Before I had left Castlegar, I wanted to have finished this little project of mine; however, due to unforeseen events that took priority or just made it literally impossible to work on this, I couldn’t finish everything as I had hoped. I am now home and am looking back at my creation, giving it the final word of approval.
Since most of the fabrication was rushed, and from the lack of proper tools, I’m not completely happy with the results. I had assumed that the connectors I was using were the same dimensions as the ones found in the default components library located in EAGLE; of course, a simple double-check would have killed this issue. For starters, this oversight now causes the boards to float around inside their enclosures and makes it extra challenging to disconnect any cables from them. Adding to this, the extremely rough cut-job using a Dremel has also left me unhappy with my results.
Apart from aesthetics, the units mostly function as I planned. I do keep running into issues that wouldn’t be there if I had taken my time planning this project, though. So far, I have been able to fix any problems that arise – looking at the bright side of things. I had a minor issue with a defective LED strip, but I have replaced that, and all the wiring in the vehicle has been completed. The last couple of things on the list are to confirm that the units are working as planned and mount and connect them to the vehicle; it shouldn’t be too much longer!
Optimistically thinking, these issues have saved me from another headache: interfacing with the headlight switch and emulating it. Up to this point, I have relied upon some poorly organized diagrams of how it works; however, nothing can beat a real-world test. I quickly popped out the switch and wired it up to test and visually see how it works. This switch has six functions and relies on four wires for communications; three of these behave almost like a binary switch.
When the dial is in its auto position, all three wires are disconnected. When it’s set to the power position, a single wire is grounded, completing the circuit. When the switch is moved to the parking lights selection, it switches another signal wire on. Finally, when the switch is in the low beam position, the wire that signals the parking light selection is left connected, and another wire is then also grounded. As for the brightness toggle wheel, it works by varying the amount of resistance depending on if the user is pushing up or down; this signal is then sent through a single wire to the body control module along with the other wires.
