98 Eclipse Tail Light LED Conversion Project

[azdave]

I've been to this site on and off for a while and though I would post my latest project.

I did a full tail light conversion on a 98 Mitsu Eclipse. I also added lights to the center section housing  of the car that normally was just red plastic painted silver on the back to simulate a tail light.

I documented all the work on HIDplanet.com in their LED forum. Link is below.

Here's a quick run down on the project:

828 individually hand soldered SuperFlux LEDs mounted SMT-style in 22 separately activated lighting sections.
26 custom-etched circuit boards of my own design
275 SMT 15 ohm resistors
6 custom-modified pulse width modulators
6 custom-built power supplies with 24 separately activated outputs. Each of the 24 outputs can drive up to 80 Superflux LEDs at 70mA.
Over 5000 solder connections.

Measurements (all measured @ 13.6V)
Idle current (full system off) = 30mA
Marker lights = 1.25A (slightly brighter than factory lamps)
Brake lights = 3.75A (noticably brighter than factory bulbs)
Full-on = 10A @100% duty-cycle (intensely bright for strobe functions)


Brief video of light strobe effects during shows.
Right Click, "Save As... "
http://www.rcaz.com/movieclips/led_demo.wmv

Here's a pdf of the circuit layout for the center section of lights.
http://www.rcaz.com/images/eclipse/centerschematic.pdf




Complete thread on HIDplanet.com
http://hidplanet.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=6596&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=0

A few pics...








azdave

 

[Rob]

Welcome to the boards, and thanks for sharing your project. That is first class work. I've added a custom title to your profile in recognition. Well done.

[seanyiya]

All I can say is wow..... speechless...
That some ELITE work.... 

[Radio1ne]

As a law enforcement officer (almost retired) and doing some consulting work,you've got a winner. If your system could be built into an aluminum extrusion approx 2" X 48" for rear window mounting in side a vehicle it would be the ultimate "traffic advisor". Cost would be a limiting factor obviously. Could this type system with controllers be built in the area of $100.00 ??

Dick Jenkinson
Engineered Benchwork
Westerville, Ohio

[Rob]

Welcome to the boards, Radio1ne.

I don't have access to azdave's complete plans and specs, but it seems like 100 would be in the realm of possibility.

[justDIY]

$100 for the parts is certainly possible, but not for labor.

Through my work, I deal a lot with law enforcement and sometimes I look through the magazines they get flooded with ... I have seen LED matrix lightbars for rooftop, trunk or rear deck that offer features similar to what Dave's lights do, and more, but you're looking at another 0 (at least) in the price.

I think a lot of that is probably govt fleecing, however, there is a substanial assembly time cost involved too ... since these things aren't high-volume production items, they're probably hand-assembled, and it takes time to do something like that!

[seanyiya]

I've seen some Police light bar on the internet for sale.. it was range from few thousands...
LED would costs alot and labor would be very high...

I think some use Luxeon LEDs....
I've found this one..
http://tomar.com/products/blade/blade.htm

From looking through other light bar and some uses 36watts of power...

[abbtech]

Slick job!