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Police Lightbar Project

My friend acquired a police lightbar from an old police cruiser, and we thought it might be fun to use it with our band on stage. I haven't had a chance to look at it closely yet to inspect the ratings and such, but I'd like to be able to convert it so instead of running of a car's 12V battery that it be plugged in to run on 120V AC. I believe this thing probably draws 30 to 40 amps from the car battery.

Can anybody tell me how I would go about with this conversion? The light bar has three stages (spots, intersection lights, main spinning lights). I'm creating a stompbox that we can use to turn off/on each stage. I know how to do this. I just don't know how to do the 12V DC conversion to 120V AC.

I hope I'm correct in assuming that I can decrease the amperage significantly by increasing the voltage (P=I*V) or else it becomes unusable in an outlet served by a 15A breaker.

Any suggestions on how to do this conversion? It seems that it should be pretty easy. I just don't know the steps involved.

Jason

Reply to
jjbutera
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I would bet a cheap 10 to 20 amp battery charger will work. The light bar has no internal electronics so the ripple from the charger should not be a problem. Dave

Reply to
CheapscateDave

Hi Jason,

Your easiest solution would be to power it from a 12 Volt supply. Get the max. current specs at 12 V. and get a power supply that can handle it. Converting all the circuits to 120 V internally is probably not worth the trouble.- IMHO. Regards, Tom

Reply to
Tom Biasi

First, find out how much current you really need. My bet is that it needs *WAY* less than that.

Next, the easiest conversion is a DC power supply that provides

12 volts at the current you really need. A 30 to 40 amp supply is not cheap, so it is mandatory that you find out how much current you really need.

It also it is possible to use 12 volts AC with a transformer to run bulbs in the unit. The bulbs will work fine on AC or DC - but there may be motors and blinkers in the unit that will work on DC only. A transformer should cost less than a DC supply.

Converting by changing the parts in the unit to 120 vac parts brings up safety issues, but it is probably a non-starter anyway. It would mean gutting the unit down to an empty shell, then installing 120 vac stuff in it to replace the 12 vdc stuff you removed. The installation of the new bulb sockets would likely be a mechanical nightmare.

Ed

Reply to
ehsjr

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