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Step 9Hacking the Taillight
This is pretty much the same thing as the headlamp.
Except here, my taillight came in a fairly ungainly casing, from which I decided to free it. Conveniently though, the circuit board was in the shape of a long stick, which made for a good light bar. And it operated on a pushbutton basis. Which made wiring up to the corresponding LED/pushbutton on the strap a cinch.
So. I wired the supply and ground voltages to the Load source, then wired in the pushbutton to where the original button was set. After that, I paralleled a resistor leading to the status LED on the LED/pushbutton, into one of the red LEDs actually on the board. Therefore, whenever that LED lights up, so does my switch, letting me gauge the current display pattern it's running, based on the timing between the flashes of my status LED. That makes for six wires leading out of the board, two into the project box and four to the corresponding LED/pushbutton.
After all that, I went ahead and encased the whole thing in hot glue, forming it a bit to have a divot where I can secure it into the bag, before sewing a few loops around it onto the exterior of the bag.
And yes, I do realize it looks a bit like a little white turd.
Except here, my taillight came in a fairly ungainly casing, from which I decided to free it. Conveniently though, the circuit board was in the shape of a long stick, which made for a good light bar. And it operated on a pushbutton basis. Which made wiring up to the corresponding LED/pushbutton on the strap a cinch.
So. I wired the supply and ground voltages to the Load source, then wired in the pushbutton to where the original button was set. After that, I paralleled a resistor leading to the status LED on the LED/pushbutton, into one of the red LEDs actually on the board. Therefore, whenever that LED lights up, so does my switch, letting me gauge the current display pattern it's running, based on the timing between the flashes of my status LED. That makes for six wires leading out of the board, two into the project box and four to the corresponding LED/pushbutton.
After all that, I went ahead and encased the whole thing in hot glue, forming it a bit to have a divot where I can secure it into the bag, before sewing a few loops around it onto the exterior of the bag.
And yes, I do realize it looks a bit like a little white turd.
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