DucatiBoy Circuit Ordering Discussion Thread

[edrock200]

Yes, you are correct, everything will work with all wiring hooked up correctly + this mod.

[edrock200]

ducatiboy, two things:
1. Can you please explain how a 12v to 0v duty cycle works? Just curious.
2. I would like to edit the sticky thread on TR7 programming to recommend this product instead (but leave the instructions in case.) Is this cool with you?

Thanks again for supporting the group with this cool adapter!
-Ed

[ducatiboy]

[quote name="edrock200"]
2. I would like to edit the sticky thread on TR7 programming to recommend this product instead (but leave the instructions in case.) Is this cool with you?
[/quote]

2. Sure, not a problem. I don't want to dethrone the TR7 cause I have a lot of respect for the PAC audio guys. But sure. If you want to, knock yourself out. I'm quickly running out of the initial run of boards I made just for myself. It looks like I might need to up the production. :)

[quote name="edrock200"]ducatiboy, two things:
1. Can you please explain how a 12v to 0v duty cycle works? Just curious.
[/quote]

1. If you want to dim the car's interior lights, you can drop the voltage. So think 12 volts is full brightness. If you wanted them 1/2 as bright you drop the voltage down to 6 volts. But where in your car can you get 6 volts? You can't. So a light dimmer would have to "make it" by using a resistor divider or something. You can do this, but you would need really beefy resistors cause the amount of current it takes to power your lights at 6 volts is pretty high. And then you will want it variable. You will want to give the driver 6V, 6.5V, 6.75V, etc, etc, etc... So you can make one of the resistors variable, but they have to be really big and beefy. It's a messy solution.

What they do is the same way I used a different circuit to got rid of the resistor on the heated grips I put on my motorcycles. Use a 0v - 12V signal and adjust the duty cycle.

Duty cycle is a fancy term for "ok you have a signal, it's going from 0 volts to 12 volts. what percentage of the time is it 12 volts? and what percentage of the time is it 0 volts?" So you want to dim your lights, with 6 volts (just an example). Instead of making 6 volts which is contineous, which would waste the other 6 volts (between 6 volts and 12 volts) as heat. You can turn on and off 12 volts without producing any heat.

So turn on the light for 5 seconds, and off for 5 seconds. The average over time will be 6 volts. Well, a human would also see that flicker. But remember movie theaters, that thing flickers at 24 frames/second and your eyes don't see that. They flash my car's lights on for about 3/1000 of a second, then they turn them off, then on again, then off again... my car does this so fast, that you won't even see the flicker.

Disclaimer: there is a little more to it (for those electronic people out there) but I thought this was the basic principle that people could grasp.

[quote name="edrock200"]
Thanks again for supporting the group with this cool adapter!
-Ed[/quote]

And you all are very welcome.

[edrock200]

Cool thanks for the explanation.

[ducatiboy]

Ok, the first 17 have been bought and paid for. I will be raising my price to $25 each for the next run and it will be large, no sense in running out of these.

But I will not be ordering these till I get confirmation from the first group that these aew all working in thier cars 100%. So the next batch will be going out no earlier than may 18th.

Thanks for your understanding.

[color=red][size=200]Please re-read the first post in this message cause I'm editing it for the next run of units.[/size][/color]

[wishbone]

Woomp! I look forward to giving it a shot! Thanks again for putting these together. Now lets hope that pioneer doesn't remove this "feature" in their next software release. :roll:

[wishbone]

So has the first batch shipped yet?

thanks!

[ducatiboy]

[quote name="wishbone"]So has the first batch shipped yet?[/quote]

Not yet, I have all the parts (they all came in a couple hours ago, I'm going to stay late at work to try to get them done tonight. Those who paid me via e-check haven't cleared yet though. Hopefully I will finish them tonight, if not, then tomorrow night and they should go out Thursday (I hope).

[wishbone]

[quote name="ducatiboy"] [quote name="wishbone"]So has the first batch shipped yet?[/quote]

Not yet, I have all the parts (they all came in a couple hours ago, I'm going to stay late at work to try to get them done tonight. Those who paid me via e-check haven't cleared yet though. Hopefully I will finish them tonight, if not, then tomorrow night and they should go out Thursday (I hope).[/quote]

Mine was a paypal balance transfer so no worries there. Just curious. Thanks!

[ducatiboy]

Wow, guess what I made a few of tonight?

They look good. I built up 12 so far. So here is the picture of the first generation. It's all surface mount. Which by the way is way too small. The next generation will be slightly bigger and longer and thinner. Over all size of gen 2 will be about 1.75 times bigger than what you see here. Surface mount made it super small, but it takes way too long to make any quanity of these, I was going a little carzy soldering these tonight. Not that any of you should care, as long as this thing works, right?

I just thought I would post a pic of the size and shape of what I got so far, I'm going to try to ship some of these tomorrow. Cross your fingers :)

[ducatiboy]

And the very first Ducati Headlight Flasher circuit is installed and working with not a single glitch. I kept my headlights on just to test, but it works no matter what the headlights are doing (on/off/auto/etc). I have envelopes and things in the truck, I hope to have these out tomorrow (if all goes as planned). I hope to have all the first 17 out if possible (I might need to one of the techs at work tomorrow to goof off and build these instead of doing real work, but I think I can pull that off).

I really set out to be very personable with the email and pm corrospondance but I'm getting hammered with requests and spending a lot of time trying to build these as fast as possible (and test them as well), that I might sound short or annoyed or not very talkative in personal emails and Pm's. If I do, I apologize. I'm just trying to focus on the devices themselves and to get you a reply of some form asap.

Anyway not to brag too much, but it's installed in my truck and working great.

Notice I ran some wired out from behind the radio to under the dash, I was getting sick of pulling out the radio to run tests :)

[tomalley]

I've just ordered mine - and I can't wait!!

[ducatiboy]

The first 17 shipped. The next run will ship out Most likely monday or tuesday, so far, everyone who paid me is in for that second run. If you paid by "echeck" and it didn't clear yet you were "bummped" to the second run (paypal said it would not clear till monday anyway). So one person who thought they were in the first run and paid by echeck didn't get it yet.... sorry.

[JasonH]

Made this a sticky for ya.
Keep up the great work! :D

[palacios]

Let me know if you received it and when you plan on shipping it. I think you said you were gonna ship the second batch on Monday or Tuesday but I got confused because you also said you weren't gonna order the parts for the second batch until everybody reported no problems with the first batch.