Tue, 30 Oct 2012
Bike Lights
I have a new personal project: I am trying to build a set of lights for my bike. So far my setup is quite simple: I use a 700 mA Buck Puck current regulator to feed a front Cree XM-L white LED and three rear 350 mA red LEDs. It can only be switched on or off, and cannot blink at all. So I wanted to make something more sophisticated.
I have been playing with electronics many years ago in my teen-age years, but I have been doing only software since then. So I have taken this as an opportunity to find out what progress the world of DYI electronics has made, and to learn programming of microcontrollers. I want the resulting electronics to have the following features:
- LED drivers for high-power LEDs:
- Atmel AVR Tiny CPU, programmable in-system (various blinking modes, etc.).
- Power: 7 to 12 V battery pack (either lithium or NiMH).
- Ambient light sensor (for automatically setting the mode depending on the conditions).
- Battery voltage monitoring.
- Cycle computer illumination LED.
- Two status LEDs.
- Two buttons for adjusting modes, switching on/off, etc.
- Software on/off.
- High-power software switched output driven by a MOSFET transistor (I don't know the purpose yet, I just had a spare pin and MOSFET :-).
I have managed to learn how to use the gEDA suite of tools, and created my first PCB with it. Yesterday I have sent the result to the fab. Anyway, I have made the Project Bike Lights page for my project, where it is possible to watch the progress or look at the firmware code, schematics, and PCB design.