FlyLeds Standalone taillight wiring issue - help the wiring challenged

[eavila1]

Paul you there?

Ok so after I (electrically challenged) completely wiring my G3X system and other items with no issues, the time came to power everything and test. All is well, but one issue I have is with my FLYLEDS standalone taillight. I have a 2 conductor shielded going to the tail. White wire going to position and the whit/blue to the strobe, then I followed standard shield drain termination installation procedures at the taillight plug. Both position and Strobe wires go back to panel to separate single on/off switches.

When i flip either switch, I get both position and strobe functioning which is not what should be happening. So then I started trouble shooting and ended up disconnecting the white/blue strobe wire at the tail end, then flipped on that same strobe switch at the panel and it is still operating the light. ?? So I'm assuming somehow in my cutting of the wires to install the ground shield drain I must have nicked the wires to where both wires are no longer isolated?

So then I left the shielded position wire connected and disconnected the shielded strobe from the tailight , then ran a separate individual wire from the strobe switch to the strobe and everything is working fine.....position flipped on only, good......then strobe on and it flashes. Separate functions.

So I'm not really wanting to run a separate wire to the tailcone again but would prefer to use the two wires already there of the two conductor shielded. I'm thinking I did something wrong from the disconnection points at the tailight by running shield terminations when i didn't need to except for at the very end at the tailight connection on the negative that goes to ground at the tailight. I've also disconnected that shield termination ground at the tailight and grounded locally at the tail instead and it doesn't change anything as far as the original problem.

The instructions say to run separate wires to the individual switches but I though I was being clever by running shielded wire for EMF noise.

Any ideas? Thx

 

[lr172]

Need to ask paul about this. IIRC, these lights were designed with the assumption that the + lead is inside of a shielded cable and the ground return path would be the shield. This is part of his design for eliminating EFI noise and is a relatively common strategy.. I would NOT just do an airframe ground for this strobe unless Paul told me it would work. I use a A/F grounds a lot, but avoid it when special designs are in place for noise reduction.

 

[eavila1]

Yeah I believe the other assemblies call out shielded, but i could be wrong. Paul's instructions on the standalone taillight unit is for single individual wires, then grounded locally. Claim no noise for all their products which I believe in. Great product(s) and it is definitely bright. I may redo the wiring at that plug tail end and new ground shield terminations. I must have shorted something or nicked the wires after cutting shielding too deep or something. I don't know. It was just baffling that after flipping either switch individually I got both position and flashing strobes going off.

 

[bruceh]

It sounds like what I experienced on my Position light and strobe. The strobe was always on. Paul gave me some trouble shooting advice. Swapped boards from side to side, did some continuity testing and determined it was somewhere in my wiring.
I had previously had another brand of lighting on the airplane and did some soldering of the shielding and inadvertently had melted the insulation around one of the wires. I had the shielding touching the conductor of one of the wires and that caused it to keep the strobe from strobing.

It was hidden under the shrink wrap and had not affected my previous lighting installation, since the white/blue wire was also a ground wire.
I've since then started using solder sleeves for connections like this. The heat gun won't damage the insulation like a soldering iron tip will.

 

[Paul from Flyleds]

Hi Eddie

The Stand-Alone tail light has two power inputs, one for position mode and one for strobe mode. They won't interact, so your issue can only be that your two power wires are shorted together somehow. You should be able to verify this (and it sounds like you already have) with a multimeter at your disconnect plug, which takes the tail light out of the equation.
It looks like things are pretty tight at the rear of the disconnect plug, so I'd be pulling that one apart and redoing it first. I'd suggest that Bruce is onto something there. Overheating the sleeve usually ends up shorting internal wires to the shield, but wire to wire is also possible.

This light (like the rest of our products!) doesn't make any electrical noise, so no need to be paranoid about using shielded wire, or shielding the wires to the last centimetre (or equivalent inch fraction...) A local ground is also perfectly fine for this light, as is using the cable shield for your ground return.

Let us all know what you find!

 

[eavila1]

Hi Eddie

The Stand-Alone tail light has two power inputs, one for position mode and one for strobe mode. They won't interact, so your issue can only be that your two power wires are shorted together somehow. You should be able to verify this (and it sounds like you already have) with a multimeter at your disconnect plug, which takes the tail light out of the equation.
It looks like things are pretty tight at the rear of the disconnect plug, so I'd be pulling that one apart and redoing it first. I'd suggest that Bruce is onto something there. Overheating the sleeve usually ends up shorting internal wires to the shield, but wire to wire is also possible.

This light (like the rest of our products!) doesn't make any electrical noise, so no need to be paranoid about using shielded wire, or shielding the wires to the last centimetre (or equivalent inch fraction...) A local ground is also perfectly fine for this light, as is using the cable shield for your ground return.

Let us all know what you find!

Thanks Paul I think you and Bruce nailed it. I've verified its not the Unit since everything worked fine as it is supposed to when running the separate wire to strobes and leaving one shielded wire to the position +. It has to be shorted somewhere within the shielding. I'm going to redo my plug connections and i'll let you know what I find