countersTrike

Vibration from the music on the boombox so the neighbors downstairs will not complain- that is the subject of this thread; is it not? OK, OK. I will hush up....

hotbike

The kickstand.

Rollfast

Hotbike, I have a suggestion that will allow the fairing to remain.

A CAR STEREO and small 12V sealed lead-acid batter of the type for the EXIT emergency lighting/signs found in public buildings everywhere. The hobby shop sold me a 12V wall adapter I could plug in to charge it. Since you will probaly have to place the weight FORWARD it would make good sense to store it in the fairing and to power some 12V LED or halogen (MR series) lamps. While I don't know about the possiblility of halogen car and multipurpose bulbs being phased out like the older fluorescents and iconventional incandescants the LEDs can be adapted from many existing flashlights on the market or built up by hand. Want a good taillight? Go to a motorcycle shop wity a parts yard and find one you like then mount an LED 56/57 equivalent in it.

Himt: Older analog car stereos lack clocks that drain a battery slowly and mechanical presets likewise mean no residual drain. I recommend old Kracos or Sparkomatic especially something not very powerful and 4-5 1/4" dullrange or coaxial round speakers. 4-7 or 10 watts maximum will help preserve the battery and LOW VOLUME when operating lights, if at all.

If a TANK can be incorporated into the design then you can build a battery pack for one or the other or whatever. Dont forget to make a locking watertight cover for the stereo and make a covered plugin to easily charge.

NiCad batteries BURST in freezing temperatures--DON'T USE THEM! Likewise I have no idea what NiMH cells do in those circumstances. STUDY STUDY STUDY

Good luck with your continuing lessons...it looks as if you are learning a lot as you progress.

hotbike

Well dude, I'm one step ahead of you. The bike already has lead/acid batteries, a 12v12ah on the left and a 12v7ah on the right. They are on the "shelf" under the boom box, look carefully at the pictures.

I had a 12v mr16 halogen light, but it remained attached to the fairing when I removed it, and it is now in a closet.

I am looking for 12 volt LED lights, but the local auto parts store doesn't have any. I have seen some nice things online.

hotbike

I want you to look at this link:

https://www.alibaba.com/product-gs/35...ng_lights.html

I can NOT find anything like this at the local auto parts store, but I would buy a set if they had them.

mr. doom

Here is my rig.
It is now on a trailer with four more 10" pro-speakers for a total of six 10's and 28 tweeters.

UptownJoe60640

Cool thread! I wouldn't take it to the level others have but I do have my own setup. Me and my fiance attach her iPod Shuffle to our rear bicycle rack with a bungee cord when we go to the lake. We usually drink, dance, have good conversation, and I usually enjoy a Romeo Y Julieta cigar! Good times and works perfect for what we use it for! Check out the video below. Sorry, my fiance left our bungee in her locker at work so I couldn't set it up to show you it in complete action but this will work.

hotbike

Where do you put the batteries?

Rollfast

Pilot Travel Center (truck stop chain) is where I got mine. With the phaseout and selldown of many incandescent buld mandated by federal law over the next couple years they will become quite common soon. Marker lights for semi-trailers and utility lights run mostly under 20.00, white, amber and red (any other colors are not really allowed on commercial interstate transporation vehicles, you'll get in trouble).

hotbike

You seem to forget, I live on Long Island, and L.I. is a dead zone for commercial trucking. Long Island is a "dead end", and any truck coming to Long Island has to backtrack a hundred miles before it is back on the nations interstate highway system. There are no long haul truckers living on L.I. So we have no Truck Stops, nor any suppliers of truck parts worth mentioning.

Please have another look at this link, which I gave you in reply #30:


https://www.alibaba.com/product-gs/35...ng_lights.html

This is what I want.

LED trailer lights are not available at the local auto parts stores around here. I'm waiting.

Rollfast

https://www.google.com/#sclient=psy&h...iw=770&bih=277

https://www.ioffer.com/i/12-led-light...hite-134949973

Rollfast

Don't forget that by 2013 many incandescent lamps will be banned in the US to manufacture or import, with the present stocks legal to sell until they are sold out. LEDs will be the only hoice for small applications such as stereos, flashlights and bike lights to the best of my understanding.

Why you are wanting to use Alibaba (Chinese website) instead of a US source I can't understand. You can DIY with LEDs sold in the US as easily.

hotbike

SPEAKERS PULLED FROM AN OLD IMAC (PHOTO BELOW)

Anyone know how to wire these? If I hook them up to an old 8 Ohm amplifier, will I fry them? Would they work with some kind of mp3 player?

hotbike

Now the iMac plastic is back on the bike. That boom box was a piece of crap, the radio stopped working, and then it started eating tapes. There's plenty of good music on FM radio, so I now have an old AM/FM/VHFhi radio inside the iMac fairing. The VHF hi is cool, I can hear the weather radio, and air traffic control, the new/old radio also has TV sound, but it's the old analog kind, and all I can hear is digital hash noise.

dougmc

They look like they're just standard speakers. Probably not very high power.

Cut the plugs off, connect the wires to the amp, start with the volume on low, and turn it up. Stop turning it up when they speakers start sounding bad.

You could probably wire them into a mp3 player directly without an amp, but the volume would be very low.

Really, the easiest way to make a bike stereo is to find a set of computer speakers that have 12 VDC power (that includes the amp -- you just have speakers here) and power it with a gel cell battery. You can generally find plenty of these at Goodwill or the equivalent for cheap.

Doug5150

I still don't understand why one would avoid using a tiny + lightweight music player with headphones on a bicycle, then go to the trouble of mounting a large radio and large batteries, and then never play the radio at high volumes "because it's dangerous"....

Also We Note: cassette players started out a great idea but ended up being a colossal scam: the way that most were built, they would slightly erase the tape in them each time it was played.

e-Man

I have been told just the little powered speakers I have are "dangerous", but I see them as safer than headphones because I can still hear everything going on around me. I get slightly nervous when I have to have all the windows up in my car, always afraid i will not hear emergency vehicles, lol.

On a similar but different note (no pun intended) any special music y'all like to play whilist riding, or is it just personal favorites? I got an mp3 of this song and added it to my play list for when I am out on the bike, lol: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UTlCIrflE4o

xizangstan

Ha! Not my kind of music. Try this...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3JAfnwzHcdk&NR=1

dougmc

A good stereo system can turn a bike ride into a party on wheels ...

i.e. the tape wore out? That happened to records too. And wax cylinders, and DATs and many other formats and it's hard to avoid with the technology used at the time (though somebody did make a record player (recently, long after vinyl became a niche market) that read the grooves with a laser rather than a stylus.)

(If you're claiming that the read head erased the tape when it was turned on or something, I imagine that's possible, but it would be a bad design and the vast majority of players were not designed that way.)

mwchandler21

https://gatged.com/amazing-ipod-speak...rite-bike.html

dougmc

I have this.

-- it's out of production, so might be hard to find.
-- it drains the battery even when turned off -- you have to remove the batteries (or stick some paper in there to block the contacts) or they'll be dead in a few days.
-- most importantly, it's not very loud, even at full volume. Riding in traffic, you may not be able to hear it with the volume turned up all the way. (And the sound gets crappy at full volume -- you need to back off a bit for normal use.) And that's just for the rider -- if you're looking for a party on wheels, this isn't it. (But for quiet rides by yourself, it's nice.)
-- it's not stereo (it just has one speaker.) (Not really a big problem, however.)
-- it's a tad bigger than your average water bottle. So it might fit in your holder, or might not. (It does come with it's own holder, however.)

On the plus side, it's very convenient, and the remote control is nicely done. It comes with an AC adapter that's pretty much useless (it'll let you use it inside without discharging the batteries, and will charge the iPod inside while doing this, but you didn't buy it to use inside.)

mr. doom

They mount to the rack with with the T-amp.
Car amps and head units burn up your battery as heat so a efficient amp and speakers will give you much longer run times. Look up the "Boominator" ultimate DIY boom box for information on amps/batteries/solar for this type of project. The $25 Lepai t-amp is loud enough for most people but my bike is using a $55 Shure 4x100watt chip amp.

My system is light loud and cheap, it can run off 12v or 24v and I have both the heavy SLA batteries and some cheap light cctv li-ions that are working great.
The trailer with four more 10" speakers is almost done and I will post some pictures when I figure out which lights to mount onto it.

e-Man

If I had nothing better to do, I have some 6X9's in some modified boxes that became part of my home stereo. Looks like it all fits nicely. I take it you didn't get to hear it cranked up?

freighttraininguphill

Nope, didn't get to hear it. The bike was unattended. If I could have heard it I would have recorded video.

bronson

that would be cool, but really its not safe, you cannot hear the vehicles thats passing by... just my opinion..