Regulator/Rectifiers?

Also, the lit headlight, or two, in the case of the Striple, actually
tends to make it harder for folk to judge the speed and distance of the
blaze of light.

The Striple comes with a fairly small battery, and, when "fiddling" with
the mapping in the ECU, you want the ignition switched on, but the
engine not running, so you run the risk of flattening the battery.

On trackdays, I'd prefer to tape up my headlights, but, if they are on,
they'll bake the tape onto the glass.

BTW, on the BMW, which I got the on/off switch for, my standard daytime
running is side lights on, and a pair of small, 35 watt, "running
lights" also switched on. They are visible, but not too bright, and
they present something different from most motorcycles on the road.

regards,
CrazyCam

 

In aus.motorcycles on Sun, 28 Nov 2010 08:40:50 +1100

You could find some of the clear vinyl/plastic designed to adhere to
headlights as protectors? Then paint it... put it on for track days,
take it off for normal riding.

I got a universal kit - meaning a chunk of the stuff, cut it yourself
- from MCA from memory.

Zebee

 

I run one white headlight, one yellow headlight for the same reason.

 

To be fair to Triumph, their previous electrical knowhow came from Joe
Lucas.

Theo

 

The old power supplies using a 'past' or series regulation absorbed all the
power and what wasn't used went to the air as heat. This is terribly
inefficient as a 500 watt power supply from which you drew 50 watts
generated 450 watts of heat, enough to keep a small room warm.

Phase mod power supplies monitor the current draw and turn off the input
power at the appropriate height of the input sine wave, turning it on again
at the zero voltage cross point.

Try http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pulse-width_modulation This shows input
power control of an AC motor but the principle is the same when applied to
power supplies. Basically you only allow a part of the input sine wave
through the regulator to become your output power.

Theo

 

Is that legal? I understand that her in Oz, yellow used to be the colour for
fog lights and it is illegal to have fog lights on in WA when there is no
fog $200-400 fine.

Theo

 

Don't know for sure. This bulb came out of a grey-import bike and I've seen
similar grey-import cars with the coloured headlights.
The grey-import bike was inspected and plated with the bulb in it and this
bike was inspected and un-written-off with the yellow/white combination
headlights but I don't expect any of that would matter to a cop (or a
court).

A quick look at the Qld Transport website says that bulbs must be marked as
complying with European ECE37 standard (generally just a large E) for post
1991 vehicles so I really doubt my '80s vintage Jap bulb is gonna' be legal.
Damn!

Thanks Theo.

 

European fog lights used to be yellow as did all head lights in France. They
eventually all agreed that all lights to the front of a vehicle will be
white (except for the indicators) This was after 1970 but definitely before
1991.

OTOH my 1967 Mercedes has yellow fog lights, but they are only legal because
it came with them. Once I get Historic tags, it ceases to be a problem
anyway.

Theo

 

Nope

 

Sorry; the 1991 bit is in our ADR (51 I think). All Australian-regod bikes
post 1991 must have the E headlight bulbs.
It made no mention of when ECE37 came in. (a Google hit suggests 1982)

 

Ah...yes.....Joe Lucas
The Prince Of Darkness

 

Odd I thought that bloke was from some tiny little mid eastern euro
country rather than pomigolia

 

To be totally fair to Lucas, their stuff really was shit. The only thing
that saved them was being bought out by Bosch.

Theo

 

Considering how long Lucas was around they successfully filled a niche
for decades , bosch wasn't perfect either being generally more
complicated and costing more and even breaking down occasionally . I
still use some of the Lucas magneto's on the trumpy and bsa and they
perform ferpectly , it's just the generators that have internal wind
causing the odd flicker when it rains in the next county

 

Internal wind? Doesn't something have internal wind because it is full of
shit?

Theo

 

My old Trump 500 speed twin had Lucas electrics and was always breaking down
the Matchy 500 twin also broke down fairly regularly and the Matchy 650,
they both have Lucas electrics and kept me on the side of the road more than
a dozen times.
The Vincent breaks down quite often.
I reckon I kept Neil Mann in food over the years
The Honda on the other hand, never broke down electrically

 

I thought that Lucas bought out Bosch when it was named CAV-Bosch during the
1930's

 

I have no experience with Lucas motorcycle electrics but I know the
Australian-build Datsun 1600s had Lucas alternators and distributors and
they were pretty awful.
The popular fix was to get an early model (or wagon or 180B wagon or
SSS) Hitachi unit (or an aftermarket Bosch).

 

Looks like my story was incorrect. Lucas merged wit Varity in 96 and died in
1999. The name and logo were acquired by Elta Lighting from TRW in 2004 and
is used on some of their products.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LucasVarity

Theo

 

I was wrong George. Lucas bought out Bosch shares of CAV in 1937. Lucas and
Robert Bosch remained separate companies until 1999, when Lucas died as a
company. The Logo and brand name live on as products of Elta Lighting, who
bought the logo from the then owners, TRW, in 2004.

Theo