Idea into a reality??

This may have been better posted in the cafe but it is LED related so I will try here.
I notice many great members here who are trying to do there own thing by developing new ideas and products.
I am sure that people like Mr.Gransee started out with only an idea and a little cash.Now look at what he has made of himself.Then you got others who are on the verge of breaking out any day with some new product.
I think this keeps this market healthy and there is a definate place for new versions on this fastly moving market of LED lights.
I do not have the skill to make a new design but I do have a lot of very functional ideas.One in particular that I am thinking on and would like any suggestions how a normal person turns an idea into a working product?
I think it is often normal tinkerers and gadget lovers that the bigger companies get a lot of their ideas from.I have read that many big businesses use this forum as a basis for determining what is hot and what is not.
I am trying to work out some details with some lathe workers in my area but have found out that this stuff costs a lot of money and trial and error could break the average person.
I just am curious how one would go about making a plan to develope and market a good idea.Should I keep it to myself and try on my own or should I approach investors or bigger businesses and take a chance of being drowned by their resources.
This may all be a pipe dream but it is a fact that some of the best ideas and products all started with one mans idea.
The LED is a fast growing market along with Luxeons in general.I feel that there will be many inovations in the future with many here that will put out some great products.
Just an aspiring modder here with no tools and limited experience....but you never know as anything can happen...hehe

i think an important first step is to investigate if the item hasn't been yet developed.
i had a great idea but after searching 2,5h in the patent bureau i finally found it already be patented /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/icon23.gif

i'm producing right now the prototypes of a bezelcarrier and found out that the machinery hours are VERY expensive.

also this is a very "small" idea it really costs money to bring it to reality. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/icon3.gif

marc

Robocop, an old but still very good book about this subject is "The Incredible Secret Money Machine" by Don Lancaster. His somewhat frenetic websites is at www.tinaja.com and I think the book is still in print (maybe there's a new edition).

R,
For what it's worth.

Ive had a number of ideas long before they became products. There is no shortage of people that have insperation. The mix is insperation and ability. For those lacking ability at least a lot of money.

Back in 84 or so, I had worked out a silent turn signal flasher for my car. It had controlable speed and on/off times. It would switch 20amp twelve volt load all year long.

Great idea, I diden't know anybody who was interested. It happened long before Al Gore invented the internet.

That gadgit morphed into a pulsed power electro plater. I built it from a hand full of parts, perhaps 30 bucks in all. My sister has it for electroplating jewlery items. To this day I have yet to see a hobby/jewlery plater that works on the same principal. It would also be a killer wet cell battery charger.

When I was playing games with people doing rude things to my radio club. Had a number of improvments to various RDF tools.

Hacked into my radio scanner to extract the 'scan stop' signal off the squelch chip. Used that to key the DF so it was only active when the rx got something over squelch limit.

Adapted a DSP notch filter to the speaker output of the Doppler DF to notch out the whine of the antennas. This way I could hear signal phase reversals and nulls better.

Made an improvised RF shield from a paint can. All kinds of little things.

Once I made an optical radio with an IR photo transistor and an audio amp. It allowed blind people to have some frame of refference for the sounds of various light sources. They got to hear a TV raster, an LED calculator MultiPlex, the sound of a head light filament from a car. All kinds of light sources.

Took it to work one day and was poking around, found out the "busy light" on the thick net network box was not just a packet detector, it was connected to the data stream, and it was spraying the packets as light pulses for a dozen feet around. Showed it to the security folks, and they had a heck of an anal pucker. After three days it was decided since no classified documents went over that network, it diden't matter if the busy lights sprayed the packets. The stuff you find in the world from people saving steps and effort.

If you have an idea and want to see it developed, small companies are the way to go.

Before I took this job I was working for a place that made exotic radio for the NBC (Nuclear Biological and Chemical) industry. Very often when we needed a feature, we invented it on the spot. No big deal. You won't get wealthy but your stuff will get built. You also get to be the worlds only expert on it.

While there I worked out a few things.
An RF radiation test fixture for swiss watch consistant settings of the receivers and transmitters.

Subtle internal improvments to prevent self generated RFI.

Various external boxes to add sub audable tone code abilities to standard test gear.

Solid state power supply test loads.
All kinds of wacky stuff.

At this point if I had to limit my self to LED projects what comes to mind are...

After market tail lights for cars. Back home, I have an 89 Chev pick up truck. When a tail light burns out in the rain, I got to change them in a down pour. (you don't depend on Virginia drivers to see your tail gate) Not a lot of joy to be found that day.

Photographic safe light for black and white photography. Perhaps motion sensitive so that it fades when your not moving around, like during an enlargment exposure, or developing. That way it keeps the total dose down, or comes on when you enter the dark room.

Near infra red light jammer for traffic light photo cameras

Some kind of low priced, low power strobotach for measuring physical things. The xenon fired high power GenRad's are nice for examining rotating things in industry but are over kill for more civilian uses. IM thinking of observing things in the automotive, hvac, electric motor repair, all kinds of little things. Fast rise times of LED and their controled focus would make a mini hand tach a useful thing.
Perhaps some kind of a tach sync input via sound ,optical or magnetic trip, this will allow instant RPM measurments and phase adjustments to observe the whole 360 degree of rotation.

Small instruments for measuring suspended particles in air or water samples. If the beam can be focused down enough perhaps a gauge that can read the size of said particles.

A lot you can do with good optics and lights.

Later dude. Much luck
Jack Crow in Iraq

Jack Crow

Yea I seem to remember some hullabaloo about data security and those LED lights about two years ago. So much for Tempest/RFI, just pick it up off the LED. I wanna say Lockheed, but I'm probibly wrong.

GregR

cafe ideas post thread...

G,
One of the nice things about geting stuck in Northern Virginia traffic is you get to observe gizmos in action.

The TSL (Traffic Signal Light) camera I was watching took several flash photos each time a violator tripped the system. The flash it's self was not exactly white light.

In one instalation in Vienna, there is what I suspect is an Infra Red spot light to light up the sceene at night. Also I don't see the strobe light go off at night. More IR?? Let's strech some things here.

The data take or photos when shown on the tv are usually anamiated to suggest motion. But it's only three or four frames total, from two directions.

No doubt they tend to nail some people that need to be controled. In every corner where I have observed these systems in action I suspect the time for the 'yellow light' time is cut by about 2/3. Since Lockheed get's a cut from each ticket issued this makes business sence for a 'for profit' corporaton.

What I was thinking was to use a photographic strobe slave module and some flash units from disposable cameras. Then a better idea struck me. If you flash a VA licence plate it has refelective elements in it. That's why the plates in the news photos seem to glow. Inverse square law the flash so that the flash lamps are in the tail light illuminators and filter for infra red, that should grossly over expose the photo with systems flash taken from 60 feet. The ***** is going to test it.

With the advent of high power LED it should be possible to make some very hot IR LED lamps and let them shine on the plates for night time use. Normal humans won't see it, but cameras will have a bad time digesting it. Since they are not filterd for IR we win one.


Why the venom?

I don't like the idea of robots being used to shaft people.
It's a waste of technology just to have another tax on citizens.

Yeah there may be a real cop reviewing the photos before a summons is issued. There could also be a real cop on the corner to get the worst violators. His presence would detur all kinds of criminal activity. Enough rant.

Now you know more than you care to.

It's the end of the business day here in Iraq, time to go to the tent get the stuff to take a shower. Dinner at five. Watch a movie at night. What a lot of fun. Each day is ground hog day.

Be well
Jack Crow in Iraq

Document your idea very well and lock it up the documents somewhere safe. Do a patent search. If you cpme up clear build as many as you can in a years time and if it is worth the effort patent the product.

Just $0.02 from a tinkerer,
Wylie

Lot of good information and I appreciate the results.
I was just curious as I met a fellow member recently who was speaking to me about the "old days" before this entire flashlight trend really took off.
He mentioned Mr.Gransee and how he began as more of a computer guy with a few crazy ideas.Now he has one of the best EDC carry lights around and I like his business style.
They say necessity is the mother of invention and this holds true.
Look at the Quig light that was made by a police officer who saw a need for a small hands free lighting system for officers.I cant tell you how many times I have had to hold a small Photon in my mouth and write down some quick details.My point is that a normal guy saw a need and made a decent product.He was not surrounded by swarms of scientist and advisors crunching figures but just an idea and a need.
I am constantly amazed at what some of the members here can do with a lathe and an idea.
If I knew how to use a lathe I would probably never sleep and be a danger to myself...hehe.
I am going to read up on the subject and do some more searching.It just seems to me like more innovative developments are coming from modders and plain old hobby type people than the bigger companies.
Can not wait to see what 2004 holds for this field as well as the more skilled members here.
I never knew that quality lathe work cost so much.As I said I have a few friends around here in this field but few are willing to entertain my ideas as it is so costly to experiment.
Thanks again for the input and I will keep you all posted on my findings.