Long-running, useful automatic emergency lights?

I've spent many years working in public places with emergency power and lighting. The 'traditional' emergency light 'pack' is that hokey looking box with the two spotlight heads. These usually are dead, if they're OK, they only run 90minutes, and they put out two weeny spots of light. In a stairwell, that's an ok light pattern. For the rest of the place, it's lousy.

I got frustrated, and cobbled up some cold cathode fluorescent based units. These have the scrawny tube that is used in laptop LCD screens, that are small and pretty efficient. And with a Mylar sheet behind them, put out a decent, wideangle flood. JKL makes the ballast, which I slightly modified, and the lamps, tho you can get both surplus for lots less.

Runs from a wallwart, charges and maintains a SLA battery, and runs for many hours. (Two days for one of them)
Power goes out, it comes on. Start is a bit wimpy, but after a minute or so, it really cranks.

Also makes a dandy under car light, and I always take one when I'm staying in hotels.

If anyone's interested in this kind of gadget, I can post the charge/automatic circuit and pixs of a couple units.

I'm also working on an LED version of this thing, to see what it can do, now that the whites have gotten so good and so cheap. But I have to say that these have been awful handy the last few years, and I haven't seen many good commercial ones. Tho I did pick up a Chinese made coleman lantern style thing from Ebay that has radio control and power fail modes that actually gets close and is the first one besides mine I've seen with a regulated charge circuit that works..

Any thots?

Time to quit rambling..

Yours, DRS the solderin' phule.. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/crazy.gif

Hmm, I'm certainly curious. I've got a couple of the flourescent emergency fixtures in this room, one of which gets used as a semi-portable light. (Fitted with two extra switches onboard, (Mains light on, as this is a maintained fixture), which gets used to turn it on and off when it's on the shelf in the corner of the room, plugged in, and a battery kill switch - self explanitory. ALso fitted an old PC power lead input plug to the case, so that a standard power lead supplys power, so I can just pick it up and go if needed.

Not totally sure WHY I made this thing...but I was bored! And I wanted to see if I could fit all that extra stuff into the case...okay...I forgot to take into account where the starter was, and had to move it later, but I did manage.

Also changed the on charge LED out for a white one, so even when just on charge, gives out enough light to see by in the immediate area.

Interested to see what you've come up with there.

[ QUOTE ]
drs2000 said:
If anyone's interested in this kind of gadget, I can post the charge/automatic circuit and pixs of a couple units.



[/ QUOTE ]

Bring it on, Dude!

Doug Owen

Pix of my automatic emergency lights!

Ok. i've got the idea now.. Here's the pix of a couple of the lights I described. Fair warning: The smaller one's a bit of a one-off. Had a cracked screen pocket color LCD TV I bought at the flea market. Did a bit of reworking by removing most of the video stuff, and gave the unit to my blind friend so he could pick up ALL TV audio, not just VHF.

But I still had this backlight assy... A little bit of study and solder, and it's been sitting on the shelf next to the VCR for years. Power goes out, it goes on..
Runs for 4 hours or so, last time I checked. 4volt 2AH.



The little section to the right of the battery is the charge controller, status/ready LED and powerfail detector.
Runs off of a 9V DC wall wart.

Here it is running. In front are two Dorcy AAA lights. The left one stock, the right one Luxeon. And the odd bits are photocell controlled LED lights. (See the Milkycandle thread)



Here's both units together, off. The larger one has a larger bulb and a 14-18 hour runtime.



And here's with them running, no room lights.



They both light up a decent sized room well enough to navigate safely. The larger one has more light and throw, and can used for larger areas or more light in closer..

Guess I should try to get some area illumination shots soon..

Anyway, hope these were enlightening... /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif

Yours, DRS the crazed..

Re: Pix of my automatic emergency lights!

Now, that larger unit looks nice, small one's neat, but the bigger one would be really handy. Might look into sourcing some of the parts after Christmas if I get time. Any idea how much they cost to make?

Re: Pix of my automatic emergency lights!

Actually, this is neat.
I've been wondering why someone doesn't do a commercial CCFT or LED power failure light. I was thinking a little smaller, but the idea is the same. Not much light is needed to navigate by.... Maybe I'll look into making my own instead. Thanks for the idea!

Re: Pix of my automatic emergency lights!

So, cool, let's take this out for a walk as the saying goes.....

How about 'grab and go' so when you pick it up out of the rack it comes on?

If the idea is a commercial PF light, how about we put an interface in so it can be tested remotely? You know, an embedded photocell and something to interrupt the mains? It could be a wall wort deal, maybe with a phone jack on the side, the PF light plugs into......

Doug Owen

Re: Pix of my automatic emergency lights!

[ QUOTE ]
Doug Owen said:
So, cool, let's take this out for a walk as the saying goes.....

How about 'grab and go' so when you pick it up out of the rack it comes on?

If the idea is a commercial PF light, how about we put an interface in so it can be tested remotely? You know, an embedded photocell and something to interrupt the mains? It could be a wall wort deal, maybe with a phone jack on the side, the PF light plugs into......

Doug Owen

[/ QUOTE ]

Quick add: Just remembered b-4 I hit Post, that there're BSR x-10 wall warts out there, that would run the 6V version of this thing stock! (Used with that annoying X-10 X-cam as the easy way to sequence cameras. Rather than switching video, they set all cams to the same RF channel, and different X-10 channels, and turn on only one at a time.. Puuurfect... With my X-10 console, All on, All off, or any which way.. Doug you're a cheenius!!)

Ohhh. Eevvyyll thots... /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/mad.gif Powerline interface, or even BSR X-10. Set them to different addresses.. Drive people starkers!!!!!!! /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif

"Joe! Tell me that you just saw the warehouse emergency lights do the 'Wave'... Or I gotta go see the shrink!!!" /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif

I do use them as a quick 'Grab and Go' light, but using regular coaxial power jacks. The design we were talking about at work was a rack of these in the Earthquake/emergency lockers, on standby, with a white LED on 'em to locate. (The first version (not shown, out for a new batt.) had a white LED (when they first came out...) and a switch, so that, when the power went out, it would light either the LED or the tube. You can imagine the runtime at 10ma with a 6V 3AH battery..

The restrooms would have a base up on the wall at 7-8ft, with an edge lip, and a 'harness' or just a giant 'hasp' like bit that would fit over the handle and padlock.
The calcs were to illuminate a 10 stall restroom well enough to install a bag in the 'fixture', do your thing, retrieve and seal, and toss into a can. (Assumes no power, water or sewer operation) Hang these in the restrooms you want used. (Why they aren't everywhere). They'll run for 24 hours, so you can worry about other things.. (Been there, done that. Getting people out of elevators is fun and popular. )
If you need more than 24hrs, swap out either the 6v12AH batt, or grab another standby unit.

When the situation's over, collect and toss back into the rack. The current version takes about 40 hours to charge, but that's waaay tweakable. With a rack charger, just a few hours for most of a full charge.

The current plans are to issue green Cylumes to each 'user' and have them operate as above. Sounds fun, no? I think that there's supposed to be an attendant with a 2D flashlite or such, for backup.. You can see why I had a 'better' idea??? /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif

By the way, the first version was done in '98, IIRC, using an 8 year old used Panasonic SLA 6V 3.2AH. I finally had to retire the battery summer 2003. Well treated SLAs, especially starved electrolyte versions, can last a long time.

I will try to post the data on the unit, with the JSL lamps inverter(s) as reference. Most other (TDK, etc.) CCFL inverters can be tweaked the same way, and I'll dig out the current surplus houses that have lamps/inverters available cheep.. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif Either All Electronics and/or Electronic Goldmine had them last flyer/catalog.

My version will adapt to most anything between a 1 watt to 13 watt, 4v to 12v design. Charge and power fail control.
(Uses an LM317 for charge, and a single transistor for the rest. I like simple..;-)

I just remembered. The sketchbook with the original Schematic's in the car.. So after the root canal, (Tuesday), I'll give it a go..

Yours and happy holidays, DRS the crazed... /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif

Re: Pix of my automatic emergency lights!

[ QUOTE ]
Zelandeth said:
Now, that larger unit looks nice, small one's neat, but the bigger one would be really handy. Might look into sourcing some of the parts after Christmas if I get time. Any idea how much they cost to make?

[/ QUOTE ]

Oops forgot to answer this. If you go to Fry's or Jameco and buy the JKL lamp and 6v ballast, you're talking 20-30$.
Kinda steep. Surplus, tho, All Electronics I think has lamp 'new pulls' from LCDs and inverters that'd work for under $15 total, maybe $10. If ya got a dead laptop screen that still lit, (And are veeery careful! Those things are long and thin glass. Break on a whim. Mount in a resilient fashion. Two blobs of RTV works..), go for it. Laptop inverters may work, tho some are software controlled or tricky to puzzle out. One thing about a laptop inverter, tho, is that they're dimmable easily, giving you more options. Some even have the control on the inverter board.

The rest of the circuit's made from easily available parts. An LM317 in the TO202 or TO220 package. Heat sink if you want a fast charge. A couple capacitors, diodes, and a medium power transistor. Small variable pot. LED. one or more 6v small lamps, dpending on charge rate desired. A wall wart around 9VDC or AC with enuff current capacity to handle the full charge current +25%. Switch, case, battery. SLA no change or Nimh with slight changes. Lithium rechargable with more changes.

All the small bits above are $2-$5 at retail or surplus. Wall warts as found or surplus $1-2. SLAs or nicad as found. 6V 10AH SLA from your local professional alarm supplier, if they'll sell to you, about $10-15. Yuasa/Enersys good, the Panasonic version even better.

Jameco has the nice cases in the pix above. Not real cheap, but very nice. Forgot who had the Mylar film..

The handles from trashed traffic signal lamp switch paks..;-) Hardware store more traditionally. (Hey, I'm a cheap packrat. And I've got a whole airport for parts..;-)

Again, the whole mess is 'designed' to be really flexible. I've built 6 of these, no two alike, three batt voltages, 2" single to dual 8" tubes, 4 hours run to 40+, in all different cases.. And I've been collecting parts for years to build more..

Yours, DRS the crazed..

Re: Pix of my automatic emergency lights!

Been a bad drs. Took me awhile to edit and fix my schematic so that someone other than I had a chance of reading it.. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif

over on another emergency lantern thread, I've been discussing modding some of the new, cheap CCFL lights out there. the $7.77 CCFL/PR flashlight referenced here:
http://www.candlepowerforums.com/ubbthreads/showflat.php?Cat=&Board=UBB16&Number=404211&page=2&view=collapsed&sb=5&o=&fpart=1

as an example. This circuit will be modded for Nimh batts and the CCFL inverter in the $7.77 light and I'll see what results. Will post if interested.. And it works out ok..

Anyway, here's the drawing:

(If that's too small, try viewing http://www.minespot.com/cpfstuff/ccftemer.gif instead.)

And those $7.77 lights are still available..

Yours, DRS the crazed.