Articulating Roof Mounted Light System - Page 3

FJC8871 · 06-03-2009, 08:32 AM

Quote:

GTKrockeTT previously said:

i'm in for the group buy.

Yes group buy. She is a keeper. Keep her!! Very cool and impressive senior project!

FJNewb · 06-03-2009, 08:38 AM

Glad you posted this up. I was looking into making this for my FJ and possibly selling some setups as well. This product could be made relatively cheaply if you ditched the electric actuator and used a different motor and support meachnism to raise the lights. I already have a motor spec'd out for this which is less than $10. I hadn't planned on making the lights rotate but now it is something I might have to look into....time to break out the old controls book which I haven't looked at for a year or two

**JoeUser** · 06-03-2009, 08:41 AM

It's always fun to see new mods, and kudos to your fiance for a great job!

rider77 · 06-03-2009, 09:06 AM

Quote:

Lucrum previously said:

Looks like you guys had some fun. Just for what it is worth. You can use 18 GA wire with those actuators and save yourself some headache. Also it may serve you better to run the actuators off of a secondary source as we did to eliminate your power run to the cab. Can also use this to control the range of motion of the actuators since they have non-movable limit switches. Ours is set up very simple so it is pretty much a universal application so you don't have to do anything to the vehicle and the limited power run makes it so you don't have to make any holes either. You should take some orders. We have stopped selling ours for now to catch up on orders. Keep making cool stuff and you got a side job, ha ha!!!

ya, when we picked out the wire I thought we were getting something smaller but somehow we ended up getting a thicker gauge. by second source do you mean relays or what do you have in mind? relays were an idea but honestly the wiring was a one night project and time was ticking so we had to ditch the relays for the time being. something like that is in the near future though.

your light system was the inspiration for this one. we were offroading one night at cleghorn and discussing possible senior project ideas for my fiance. she needed something that covered a lot of technical areas and then we both thought that making something similar to your product would be very cool. so hats off to you for the inspiration. we both really thought your design is very nice as weve seen it on Todd's truck a few times.

rider77 · 06-03-2009, 09:13 AM

Quote:

sealevel previously said:

Very cool, nice work!

thank you!

Quote:

Toledo FJ previously said:

Does your girl have any cute sisters with fab skills?

no sisters or girl friends for that matter...as you probably know the engineering field is mainly composed of guys so pretty much all her firends are guys. that would be pretty cool though to have an all female fab shop. seems like a new show for the discovery channel or something, lol.

Quote:

FJC8871 previously said:

Yes group buy. She is a keeper. Keep her!! Very cool and impressive senior project!

thanks again, ill keep on passing the kind words to her. shes been looking at this post. and yes, we are getting married this June.

Quote:

FJNewb previously said:

Glad you posted this up. I was looking into making this for my FJ and possibly selling some setups as well. This product could be made relatively cheaply if you ditched the electric actuator and used a different motor and support meachnism to raise the lights. I already have a motor spec'd out for this which is less than $10. I hadn't planned on making the lights rotate but now it is something I might have to look into....time to break out the old controls book which I haven't looked at for a year or two

glad this project could help get you motivated again to build something and be creative. I love sharing on this forum because it sparks interest in so many other people to be creative. several designs were reviewed but the actuators were chosen for simplicity in this case. a screw jack system was also in review with an electric motor.

Quote:

JoeUser previously said:

It's always fun to see new mods, and kudos to your fiance for a great job!

thank you, glad you liked it!

ducky · 06-03-2009, 12:28 PM

so ~$500... not too bad then. I think I might give it a try. Any news on waterproof-ability?

My other idea is using SS linear air actuators. I have them spec'd from work, and all I need is to hook them up to my trusty co2 tank. Course I wont have fine rotation control like the electric.

MIKESCRUISER · 06-03-2009, 01:10 PM

wow, thats awesome.

rider77 · 06-03-2009, 01:46 PM

Quote:

ducky previously said:

so ~$500... not too bad then. I think I might give it a try. Any news on waterproof-ability?

My other idea is using SS linear air actuators. I have them spec'd from work, and all I need is to hook them up to my trusty co2 tank. Course I wont have fine rotation control like the electric.

the actuators themselves are all weather sealed from the factory. the lights are sealed fairly well from KC and all raw metal has been powder coated. the bearings are also sealed with very nice phil web bicycle grease (its like blue taffy). the only thing im concerned with wearing due to weather is the heim joints and eventually over time the bearings. they arent too expensive to replace though.

my experience with air powered type actuators is that they move way to fast for something like this. the linear actuators here are just the perfect speed. an electric motor hooked up to a screw actuator would work well but screw actuators arent good with dirt.

ducky · 06-03-2009, 02:35 PM

If thats the case, Im definately going to have to give them a look again. Weatherproofing for the electrical stuff is my main concern cause I can always machine aluminum or ss joints. Looks very nice and I really like that you dont have many greased parts to leak on the roof.

**Lucrum** · 06-04-2009, 09:21 AM

Quote:

rider77 previously said:

ya, when we picked out the wire I thought we were getting something smaller but somehow we ended up getting a thicker gauge. by second source do you mean relays or what do you have in mind? relays were an idea but honestly the wiring was a one night project and time was ticking so we had to ditch the relays for the time being. something like that is in the near future though.

your light system was the inspiration for this one. we were offroading one night at cleghorn and discussing possible senior project ideas for my fiance. she needed something that covered a lot of technical areas and then we both thought that making something similar to your product would be very cool. so hats off to you for the inspiration. we both really thought your design is very nice as weve seen it on Todd's truck a few times.

thanks so much. Yeah you could go with relays which are really easy and reliable or if you want to go more complex you can have a board printed and
go full blown. Either way it will allow you to only need the power wire already at the roof for the lights and controls then you can step down to some 24GA wires to tuck next to it for your switches with no other runs. Sorry don't mean to pick anything apart, just think your project is fun and like this stuff. Way to go.