Battery Vent Fan Control

[RCpilot]

Got my LVD/Dump control kit from Glen Hurd friday. Nice looking board, lots of extra parts to modify all aspects of the kit. Assembled it in about an hour and had it running a fan an hour or so after that. Made a few adjustments of RX to get the hysteresis I was wanting and called the kit a success. Then, I took a wall adapter transformer and gutted it for the case. Sanded it to fit over the fan tube and made a custom label where the original label fit. It says: Glen Hurd's Fan Ventilation Control right under the "Fan On" LED, actual label is posted too. Had to give credit where credit's due! Using a hot glue gun glued the board into place with the voltage adjust pot lined up with a hole for adjustment later. I need to install it back on the battery now and set the kick on voltage to correspond to the battery beginning to gas. On the bench, it comes on at 13.62 volts and don't shut off until the voltage drops to around 13.22. That's giving a .4 volt hysteresis. Many thanks go to Glen for an excellent circuit, Priced too cheap in my opinion. He ought to be charging around twenty bucks for it and I would have still bought it at a price like that. I found a commercial fan control online and they wanted $77 for it without a fan. I have $12 in mine and it has a fan! It's totally self contained with a couple of wires exiting for connection to the battery. I'll add a small inline fuse for protection. With the fan running the entire assembly draws 90ma.  Here's a few pictures of the build.

Kelly

Here is the actual label used to glue on to the front of the control. I print these on glossy photo paper then cover the paper with clear packing tape. This gives a label that you can't tell from something factory made.

[snowcrow]

Nice neat looking job there Kelly!! I like the custom made label!!

Having the circuitry mounted on the pipe, I would pot the hole were the wires come out of the pipe and use a small cylinder fuse on the supply side, just to be safe!!

Blessings, Snow Crow

[Bruce S]

RCP;

 VERY nice :=)

That little circuit just keeps finding more & more ways be as usefull as all get out. It keeps this up and I think G- will be able to retire as a dozen Aire :-D

Cheers

Bruce S

BTW: are you for hire on those labels? of the 7/8 that I've assembled and installed most are in ugly little boxes with nothing more that a "p-touch" label on them.

[ghurd]

That came out very nice!

I like the idea of the fan running only when the battery is over a certain higher voltage.  Batteries like those won't miss 90ma while charging fast enough to bubble, IMHO.

Anything with hot glue is good.  :-P

G-

[RCpilot]

Thanks Bruce! This label only took about 1/2 hour to make, anyone can do it if you have a "Painting program" I use Paint Shop Pro and have had it ever since version 4 but I think something this simple could be done with "Paint" which comes with every version of windows there is. The trick is to size the initial image to the exact measurements of the label using a ruler scaled in .100" dimensions. Modern computers and printers are pretty accurate when it comes to inputting sizes on the PC to what comes out of the printer. Then all I did was "Flood Fill" the whole image to the blue color, switch to text mode and put in the four areas of text, guessing at where it goes. Same goes for the holes that are the lighter blue color. Printed out on regular paper first to test. It never works first time so then you "move" the text around to line up better, test print again until everything lines up. Final print is done on standard inkjet photo paper. Using clear packing tape, starting at one side, slowly rub the tape on to keep bubbles from happening then finally cut it out with scissors. I used 3M Super 77 spray adhesive on the back of the label and stuck it on. Using an X-Acto knife cut out the holes for the LEDs and adjustment hole. Label done. I have made many many labels over the years for various project using this method and they all still look good as the tape protects the inkjet ink from humidity and wear. I wouldn't want to charge money to make labels for others, I would rather teach you how to do it yourself! If you have a specific project in mind let me know and I would be more than happy to try to help you make a label for it. I would be willing to assist over the phone if needed.

Kelly

[RCpilot]

Thanks "G", thank you for a circuit that worked the first time! This is my second "Home Brew" circuit used in my project as opposed to Retail stuff that is way over priced. The first was the Redrock tracker. If you packaged your circuit built in some kind of case, made some labels for it like I did, you could get a lot more out of it while still keeping it reasonably priced kinda like the Redrock tracker web site does. Just my opinion but I think you could...

Kelly

[Bruce S]

RCpilot;

  Thanks for the info. Sounds easy enough, the instructions are as through as I could want.

I can build/program and inplement an entire VOIP that spans the globe but when it comes to "paint'n " I'm worse than a 4 year old with white paste glue:)

Your explaination seems easy enough, now all I have to do is find a Windows computer :)

Cheers AND keep up the great work!!

Bruce S

 

[RCpilot]

Where in MO do you live Bruce? I'm In Rolla.

[Bruce S]

Hey RCpilot!!

I'm up in the land of "no hobby mills" St.Louis :=)

Nice place Rolla, had a professor there, He's the famous one that did all the work on his H2-powered car. WAY WAY too smart for me.

Are you around college are or outside town?

There's a froogle map with a link from last year that show where most people are have a look.

NTL is South of us, by my home town of Poplar Bluff.

NTL you out there?

Bruce S

 

[RCpilot]

I'm north of town, just on the edge. I'm outside of city limits so as far as projects are concerned, I can do whatever I want without answering to anyone. I get up to St. Louis once in a while.

[Bruce S]

Must be nice :)

Hey I think there's another on here from your area;->

His handle is RP.

Here's a link to the frapper map.

"http://www.frappr.com/otherpower">http://www.frappr.com/otherpower.

With the wind that came through last, I'm glad I didn't have any spotted owls like Dan did to take out his 20'.

Cheers

Bruce S