2twin350s Posted October 2, 2005 Report Share Posted October 2, 2005 (edited) just got my light from billet banshee off ebay. put it on friday. it fits and looks nice. fired it up and worked great. saturday, pushed bike out of garage and fired it up and not even riding it ,1 lite burnt out and theft side lights are pulsing and gettin dim.he says 60 day warranty and that is fine, but for the time and money it takes to send it back i will just ask him for bulbs to fix it myself, or i will go get some bulbs and fix it. just wanted to let you know. the housing looks great and i should be able to just reuse that with some better quality bulbs. Edited October 2, 2005 by 2twin350s Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chris642 Posted October 3, 2005 Report Share Posted October 3, 2005 no shit?? same thing happened to me, tried to contact billet banshee, no returned emailes, i just said screw it becasue 3 out of the 6 worked. mine blew out 5 seconds after i started it, looks nice though. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
2twin350s Posted October 3, 2005 Author Report Share Posted October 3, 2005 yeah what the hell? i will just rebuild the thing right.i heard some of you had a problem with em,so i took a chance.i will go get some leds at radio shack and repair myself Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bansh88 Posted October 4, 2005 Report Share Posted October 4, 2005 Didnt I tell you guys to go with Radlites?! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bigboybanshee Posted October 4, 2005 Report Share Posted October 4, 2005 I got two billet LED taillights (450 and banshee) and have had no problems out of either of them. Are you guys sure you had the polarity correct when hooking them up? I heard reversing the polarity even just for a second will mess up the LED's Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Justintoxicated Posted October 4, 2005 Report Share Posted October 4, 2005 (edited) I got two billet LED taillights (450 and banshee) and have had no problems out of either of them. Are you guys sure you had the polarity correct when hooking them up? I heard reversing the polarity even just for a second will mess up the LED's 422691[/snapback] Ok here is the problem with runing LED's on a banshee. The Banshee is Variable AC power. LED's really prefer DC power. In fact they only really work on DC power... Due to the fact that Voltage is variable, frequency is variable and voltage is AC, Typical LED's are not well suited for a shee without some kind of simple circuit. Radlites are probably 12V LED's not 2-3V LED"s wired for 12V, that is what makes them more resistant to death when voltage spikes on the banshee. on a typical LED a 1 volt increase drasticaly increase the amount of currnet consumed, on a 12V LED a 1 volt increase would not likely raise the current as much. (in this case) since Power=Voltage x Amps. When an LED is fed more voltage the curent also increases! so at double the voltage you would likely also be feeding nearly double the current to the LED! so if you had a 3V spike to a 3V LED it would likely also be recieving 2x the current. a 3V spike to a 12 V LED it would likely recieve an extra 1/4th current. for example 3V*30ma = .09 watts becomes 6V*60ma = .36 watts and 12V*.75ma = .09 watts becomes 15V*1 ma = .15 watts (not nealy overpowerd as much by a voltage spike) Still not really true, as in 2x the voltage does not necessarily mean 2x the current...This is simply an example to understand the basics. And to also explain why resistors are NOT well suited for regulating power or current on a bike like a banshee. Edited October 4, 2005 by Justintoxicated Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chris642 Posted October 5, 2005 Report Share Posted October 5, 2005 Didnt I tell you guys to go with Radlites?! 422663[/snapback] maybe i would of if you had told me last year when i bought the damn thing Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
2twin350s Posted October 5, 2005 Author Report Share Posted October 5, 2005 no i had polarity correct. led stands for light emitting diode. a diode is a one way voltage passing resistor. i am aware of how to install correctly. the stinkin thing just has cheap bulbs. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Drakaar Posted October 5, 2005 Report Share Posted October 5, 2005 What color were the led lights that blew up? I have a red one and a blue one, the blue one went pop after about 15 minutes but the red one is still good. right 3 bulbs went on the blue one....... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Justintoxicated Posted October 5, 2005 Report Share Posted October 5, 2005 (edited) no i had polarity correct. led stands for light emitting diode. a diode is a one way voltage passing resistor. i am aware of how to install correctly. the stinkin thing just has cheap bulbs. 423082[/snapback] Cheap LED's last a very long time...If properly setup, which I highly doubt was done for this taillight. Unless the guy provided a rectifier and current limitnig resistor. your missing my point....There is NO polarity on a banshee...Banshee is AC there is no + and - unless you have converted to DC...Yes the wires are marked this way (black and blue), but it is AC, and AC power is Alaternating current so there is NO polarity as it alternates back and fourth betweent eh 2 wires... you can flip the wires and it will do EXACTLY the same thing... Some LED's don't like their polarity to be reversed especialy if overdriven. Heres the deal... The right 3 LED's went because theya re wired in series. So if the first one poped the next 2 go out. Mount Blue LED's are around 3 to 3.5V, so you add them together. 3.5x3 = 12.5V your banshee often pueshes over 12V do to being AC and not as much voltage loss as from a rectifier... All the shee has is a voltage regulator, but it will spike as high as 14.4V. or maybe the red are 3.5V LED's and the Blue are 3V... Then the reds are only being slightly overdriven while the blues are way overdriven...They would need a resistor to drop the volts. something like a 100 ohms shoudl do the trick.. if you don't want to do it the proper way...make sure the resistor goes on whichever wire (does not matter cause AC power) that is connected to the LED's + side. Edited October 5, 2005 by Justintoxicated Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
2twin350s Posted October 5, 2005 Author Report Share Posted October 5, 2005 (edited) yes mine are blue. i have haerd that the red ones are better. and justintoxicated i get what you are saying, but do to the fact that i never revved the bike at all, i dont think spiking is the issue,i started it and was good the first time and next day started it and bam. the one bulb is really dim and tyhe 2 next to it are flickering. i just think they are cheap bulbs, however, i will bring home my fluke 88 and do a min max voltage spike test to see. Edited October 5, 2005 by 2twin350s Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Justintoxicated Posted October 5, 2005 Report Share Posted October 5, 2005 they all should flicker at idle because the AC Frequency is related to the revolutions of the flywheel which is related to RPM. Yea they might just be cheap, radioshack chargers a fortune for Blue LED's I would look elsewhere! Thanks for the pic... BTW is there a backplate on that tail light? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sandman Posted October 5, 2005 Report Share Posted October 5, 2005 I actually just purchased one of these lights (blue) off ebay from billet banshee However I haven't installed it yet. I think what I will do if I run into the same prob. you're having is mount just the center piece under the gas tank to illuminate the motor (polished) that way it won't necessarily matter if 1 or 2 bulbs go out since you won't be able to directly see them. (big pimpin) Just a thought. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
2twin350s Posted October 6, 2005 Author Report Share Posted October 6, 2005 they all should flicker at idle because the AC Frequency is related to the revolutions of the flywheel which is related to RPM. Yea they might just be cheap, radioshack chargers a fortune for Blue LED's I would look elsewhere! Thanks for the pic... BTW is there a backplate on that tail light? 423372[/snapback] yeah when i got them on, they did not flicker at all. then like i said next day i started it and they were acting up. only the left 3 flicker. and yes,there are 2 allen bolts to get access into the housing and bulbs.like i said,the housing looks good,with the lites off.lol Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Justintoxicated Posted October 7, 2005 Report Share Posted October 7, 2005 (edited) yeah when i got them on, they did not flicker at all. then like i said next day i started it and they were acting up. only the left 3 flicker. and yes,there are 2 allen bolts to get access into the housing and bulbs.like i said,the housing looks good,with the lites off.lol 423655[/snapback] I'm thinking about picking one up to do some modifications to it....My friends will hate me if I change from 2 to 5 of those 1 watt LED's though! OUCH! Holes would need to be drilled considerably larger though! lol 5 LED's is an odd number he either has them all in series (in which case it is not likely they would be very bright or blow up or he has some strange parallel configuration with a resistor.... if they are 3V LED's in series they should handle anything the banshee can throw at them, but it is likely they would not be very bright at idle. Can you post pics of the housing? If you get a chance? I'm interesting in purchasing one for modding purposes, I would of course add on to the circuit I already have to run 2 of the LED's properly and replace a couple of them with My own LED's for a HUGE improvement.... I really jsut need a host I don't give a rats ass about the LEDs...how much was it? Thanks! Edited October 7, 2005 by Justintoxicated Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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