The science of tomorrow! (Is it possible?)

[MichaelisEvolving]

So I've seen a bunch of these LED lit tiny speedometers that for the most part only give you mph on them. Some are only big enough to show that one small number.

Example: http://www.bikermart.co.uk/motoscope_mini.asp

But for anyone who has seen Knight Rider back in the day, or Tron more recently (80's is still recent in my opinion) lights were an intragal part of the vehicles.

What I want to do if it's even possible will most definitely be more expensive than its worth, but would look amazing.

I want to somehow attach whatever connects your speed with the speedometer and get rid of the speedometer. Instead get a strip of LED lights about 5 lights long like these: http://www.chromeglow.com/catalog.as...showprevnext=1

And mount it on top of the forks where the speedometer would normally be and have it so that at intervals of 25mph a light would turn on. Maybe have the first blue the second green third yellow fourth orange and the fifth red. It would look futuristic of sorts much like watches like these where only people familiar with it know how to read it: http://m.tokyoflash.com/en/watches/kisai/seven/

Once again it's unlikely it's even possible, and if it even is, the amount of money it would cost would be outrageous but anyone know enough about speedometers and their cables to know the likely hood of this?

[fredintoon]

Hi Michael,
"today's phone has more computing power than was used on the moon missions"
So yeah, any style of instrumentation you fancy is feasible and probably affordable too.
But why stop at a row of lights?
How about your visor having a HUD like on modern aircraft?
One that also flashes red when the local speed tax collectors paint you with their radar?

[MichaelisEvolving]

Hi Michael,
"today's phone has more computing power than was used on the moon missions"
So yeah, any style of instrumentation you fancy is feasible and probably affordable too.
But why stop at a row of lights?
How about your visor having a HUD like on modern aircraft?
One that also flashes red when the local speed tax collectors paint you with their radar?

Have you heard of Skully Helmets? Theirs has a HUD that incorporates gps and has speakers so Siri tells you when to turn as well as a camera in the back of the helmet so you don't have to turn around to see behind you. Among other things. But they cost mad money.

http://www.skullysystems.com/#home

[Jerry]

Mechanical speedometers use a worm gear that is powered through the speedo cable by the drive which is mounted on the front axle. The worm gear turns a shaft that is attached to a spring. (The faster the worm gear spins the more the spring is loaded.) The indicator needle is attached to another shaft attached to this spring. Calibrating a speedo means calibrating the spring; this is the critical part of the assembly.

For purposes of driving an LED, you would need to look at getting a vehicle speed sensor (oss, output speed sensor) and attaching it to the speedo cable. A typical Ford oss has these specs:

Output voltage will vary with speed from a minimum of 0.5 volts AC at 25 RPM to 200 volts AC at 1728 RPM. (Based on a transmission shaft speed.)

I don't know what the RPM of a speedo cable is on an XS 11 but I would guess it falls in the above range.

So, once you have a signal output from the speedo cable you have some options. You could feed the output into a logic chip and power each LED from an output of the logic chip. You could use the voltage as an input into a voltage monitoring system which outputs a signal, typically into a numeric display but there may be options for other outputs. Perhaps a battery monitoring system could take the input - it would probably have to be rectified into DC and boosted to around 10v - but many RV systems use an LED readout to indicate battery charge condition by lighting up LEDs at different input voltages.

Just a couple thoughts. Interesting idea. Let us know if you proceed and what results you get.

[TopCatGr58]

I installed a cheap digital speedo cluster on mine a little while back. It involved mounting a hall sensor on the fork, drilled and mounted the magnetic trigger disc into the brake rotor, works just fine. Instead of trying to rig up something to the speedo drive cable that's going to be counting pulses/rpms, and then sends signals that have to still be interpreted by a logic chip to control the speed indicator lights....I would think having a chip to count the hall sensor pulses might be easier??? I don't know...I'm not an electronics guru. The speedo/hall sensors are also common and not too $$, but don't know what it would take to make the pulse counter, and then have it send light switching signals for specific MPH points?

And I hate to say it, but just a light for every 20 mph isn't very accurate, and probably would not pass a vehicle safety inspection...if they are required for your location.

T.C.

[MichaelisEvolving]

I installed a cheap digital speedo cluster on mine a little while back. It involved mounting a hall sensor on the fork, drilled and mounted the magnetic trigger disc into the brake rotor, works just fine. Instead of trying to rig up something to the speedo drive cable that's going to be counting pulses/rpms, and then sends signals that have to still be interpreted by a logic chip to control the speed indicator lights....I would think having a chip to count the hall sensor pulses might be easier??? I don't know...I'm not an electronics guru. The speedo/hall sensors are also common and not too $$, but don't know what it would take to make the pulse counter, and then have it send light switching signals for specific MPH points?

And I hate to say it, but just a light for every 20 mph isn't very accurate, and probably would not pass a vehicle safety inspection...if they are required for your location.

T.C.

Luckily for me I don't even have to have a speedometer or tachometer. So when it comes to that it's fine, I'm going more for looks and to have some sense of how fast I'm going so I can try and obey speed limits.

[MichaelisEvolving]

I installed a cheap digital speedo cluster on mine a little while back. It involved mounting a hall sensor on the fork, drilled and mounted the magnetic trigger disc into the brake rotor, works just fine. Instead of trying to rig up something to the speedo drive cable that's going to be counting pulses/rpms, and then sends signals that have to still be interpreted by a logic chip to control the speed indicator lights....I would think having a chip to count the hall sensor pulses might be easier??? I don't know...I'm not an electronics guru. The speedo/hall sensors are also common and not too $$, but don't know what it would take to make the pulse counter, and then have it send light switching signals for specific MPH points?

And I hate to say it, but just a light for every 20 mph isn't very accurate, and probably would not pass a vehicle safety inspection...if they are required for your location.

T.C.

I like your idea though. Essentially if I can figure out how to convert the pulse counter into a light signature at certain intervals this may be the way to go.

[LoHo]

How about a mini EMP that disables cars making a left turn? Or sharks with frickin' lasers....