This is by far one of the coolest electrical mods I've heard of... I may have to look into doing a zoned LED system based on my stereos equalizer... 
Can't wait to see how yours turns out!
Can't wait to see how yours turns out!
Microcontroller controlled lighting system.
My newest project: Arduino controlled led system.
I'm cross posting this on a few sites so please let me know if something doesn't make sense.
Arduino is an open-source electronics prototyping platform, designed to make the process of using electronics in multidisciplinary projects more accessible. The hardware consists of a simple open hardware design for the Arduino board with an Atmel AVR processor and on-board I/O support. The software consists of a standard programming language and the boot loader that runs on the board.
What I am hoping to accomplish is a multi "zoned" led system for my car.
I participate in various things that allow me to use warning lights on my vehicle, some things are for a local government agency and some is for other things that involve police escorts. Currently I have a cheap led flasher from China that I bought off of ebay before the foreign sellers started jacking their shipping charges. The flasher came with 2 sets of lights with each set having 3 pods of 3 leds. The flasher has 3 patterns, mode A is side 1 flashes 4x then side 2 flashes 4x, mode B is alternating flash (1,2,1,2,1,2,1,2,1,2,1,2…..), mode C is both sides at the same time. These leds are amber and are mounted in the rear window. Since getting the flasher I have added some white led strips in the grill and tied them into the wires for the other lights.
So I don't have many lights and would like to add more. But real warning leds are expensive and I don't have a few hundred to drop into that. What I would like to do is have an arduino control all the leds around the car independently. Attached is a map of the different "zones" that I would like to control. The front and rear have two zones so the leds can have alternating flash patterns.
There are a few goals I have for this project to be able to do.
1. Individual zone control. (on, off, strobe, etc…
2. Preset patterns or modes. (zones 11+12 alternate, zones 21,22,23,24 on, etc…
3. Use a LCD display to scroll through the zones and modes.
Bonus Goals!!
4. Use RGB leds and control each color channel in the zones.
5. Have an additional zone for a traffic advisor (arrow stick).
Light zone map. Zone 24 would be the cargo area.
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Possible RGB Leds to use. Each led has a chip which makes each led individually addressable with only using 2 pins from the arduino for the whole strand.
http://www.adafruit.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=37&products_id=307
I was going to use a playstation controller joystick for navigation of the menu, but I recently saw that someone has figured out a library for a wii nun-chuck so I can use the joystick, button, and accelerometers with only 2 pins and power.
My whole deal with the number of pins I use is because the Arduino only has so many output pins and the less I use for somethings means the more zones I can have without getting into shift registers, which is a bit over my head atm.
I'm cross posting this on a few sites so please let me know if something doesn't make sense.
Arduino is an open-source electronics prototyping platform, designed to make the process of using electronics in multidisciplinary projects more accessible. The hardware consists of a simple open hardware design for the Arduino board with an Atmel AVR processor and on-board I/O support. The software consists of a standard programming language and the boot loader that runs on the board.
What I am hoping to accomplish is a multi "zoned" led system for my car.
I participate in various things that allow me to use warning lights on my vehicle, some things are for a local government agency and some is for other things that involve police escorts. Currently I have a cheap led flasher from China that I bought off of ebay before the foreign sellers started jacking their shipping charges. The flasher came with 2 sets of lights with each set having 3 pods of 3 leds. The flasher has 3 patterns, mode A is side 1 flashes 4x then side 2 flashes 4x, mode B is alternating flash (1,2,1,2,1,2,1,2,1,2,1,2…..), mode C is both sides at the same time. These leds are amber and are mounted in the rear window. Since getting the flasher I have added some white led strips in the grill and tied them into the wires for the other lights.
So I don't have many lights and would like to add more. But real warning leds are expensive and I don't have a few hundred to drop into that. What I would like to do is have an arduino control all the leds around the car independently. Attached is a map of the different "zones" that I would like to control. The front and rear have two zones so the leds can have alternating flash patterns.
There are a few goals I have for this project to be able to do.
1. Individual zone control. (on, off, strobe, etc…
2. Preset patterns or modes. (zones 11+12 alternate, zones 21,22,23,24 on, etc…
3. Use a LCD display to scroll through the zones and modes.
Bonus Goals!!
4. Use RGB leds and control each color channel in the zones.
5. Have an additional zone for a traffic advisor (arrow stick).
Light zone map. Zone 24 would be the cargo area.
Possible RGB Leds to use. Each led has a chip which makes each led individually addressable with only using 2 pins from the arduino for the whole strand.
http://www.adafruit.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=37&products_id=307
I was going to use a playstation controller joystick for navigation of the menu, but I recently saw that someone has figured out a library for a wii nun-chuck so I can use the joystick, button, and accelerometers with only 2 pins and power.
My whole deal with the number of pins I use is because the Arduino only has so many output pins and the less I use for somethings means the more zones I can have without getting into shift registers, which is a bit over my head atm.
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