Givi V46 LED Brake/tail lights

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Fred H.

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I was bored today (too hot to ride) so I went out the garage and made up some taillights for my new Givi out of some sample LEDs Lumex sent me.

(Full photo gallery here: https://www.pbase.com/fredharmon/giviv46 )

They worked out pretty nice. I used a Jumbo 5000mcd from Radio Shack (groan) for the tail lights, surrounded by two Lumex 3500 mcd on either side for the brake lights. The Lumex are actually much brighter and have a wider viewing angle than the Radio shack, which is why they are used for the brakes, as they would be way too bright for the tail lights. The larger Jumbo Radio shack makes a larger footprint of light at a less intensity so these were perfect for the tail lights.

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I had to do some experimentation with an amp meter and different resistors and configurations to get the current within the spec for the LED's and adjust the brightness where I wanted them to be. I wired them in series in banks of four each as this reduced the necessary wattage for the resistor quite a bit. There is a good site for calculating resistors for LED's here if you ever need to do this:

https://metku.net/index.html?sect=view&...dcalc/index_eng

One thing you have to be careful of is not setting them to the max current/voltage drop spec, as that is not intended for steady operation. Read the spec sheet on the LED carefully and adjust the current for the normal steady state rating.

I used hot melt glue to position the LED's and bent the leads over the Givi lens assy, and solder tacked small wires on each one and then wired it up. I had to fuss with them several times to get them all aimed properly and in the same way so they weren't all off at different angles. Once I got them aimed and wired up, it all works great. I am surprised how intense these Lumex LED's are, so much so that I placed an order for more of them.

The LUMEX LED part number is SSL-LX5093SRC/E and you can order them from DigiKey for about 50 cents each. I used them in two banks of four in series with a 200 ohm resistor. You can't put all eight in series as they won't be bright enough, so you have to make two banks wired in parallel, and each bank should have it's own 200 ohm 1/4 watt or 1/2 watt resistor (1/2 watt is better).

The Radio shack Jumbo LED is Radio Shack part number 276-086. They were about $3 each (ouch!), though I suspect you could do some research on the LUMEX site and find the same thing for a lot less through DigiKey. I tried several resistor values to get the brightness/current draw I wanted (under 20mA) and finally settled on 330 ohms with 4 of these LED's in series. That gave me about 17mA. I could have reduced the resistor to about 250 ohms but that would have put the LED's near their max steady state rating of 20mA (the absolute max is 40mA). I may go back and reduce that 300 ohm rating to make them a bit brighter if they look washed out in sunlight. Another consideration is the contrast between brake and tail lights, and if you make the tail lights too bright, then you won't be able to see enough difference when the brake lights come on, so you have to compromise some on tail light brightness.

It really helps the rear visibility of the bike and works like a high mounted brake and tail light, getting the light up at more of an eye level with drivers.

Tail lights only

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Tail and brake lights (Those Lumex LED's will burn holes in your retinas)

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Thanks Fred !

BTW, what connectors did you use for the power connect/disconnect ? Any special arrangement to keep from ripping out the wires if you 'forget' to unplug before removing the V46 ?

(Edit)

Whoops, I re-read the article & saw the link for the expanded pics, question answered - Thanks again!)

(/Edit)

 
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I used a small three pin connector that I had laying around. I think I originally got them from Kennedy Electronics (www.cellset.com) a year or so ago for another project I was working in.

They had a small locking tab on them, which I filled off, so if I forget to unplug them, it will just pull apart. And yes, I had to drill a small hole in my brand new Givi, but you know what they say about breaking eggs to make an omlet. I used my Excaliber drill, which if taken out of the tool box, can not be returned until it has bored a hole in something expensive.

Any good three pin connector will work. I am now thinking about adding turn lights to the Givi side panels, and if I do, I will need to find a 5 pin connector. A mini DIN connector might be a good option (like used on headsets).

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Wow, great write up Fred. Nice job. I plan to try to do the same to my V46 now that I know what LED's to get. I have the Givi brake light kit for the V46, maybe I'll see if I can just add new LED's to it. Thanks for the detailed information, as usual it is right on.

Rick

 
Wow, great write up Fred. Nice job. I plan to try to do the same to my V46 now that I know what LED's to get. I have the Givi brake light kit for the V46, maybe I'll see if I can just add new LED's to it. Thanks for the detailed information, as usual it is right on.Rick
Just curious, what does the Givi brake light kit look like and what kind of connector does it use? Could you post a photo of it?

 
Fred, I'll post a pic later tonight or tomorrow. It has a unique connector that mounts on the bottom of the V46 and on the mounting plate so when you take off the box it just comes apart. Sort of like a slide connection. It doesn't look like it would be a good , long term connection. That's why I have had the light kit for a while and have not installed it yet. I think your idea is better.

 
heres a few photos of the Givi brake light kit.

https://i78.photobucket.com/albums/j116/rickpat_photos/flowertatooGivibrakelight020.jpg[/URL]][URL="https://i78.photobucket.com/albums/j116/rickpat_photos/flowertatooGivibrakelight020.jpg"]https://i78.photobucket.com/albums/j116/rickpat_photos/flowertatooGivibrakelight020.jpg[/URL]

flowertatooGivibrakelight021.jpg


flowertatooGivibrakelight020.jpg


 
Thanks for the photos. Since I only see two contacts, I assume that is only a brake light, and not a tail light.

In addition to my home-made light kit there are probably some other better options that will require less work. For example, here is a bulb that looks like it would fit in there, all you would need to do is put in 4 sockets for them with 4 bulbs ($6.99 each). In addition to it requiring less wiring and soldering, it should already have the resistor in it, so you should just be able to wire it straight up.

https://www.superbrightleds.com/specs/7443.htm

https://www.superbrightleds.com/specs/3156_57_specs.htm

I am sure if you looked around you could find other options too. You probably could easily modify your existing Givi light kit to make it brighter by simply replacing the bulbs with brighter ones.

 
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Very nice! I was thinking if I had it to do over again I would not have bothered with the Givi light kit. Too wimpy.

 
Fred that is awesome... Any chance you'll work up a schematic for this?

Hell, you should buy that front Givi piece, make em up and sell em. :D

-MD

 
I modified it and added two more LED's in each segment for the brake lights, and now it is even brighter.

 
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I have designed and fabricated a circuit board with the LED's installed on it that will fit into the Givi V46. I have considered making them and selling them, but they are very labor intensive, and I don't know if it will be worth my while to do. Just this one took me over 6 hours, and the layout and design took at least another 15 plus I had to buy about $150 worth of tools and parts.

But anyway, here is the finished product. If you think you might want me to make one for you let me know. I might make a few of them first and see how it goes.

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I am going to make 5 initial test units that will be for sale for $80 to see if I can make this work. See the Vendor board for details.

I don't know if I will make any more after this first five or not. It will depend on how it works out.

 
Fred, is there a good reason not to just buy a led light bar and stick it up in there? I don't have the Givi...I have a Hepco box, a similar reflector. I'd thought I'd just get a couple of those 5-led bars I see advertised and splice into the brake/tail light wiring harness, until I saw your wonderfully elaborate, ingenious design.

Or will I end up burning the bike down?

 
Fred, is there a good reason not to just buy a led light bar and stick it up in there? I don't have the Givi...I have a Hepco box, a similar reflector. I'd thought I'd just get a couple of those 5-led bars I see advertised and splice into the brake/tail light wiring harness, until I saw your wonderfully elaborate, ingenious design.
Or will I end up burning the bike down?
That will work, but there are a couple drawbacks. First off, many of those cheap LED bars don't use real high intensity LED's to begin with. I am using some of the latest technology in LED's that are extremely bright.

Second, with the Givi box, the LED's have to be very precisely aligned with the four holes in the reflector plate or they won't do any good.

I don't know anything about the Hepco box, so you are on your own there. This part I am working on will ONLY FIT THE GIVI V46.

As you can see from these photos, the LED circuit I am making aligns the LED's with the existing red reflectors already built into the Givi V46.

Tail Lights On

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Brake Lights on

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Side view, tailights only

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Fred, I think ~$80 is a fair price for this significant upgrade to what Givi offers. The crappy part as you pointed out is it's very box specific. (v46)

If you need some help assembling a few (now that it seems you put together a 'kit') let me know, I'll see what I can do.

-MD

 

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