Message text written by Erich D Trombley
>To all those folks out there that are smarter than I when it comes to
electronics here is my question. Does anyone know of either a kit/design
or an off the shelf item that will limit the time the gear position
indicator lights stay on. I have installed limit switches on the
outriggers that verify gear position via LEDs. What I am looking for is
a circuit that will turn off the LED after the gear has been successfully
raised say 1 minute after the LED is lighted. I really don't want to see
two bright LED during the entire flight.
<
Why have any lights on at all with the gear raised. My system is set as
follows:
Gear Down - 3 greens
Gear in transit - 1 red
Gear Up - Lights Out
This is a fairly standard indicating arrangement. As the main requirement
for the outriggers is to show when they are down I have not bothered with
red 'in transit' lights for them. The main gear will show a red whenever
the gear is out of the up detent and not down and latched. To get a main
gear green there are two microswitches, one to sense the gear is in the
gate and the other to sense the latch is engaged. I decided to include the
extra switch when I heard of a few instances where the latch had been
missed during the landing checks.
If you are interested in the wiring diagram I used let me know. I also used
an output from this for the uEncoder to sense gear position for its low
speed warning facility.
Nigel Charles
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