hi guys,
> >
> > Thought I'd share some pictures of my new Completely Over the Top Bike
> > Light, or COtTBL.
> >
< snip >
> Have you seen Crash Carden's effort?
>
> http://www.michaelcarden.net/luxeon/luxeon3.php
>
> Nowhere near as sexy, but a good how-to. I really must do some myself this
> year. Halogen is just too retro!
>
> Tony F
> for old hat (s-o-o-o last century) home made halogen lights, and Blue
> Mountains mtb rides, see:
> http://www.thefathippy.com
>
>

Tony inspired me to build a halogen light, an ugly (think metal ramekin
(sp?) casing) but very bright 50W.

Now I am using a 50W (don't tell me you didn't see me!) car driving light,
which doesn't have the 'I made it myself' factor but works for my short
commute.

Suzy your work is superb, maybe an ugly luxeon will be born soon.

Peter
 
Dutchy wrote:

> What is all this talk of Luxeon?

Luxeon are relatively new super high intensity LEDs. Most of the white LEDs you get from Jaycar etc are 3.7V, 20mA, which is about 75mW. Luxeon make 1W, 3W, and 5W white LEDs. The 3W one is the newest type, and are a little more efficient at converting watts to lumens than the other ones. One 3W LED is equivalent to 40 5mm LEDs at 20mA each...

> 3W/5W/10W is wattage a strength measurement or a duration thingy?

It's a power cunsumption measurement. Voltage x Current = Power. A 3Ah 6V battery, for example (like my nitestick one) will supply 18 Watts for an hour, or 3 Watts for six hours.

> could you list the parts you used? maybe in order form front-to-back
> of light... :rolleyes:

From front to back:

1. Housing - turned on lathe.
2. 32mm o-ring.
3. 32mm dia acrylic sheet (cut from CD case)
4. Fraen narrow lense with holder to suit Lambertian emitter
5. Luxeon 3W white Lambertian LED
6. Thermal grease
7. 32mm dia 16mm thick turned aluminium disc.
8. Luxdrive 700mA buckpuck
9. 1K 1/4W resistor (connected to back of switch)
10. Three-way toggle switch.
11. 2.5mm DC power socket.
12. 32mm dia 6mm thick turned aluminium disc.

Also there's a few M3 screws, a couple of M3 x 25mm spacers, and the bar mount ratted from my vistalite.

The Luxeon, Luxdrive, and lens all came from www.luxeonstar.com. All the rest of the electronic bits are from **** Smith/Jaycar.

Regards,

Suzy
 
suzyj said:
From front to back:

1. Housing - turned on lathe.
2. 32mm o-ring.
3. 32mm dia acrylic sheet (cut from CD case)
4. Fraen narrow lense with holder to suit Lambertian emitter
5. Luxeon 3W white Lambertian LED
6. Thermal grease
7. 32mm dia 16mm thick turned aluminium disc.
8. Luxdrive 700mA buckpuck
9. 1K 1/4W resistor (connected to back of switch)
10. Three-way toggle switch.
11. 2.5mm DC power socket.
12. 32mm dia 6mm thick turned aluminium disc.

Also there's a few M3 screws, a couple of M3 x 25mm spacers, and the bar mount ratted from my vistalite.

The Luxeon, Luxdrive, and lens all came from www.luxeonstar.com. All the rest of the electronic bits are from **** Smith/Jaycar.

Regards,

Suzy
Click to expand...

pardon my electrical ignorance but do you need the
AC or DC 'LuxDrive BuckPuck 700mA LED Driver'???
 
Dutchy wrote:

> pardon my electrical ignorance but do you need the
> AC or DC 'LuxDrive BuckPuck 700mA LED Driver'???

DC. The AC one may be useful if you're running it from a dynamo, but I use batteries, so DC.

Regards,

Suzy
 
Just one last question Suzy,

How does the payload stay in the housing?

It seems that it all slides into the housing, O-ring/plastic cover/payload ect, but I can't see any screws to hold the guts in. Are there some grub screws that lock the alloy disc with the toggle switch in?

Thanks,

Tom (preparing the list to get making my own version for winter)
 
Casurina99 wrote:

> How does the payload stay in the housing?

The screw for the mounting clamp threads into the side of the 16mm thick disc to which the luxeon mounts. The outside of the casing is effectively clamped between the barmount and the luxeon block. That prevents the payload from sliding out the back of the tube. It also ensures there's good thermal contact between the luxeon mount and the case, which does the actual heat dissipation.

In the drawings (which I have to email to someone but have thus far forgotten to bring in from home) there's also a second o-ring in a groove around the disc with the switch and connector to stop water from getting in at the back, but then when it was almost finished I started to rush because I wanted to use it, so this detail was left out. As a result it's not completely watertight.

Regards,

Suzy
 
suzyj <[email protected]> writes:

Hello suzyj,

That's a pretty light you made, didn't see any love hearts, though.

> 4. Fraen narrow lense with holder to suit Lambertian emitter

I've been meaning to build a light for my soon to be commuter. You've
inspired me to pull my finger out. I'm curious about the lens you
chose. How far out in front of the bike do you have the light hitting
the ground, and how large the spot is?

I'm wondering if you end up with a really contrasty sharp and harsh
spot surrounded by blackness, or whether the spot is softer.
 
On Sun, 16 Jan 2005 at 22:48 GMT, suzyj (aka Bruce)
was almost, but not quite, entirely unlike tea:
>
> Dutchy wrote:
>
>> What is all this talk of Luxeon?
>
> Luxeon are relatively new super high intensity LEDs. Most of the white
> LEDs you get from Jaycar etc are 3.7V, 20mA, which is about 75mW.
> Luxeon make 1W, 3W, and 5W white LEDs. The 3W one is the newest type,
> and are a little more efficient at converting watts to lumens than the
> other ones. One 3W LED is equivalent to 40 5mm LEDs at 20mA each...

What do people know about HIDs? Wattage, expected lifetime (MTBF),
what is their mechanism for operation, etc?


And when can I expect them to become affordable :)

--
TimC -- http://astronomy.swin.edu.au/staff/tconnors/
Confucius say: He who play in root, eventually kill tree.
 
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