WEBVTT Kind: captions Language: en 00:00:00.070 --> 00:00:03.320 Hello, and welcome to Technology Connections 2! 00:00:03.320 --> 00:00:07.640 This is the very first video for this channel where we are gonna be taking apart one of 00:00:07.640 --> 00:00:08.640 these. 00:00:08.640 --> 00:00:11.570 This is a 12 inch traffic light module. 00:00:11.570 --> 00:00:16.030 Normally these are sitting up high in the air and telling you whether to stop or to go. 00:00:16.030 --> 00:00:20.150 Now, these newer styles--I've always been a little bit curious about what the optics 00:00:20.150 --> 00:00:25.689 are inside, how exactly the LED emitters are arranged and, you know, what's inside of these. 00:00:25.689 --> 00:00:27.789 So today I'm gonna take one apart. 00:00:27.789 --> 00:00:32.259 Now, this one I featured in my video on Technology Connections which is probably how you got 00:00:32.259 --> 00:00:33.259 here. 00:00:33.259 --> 00:00:36.370 If you didn't get here from seeing that you might want to check out this card, or there 00:00:36.370 --> 00:00:38.329 will be a link on the end screen. 00:00:38.329 --> 00:00:46.480 But in addition to this red one, I also have a yellow one. 00:00:46.480 --> 00:00:52.289 You'll notice that their wires are color-coded -- Very handy! 00:00:52.289 --> 00:00:55.520 And what's more, I also have 00:00:59.080 --> 00:01:01.179 a green one. 00:01:01.180 --> 00:01:06.840 Now, this green one is a little bit different from the other two because the green one-- 00:01:06.840 --> 00:01:10.340 its lens is clear. 00:01:10.340 --> 00:01:15.660 So I did buy a set of three but this one probably does not match with the others. 00:01:15.660 --> 00:01:17.340 So I'm gonna take this one apart. 00:01:17.340 --> 00:01:20.930 There doesn't appear to be a way to take these apart without destroying them because they 00:01:20.930 --> 00:01:22.119 are sealed. 00:01:22.119 --> 00:01:25.350 So, uh, let's just take a look. 00:01:25.350 --> 00:01:26.350 One thing before I take it apart. 00:01:26.350 --> 00:01:30.460 Let me turn it back on. 00:01:30.460 --> 00:01:34.600 This is what I've been using to power it for the video by the way, this is a, uh...power 00:01:34.600 --> 00:01:37.110 pack but it has a 110V outlet. 00:01:37.110 --> 00:01:42.320 These do run on 120V AC because that's what would be commonly used in America during these 00:01:42.320 --> 00:01:43.320 installations. 00:01:43.320 --> 00:01:47.420 Now, one of the things about these particular stoplights is you'll see they have a very, 00:01:47.420 --> 00:01:49.080 pretty tight focus. 00:01:49.240 --> 00:01:51.580 So I'm shining this at you. 00:01:51.590 --> 00:01:55.610 And of course the reason why they have that tight focus is because they might as well 00:01:55.610 --> 00:01:59.660 be pointed in the eyes of drivers so that way they can see them better. 00:01:59.660 --> 00:02:03.189 So they're focused pretty narrowly that way you can see them. 00:02:03.189 --> 00:02:07.380 So what exactly is on the inside of these to make that tight beam? 00:02:07.380 --> 00:02:08.970 That's what I want to find out today. 00:02:08.970 --> 00:02:10.290 So, let's take a look! 00:02:10.290 --> 00:02:15.220 Alright, to make this just a little bit easier on myself, you are on a tripod on top of the table. 00:02:15.400 --> 00:02:16.300 Hello! 00:02:16.300 --> 00:02:18.040 And you're gonna just watch me do stuff. 00:02:18.040 --> 00:02:19.070 Because that's fun. 00:02:19.070 --> 00:02:24.780 So these traffic lights have a rubber gasket around them that we're gonna remove. 00:02:24.780 --> 00:02:29.690 And as I was saying in my last video, these are designed to be sealed so if you take a 00:02:29.690 --> 00:02:35.350 look around the edges, there's really no way to get into these. 00:02:35.350 --> 00:02:42.550 On the back, there was a single screw right here, but that screw just covered the wire 00:02:42.550 --> 00:02:44.280 terminal connections. 00:02:44.280 --> 00:02:49.200 And really there appears to be no way to get inside this without being destructive. 00:02:49.200 --> 00:02:53.760 You can sort of see around the edges here that you can see the clear plastic of the 00:02:53.760 --> 00:03:00.130 lens, in fact--I'll bring the red one over. 00:03:00.130 --> 00:03:09.570 Maybe you can see on video but that is red plastic you're seeing behind here. 00:03:09.570 --> 00:03:13.900 So I think the easiest way to get inside of this is to just use a cutting wheel and, uh, 00:03:13.900 --> 00:03:15.960 cut it open. 00:03:18.040 --> 00:03:24.360 I might try just prying it open real quick with a screwdriver, see if that's productive 00:03:24.370 --> 00:03:25.370 at all. 00:03:25.370 --> 00:03:29.600 And after that I have, uh, a Harbor Freight Dremel tool. 00:03:30.980 --> 00:03:33.760 That oughta get us in. 00:03:35.400 --> 00:03:36.800 So let me grab that screw driver. 00:03:37.140 --> 00:03:41.440 (sped up) 00:03:46.180 --> 00:03:48.520 I think we're gonna make it without the Dremel tool! 00:03:48.980 --> 00:03:52.800 (sped up) 00:03:58.800 --> 00:04:00.620 Ahh! 00:04:02.340 --> 00:04:04.700 We have layers! 00:04:05.780 --> 00:04:06.680 OK. 00:04:09.080 --> 00:04:14.260 So apparently this clear plastic thing--this is probably the only part that's colored on 00:04:14.260 --> 00:04:16.400 the red and yellow ones. 00:04:16.400 --> 00:04:21.530 So I would imagine that, uh, down below this is the same. 00:04:21.530 --> 00:04:27.130 And then we have this sort of prismatic lens. 00:04:27.130 --> 00:04:30.440 This is what gives it the look of the incandescent light. 00:04:31.700 --> 00:04:41.100 And then there's a Fresnel lens beneath it. 00:04:41.160 --> 00:04:45.760 That's a lot less interesting than I thought it might be! (laughter) 00:04:45.760 --> 00:04:48.160 So let's take a look. 00:04:57.260 --> 00:04:59.419 Right (said with a bad Scottish accent). 00:04:59.420 --> 00:05:02.460 I'm just kidding, I'm not Big Clive. 00:05:03.600 --> 00:05:06.160 I do not have his expertise here. 00:05:06.160 --> 00:05:08.090 But, let's go ahead and turn this back on. 00:05:08.090 --> 00:05:13.710 This by the way is how I've been driving these, this is a little power pack with a 110V plug 00:05:13.710 --> 00:05:14.840 on there. 00:05:14.840 --> 00:05:16.900 Really cool. 00:05:18.560 --> 00:05:21.380 Let's see how painful this is. 00:05:25.120 --> 00:05:29.260 Now, when these are running off of true line voltage they don't buzz at all, it's just 00:05:29.270 --> 00:05:31.610 on the inverter that's it's kind of buzzing here. 00:05:31.610 --> 00:05:39.900 But yeah it's just, let's see, four-- eight individual chips, probably eight 1-watt LEDs down here. 00:05:42.420 --> 00:05:43.640 Let's blind you. 00:05:45.220 --> 00:05:47.560 Oh it's not too bad actually. 00:05:47.560 --> 00:05:49.500 So the Fresnel lens, here... 00:05:53.220 --> 00:05:53.920 Oh wow! 00:05:53.920 --> 00:05:56.530 That's really... 00:05:57.860 --> 00:06:01.160 So this is basically magnifying them. 00:06:01.170 --> 00:06:05.900 I'll show--I'll point you up at the wall so you can see how it's pointing at the ceiling 00:06:05.900 --> 00:06:06.900 right now. 00:06:06.900 --> 00:06:13.480 And then this distributes that so it's a little less crazy. 00:06:18.180 --> 00:06:22.310 Here's the weather seal. 00:06:22.310 --> 00:06:23.580 So this keeps moisture out. 00:06:23.580 --> 00:06:28.950 In fact, you can see... let me turn this back off. 00:06:28.950 --> 00:06:31.360 The interior of this is remarkably clean. 00:06:31.360 --> 00:06:35.880 And I'm sure these were in service, I doubt these are new. 00:06:35.880 --> 00:06:42.560 Their exteriors are a little dirty, especially in here, but inside it's almost immaculate. 00:06:50.900 --> 00:06:54.460 (sped up) 00:06:54.460 --> 00:06:56.600 Let's go further! 00:06:56.820 --> 00:07:01.340 (sped up) 00:07:01.340 --> 00:07:02.640 Oh! 00:07:06.720 --> 00:07:07.580 OK 00:07:10.820 --> 00:07:13.160 So this is the board that the actual LEDs 00:07:13.160 --> 00:07:17.080 are on and I noticed this is aluminum. 00:07:17.080 --> 00:07:22.310 Here, so this is its heat sink. 00:07:22.310 --> 00:07:28.040 It's a bit surprising there's no thermal compound between the two. 00:07:35.900 --> 00:07:41.260 But I suppose in, these aren't--especially for green, they're never--well none of them 00:07:41.270 --> 00:07:43.770 really, they're never gonna be on for more than two or three minutes at a time before 00:07:43.770 --> 00:07:49.480 they're off again, and even if there were a flashing red that would only be a 50% duty cycle. 00:07:50.240 --> 00:07:58.080 (sped up) 00:07:59.140 --> 00:08:01.420 Well that's one way to do it. 00:08:02.560 --> 00:08:05.760 (sped up) 00:08:06.260 --> 00:08:07.360 So that's it! 00:08:07.360 --> 00:08:11.540 This is all that's inside there, it's just a big plastic shell to direct the light from 00:08:11.540 --> 00:08:17.360 these eight LED chips, which the board says Lumileds here. 00:08:17.360 --> 00:08:20.270 Or maybe it's "Lumi-LEDs" I'm not sure. 00:08:20.270 --> 00:08:25.990 But on the back, in addition to a whole bunch of gibberish it says Luxeon so I'm sure these 00:08:25.990 --> 00:08:28.080 are Luxeon chips. 00:08:28.080 --> 00:08:34.669 And then this is basically just a 120V power supply here 'cause this is an American stoplight 00:08:34.669 --> 00:08:38.310 so it's on 120V AC. 00:08:38.310 --> 00:08:41.229 This is a pretty robust power supply board. 00:08:41.229 --> 00:08:46.050 All the components on there--granted, I am no expert but all the components on here seem 00:08:46.050 --> 00:08:54.490 generously sized, these resistors are quite large and the capacitor--what's it's temperature 00:08:54.490 --> 00:08:56.340 rating? 00:09:00.560 --> 00:09:03.840 Ehh, I can't see it. 00:09:12.440 --> 00:09:18.080 Oh, I don't want to talk to Florida. (received a phone call while recording) 00:09:19.360 --> 00:09:20.520 Ooh! 00:09:21.360 --> 00:09:26.320 It says on here, "GELcore" Maybe Gel-core? 00:09:26.320 --> 00:09:28.910 Or General Electric Lighting core? 00:09:28.910 --> 00:09:30.620 I don't know. 00:09:30.620 --> 00:09:32.420 I don't know what that would be. 00:09:32.420 --> 00:09:33.420 Oh! 00:09:33.420 --> 00:09:36.870 There's a lot of chips down here. 00:09:36.870 --> 00:09:39.640 Integrated circuits. 00:09:40.540 --> 00:09:46.800 If Big Clive would like to have a look at one of these and tell me more what this is, 00:09:46.800 --> 00:09:48.440 feel free! 00:09:52.960 --> 00:09:58.670 But yeah I mean, this board here is clearly just the LEDs themselves. 00:10:00.240 --> 00:10:09.180 I would be curious to know if this is simply, like if Lumileds makes these knowingly that 00:10:09.190 --> 00:10:15.120 they're for a stoplight or if this is just some sort of general purpose illumination 00:10:15.120 --> 00:10:16.750 board that they have. 00:10:17.840 --> 00:10:20.840 I should see, is there are year on these? 00:10:25.200 --> 00:10:28.600 Not that I can see. 00:10:43.420 --> 00:10:45.400 Well anyway, that's... 00:10:45.400 --> 00:10:46.560 I guess that's about it! 00:10:46.560 --> 00:10:47.560 So I'll close this video out. 00:10:47.560 --> 00:10:54.500 I will add one thing little thing, the power rating on the fixtures themselves; these days 00:10:54.500 --> 00:10:59.370 it's much closer but even now, they yellow lights use the most power. 00:10:59.370 --> 00:11:05.851 And on the particular three that I have, red was rated like 11 watts, green was 13, and 00:11:05.851 --> 00:11:07.160 yellow was 19. 00:11:07.160 --> 00:11:11.390 So it's kind of interesting cause the yellow...the particular wavelength of yellow in stop lights 00:11:11.390 --> 00:11:15.500 is apparently not that efficient, cause it needs a lot more power to produce the same 00:11:15.500 --> 00:11:16.500 brightness. 00:11:16.500 --> 00:11:19.800 But with it being a yellow light it's only on at most six seconds at a time so I guess 00:11:19.800 --> 00:11:21.910 it doesn't really matter. 00:11:21.910 --> 00:11:26.940 I may have wrecked a stoplight but I've got this neat Fresnel lens out of it--look at 00:11:26.940 --> 00:11:28.420 that! 00:11:28.420 --> 00:11:31.020 Can you see?... 00:11:31.020 --> 00:11:34.930 Oh yeah, yeah. 00:11:34.930 --> 00:11:37.660 So neat-o! 00:11:39.600 --> 00:11:42.300 Nifty, nifty, nifty. 00:11:45.900 --> 00:11:50.440 So thanks so much for watching, please subscribe to Technology Connections 2, head on over to 00:11:50.459 --> 00:11:54.269 the original video if you got here without seeing it, and I'll see you next time!