Rigid Industries Dually LED Lights

[mac]

Installed, minus the IQ-170. The IQ-170 is supposed to modulate the ground leg of the circuit, but the housing and mount of the Duallies are grounded, so the circuit shorts to ground, bypassing the IQ-170. I've emailed Skene Designs to see if there's a way to use the IQ-170 in the +12V side of the circuit instead, otherwise I'll have to find a way to isolate the lamps from the chassis, which isn't possible where I've got them mounted now (the top caliper mounting bolt).

ADVmonster.com sells a "lamp one" fork mount light bracket that replaces the M6 bolts for the reflector on the K bikes.

I think with that mount i could possibly electrically isolate the lamps. That'll have to be the next move I think. I was trying to avoid spending the $60 for that kit though.

Time for a night ride with the night blasters. If you're around Cambridge, get out yer sunglasses.

[mac]

Super quick response from Jerry Skene.  No joy on using the IQ-170 in the +12V leg. Fork mount brackets ordered.

[mac]

Install done (for now). Needed to electrically isolate the duallies to allow the IQ-170 to switch the ground leg of the circuit. Without isolating the lamps, they short to ground and go to full brightness all the time.

Here's how I did it.

I used:

• "lamp one" reflector-mount aux light brackets from advmonster.com
• 2 M6 bolts
• 2 M6 nylon lock nuts
• 4 M6 washers
• 6 1/4" nylon washers
• heat-shrink tube (i think mine was 3/8" or 1/2")

First, I put one of the M6 washers onto the M6 bolt, then a 1/2" long or so piece of heat shrink tube, shrunk in place like so:


Then nylon washer, then dually, then nylon washer, then "lamp one" bracket, then nylon washer, then M6 washer, then nylon lock bolt!


It occurred to me that the bottommost nylon washer isn't strictly necessary since the rest of the bolt is insulated, but I went with it anyway.

Here's what they look like on the brackets from advmonster:


The IQ-170 works great. I can now point my duallies higher without blinding oncoming traffic.

The advmonster brackets are a bit too springy for my taste with the big, relatively heavy duallys.

Another option that I could look into would be to take the lamps apart and try to internally isolate the housing from the ground side of the circuit. Then I could just bolt them right back on to the brake caliper bolts, a much more solid mount, and a mounting position I liked much better aesthetically(below).

[mac]

Update: one of my LampOne brackets broke from fatigue.  Didn't last long.

Plus, one day I parked the bike after a rainy ride and noticed that one of the two lamps was flickering on briefly every few seconds. After racking my brain for a while, I realized that the cause was probably a very weak short to ground caused by the water, that was allowing a little bit of current to trickle through until the voltage regulation circuit in the lamps built up enough charge to flash the lamps.

So I can't recommend the approach I took. I'm now looking at internally isolating the lamps again.
Calling all eggheads (wmax, thats you) that want to help out with that issue: I've started a  stackexchange question on how to provide electrical isolation while still allowing the heat to get out.

[mac]

Rats. damaged the PCB while trying to remove a stripped mounting screw. Knocked a capacitor off.

Called Rigid Industries hoping they could sell me just a PCB. No dice. Also, of note, learned that any vendors selling Rigid Industries products on Amazon (where I got mine) are in violation of Rigid's distributor terms.

They wouldn't offer me discounted pricing on a single lamp. Also, opening the face of the lamp as I've done voids the warranty. I kinda figured this was the case, but oh well.

[mac]

I was able to get the tiny surface-mounted capacitor back in place on the PCB, and finished the job of insulating the back of the aluminum PCB with kapton tape. The lights are back on the brake caliper bolts now, and so far, everything is working perfectly.

[TimTyler]

Check Massachusetts laws about driving light height boundaries before you get started.

My experience with the Dually's is that the beam will will be too bright to oncoming traffic if mounted that low, unless you're aiming them down at the road 6 feet in front of the bike.

[mac]

I may be running afoul of the regs, but my hope is that with the dimmer from Skene designs set to under 40% that it won't be so dazzling as to attract the wrong kind of attention. So far, so good.