Trade in your Cold Cathodes for LED's!

Cold Cathodes are bright, fun, and bring a smile to everyone's face when seen. I have used Cold Cathodes for a while and the usage of batteries was absurd, over 16 batteries every four hours! This instructable shows with only a little time, you can change your 600volt Cold Cathodes for 12volt LED's.

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Step 1: My current and old bike

A long long time and many bikes ago, was my first bike, ever since then, i have been modding it, from bikes to big wheels and wagons. When i first put Cold Cathodes on my bike, and since the thought, i have considered LED's but thought it was too expensive, and they still are. But in the long run with the amount of batteries i have used through out the time on my old bike and new bike, it has been expensive.

Cold Cathodes, although cheap, as with not being energy efficient, weren't very durable. And broke from time to time. Even just the cords. One more flaw in the design was the small fuse in the 12v to 600v inverter was irreplaceable; or hard.

frollard says: Mar 30, 2009. 12:58 AM

Thats an awesome, high visibility project! Cyclists are already in enough trouble with dumb other motorists. Perhaps green, traditional signal for 'go' (subconscious) isn't the best colour. I know I find it distracting when there are led billboards that use green as a main colour. They cause people to jump red lights all the time. Definitely stick with a non-go colour - red's good, blue might be taboo with your local police force (especially if your bike is considered a motor vehicle when driven on road, which they usually are == impersonating an officer charges, I kid you not) Still, significantly awesome project, and great writeup!

mowie in reply to frollardApr 2, 2009. 11:44 AM

you think other motorists are dumb have you ever thought of using the BIKEPATH on the side of the road and not distracting the other drivers that PAY to drive on the road

frollard in reply to mowieApr 4, 2009. 7:24 AM

I am a paying motorist (rarely ride a bike :( ) Motorists ARE dumb, in general. No amount of courtesy can average up the level of stupidity on the road. Most places aren't lucky enough to have a 'bike path'. Bicycles ridden by adults are considered motor vehicles, and in MOST areas, MUST NOT drive on the sidewalk in fear of getting a traffic violation (operate motor vehicle on sidewalk). Bicyclists pay taxes too, and have every right to use every road. Drivers should be AWARE at ALL times of whats going on around them, instead of eating, makeup, personal hygene, and cel phone distractions. Bicyclists also have to ride extremely defensively - this instructable is a testament to that. If you have a problem with sharing the road with cyclists - you shouldn't be driving.

mowie in reply to frollardApr 23, 2009. 8:27 PM

It must just be in the country that i live in or even the city but there are bike paths next to allmost every road and the cyclists still choose to ride allmost in the middle of the road so if you want to go around them you would have to go onto the wrong side of the . Some of them tend to weve all over the road anyway and not stop at red lights or stop signs . im not saying its all cyclists but you should see what they do.If they do get hit everyone allways says its the car drivers fault.

ac1D in reply to mowieMar 8, 2011. 11:15 AM

It's the same thing here, they all go on the street when they could use the special bike path.. and they are everywhere, bike path here.

Yerboogieman (author) in reply to frollardApr 4, 2009. 11:08 AM

Yes but in my town, we have a Huge bike trail, yet some bicyclists think they are too fast to use it so they ride in the middle of the road.

frollard in reply to YerboogiemanApr 4, 2009. 12:01 PM

And thats perfectly legal.

Zealous in reply to frollardApr 5, 2009. 1:36 PM

If you go down the middle of the road you can get done for dangerous driving...

Yerboogieman (author) in reply to frollardApr 4, 2009. 12:08 PM

Annoying and dangerous.

Yerboogieman (author) in reply to frollardMar 30, 2009. 11:41 AM

Well, i have blue and white cold cathodes, and my green ones broke, and these LED's change color and do all kinds of stuff.

Yerboogieman (author) in reply to YerboogiemanMar 31, 2009. 4:28 PM

lol, red and blue flashing outta get them mad, but, i've never has a problem with the police, they have always given me looks even when i didn't have lights.

varocketry says: Mar 8, 2010. 2:01 PM

DealExtreme is your friend for LED strips:

www.dealextreme.com/search.dx/search.led%20strips%2012v

xboxteen01 says: Apr 2, 2009. 5:46 PM

Thats awesome. Where could you buy those RGB strips cheap?

Yerboogieman (author) in reply to xboxteen01Apr 2, 2009. 7:20 PM

I'm not sure where you can get them cheap, mine for the controller and two strips was $75, i'm guessing you can search around on google and stuff until you find a good deal.