circuit help

[MacGyver]

At least I think it is simple...

I have 2 12v wingtip lights that I need to be able to control with
one switch and one wire running through a wing in an airplane.
This is for just one wing. That's the gist of it.

I just bought piggyback strobes for the wingtips, but I don't want to
have them on all the time that I have the navigation lights on.

I was thinking of a relay that has a remote control, or has a signal
run through the positive wire or could possibly have a low & high
setting and if we send 12 volts to the relay it trips, but it won't
trip at say 10 volts.

Also was thinking about if I turn the switch on once just the light
comes on. Flip the switch off & on again in under 2 seconds and the
lights & strobes come on. Leave the switch off & everything turns off.

I was thinking about relays with a capacitor to keep the line live for
2 seconds to be able to flip another relay... but now I am confusing
myself again.

Any Ideas???

Seems like it should not be too difficult.
Thanks so much for any advise!!!

Sean Gallagher
Pheonix, AZ

 

[[email protected]]

begin insult to your intelligence >"
Short answer, if you have to ask, you shouldnt be doing it."
End insult.


Sean, this is a safety of life application, uncertified do it
yourself circuit tricks are not a good idea here, can you pull another
wire? Aircraft wiring has to be designed as fail safe. The fact that
the airplane is chassis ground is whats messing up any possible DC
switching scheme. Plus the fact that if the wingtips fail, plus your
strobes or beacons or tail fails, you risk a air to air collision.

You could build a network that would allow you to inject a audio
tone onto the wire to turn on the strobes, using a simple decoder like
a 567 chip.But you'd have to keep that signal out of the rest of the
airframe, out of nav gear, radio gear, and anything else flight
critical. You also have to choose a tone that is not used in the
radios or avionics, ie not 9600 hertz,1100 hz, 1200 hz, 400 hz, 60 hz
or any of the ILS marker tones etc.


A microcontroller could "catch" a momentary interuption of the DC to
the lamps and toggle a flip-flop to turn on the strobes, but this is
highly unlikely to be certifiable even on a home built. You'd have to
shield and filter the daylights out of the microcontroller to keep its
radiation of its clock signal to a minimum to keep it out of your
radios. And the strobe PSUs can/will pull a nasty current ramp after
every flash possibly generating a pulse that mimics your signal. Not
good.


The other thing to be considered is the noise and power spikes on a
aircraft DC bus are huge, especially at startup. In a car for example
I've measured 500V spikes. My Cessna 172 manual (I'm considering
getting a license) calls for switching off the avionics bus during
engine start, even on a in flight restart. Its that bad. You'd have to
protect against that.

On the other hand, the strobes are a definate plus for flight safety.
FAA calls for the pilot to have the ability to your the lights off,
least you end up in a cloud or fog. T

There is a guy who writes on DIY aircraft electronics and sells some
kit gear, he would know of any approved alternative solution to your
problem. Try rec.aviation.misc or Jim Weir @ http://www.rst-engr.com/

Steve Roberts

 

[John Hudak]

begin insult to your intelligence >"
Short answer, if you have to ask, you shouldnt be doing it."
End insult.


Sean, this is a safety of life application, uncertified do it
yourself circuit tricks are not a good idea here, can you pull another
wire? Aircraft wiring has to be designed as fail safe. The fact that
the airplane is chassis ground is whats messing up any possible DC
switching scheme. Plus the fact that if the wingtips fail, plus your
strobes or beacons or tail fails, you risk a air to air collision.

You could build a network that would allow you to inject a audio
tone onto the wire to turn on the strobes, using a simple decoder like
a 567 chip.But you'd have to keep that signal out of the rest of the
airframe, out of nav gear, radio gear, and anything else flight
critical. You also have to choose a tone that is not used in the
radios or avionics, ie not 9600 hertz,1100 hz, 1200 hz, 400 hz, 60 hz
or any of the ILS marker tones etc.


A microcontroller could "catch" a momentary interuption of the DC to
the lamps and toggle a flip-flop to turn on the strobes, but this is
highly unlikely to be certifiable even on a home built. You'd have to
shield and filter the daylights out of the microcontroller to keep its
radiation of its clock signal to a minimum to keep it out of your
radios. And the strobe PSUs can/will pull a nasty current ramp after
every flash possibly generating a pulse that mimics your signal. Not
good.


The other thing to be considered is the noise and power spikes on a
aircraft DC bus are huge, especially at startup. In a car for example
I've measured 500V spikes. My Cessna 172 manual (I'm considering
getting a license) calls for switching off the avionics bus during
engine start, even on a in flight restart. Its that bad. You'd have to
protect against that.

On the other hand, the strobes are a definate plus for flight safety.
FAA calls for the pilot to have the ability to your the lights off,
least you end up in a cloud or fog. T

There is a guy who writes on DIY aircraft electronics and sells some
kit gear, he would know of any approved alternative solution to your
problem. Try rec.aviation.misc or Jim Weir @ http://www.rst-engr.com/

Steve Roberts

For correct parsing, shouldn't it be:
begin insult to your intelligence >"
Short answer, if you have to ask, you shouldn't be doing it."
End insult to your intelligence>.

I don't know what in the persons post should elicit that kind of
response. What is annoying is the lack of details in the post. i.e. is
this a model? a real plane, operational scenario, etc...

You are correct, this is a safety issue and certain guidelines need to
be adhered to. BTW, "if you have to ask, you should not do" is really
pretty bad...how does one learn?
I have to admit tho, that from the terse posting that he is pretty
clueless about electricity and electronics.
John

 

[MacGyver]

Well thanks for the leads... I know some of the basics of electronics,
If you give me a diagram & parts list, I can build it. But the
component interactions & how to accomplish what I want is a little
difficult.
Kinda like I can understand spanish, and speak a little,... Just don't
ask me how to write a poem...
But I know the very basics & am trying to learn too.