Whereas the Citroën emblem they venture onto the pavement seems nice, [OrangeTungsten] wasn’t thrilled with how their door-mounted projectors really functioned. The mechanism for detecting when they need to kick on was a bit too intelligent for its personal good, and wanted to be simplified a bit. Fortunately for us, the course of was meticulously documented for anybody else who may discover themselves in an identical state of affairs.
Initially, the projector detected when it ought to activate by sensing the presence of a tiny magnet utilizing a Corridor impact sensor. There are definitely some benefits to this strategy, however in apply, [OrangeTungsten] says the retrofitted magnet would preserve falling off and leaving the projector inoperative. The repair was easy sufficient: work out how the circuit labored, pull out the Corridor impact sensor, and exchange it with a easy button that will bodily make contact with the door body.
It’s not a really advanced repair, but it surely’s a intelligent answer and effectively documented, and that goes fairly far round these components. We have been additionally on this one as a result of an examination of the electronics contained in the projector uncovered a 8-pin microcontroller — the only real objective of which might seem to be polling the Corridor impact sensor and utilizing its standing to throw a transistor which in flip powers the LED.
It’s arduous to imagine that whoever designed this gadget couldn’t work out flip an LED on and off and not using a MCU, however we’re residing in unusual instances. We assume there’s some type of justification for this, comparable to some flashing or fading results, however [OrangeTungsten] by no means mentions the issues doing something extra advanced than merely turning on and off.
Regardless of the rationale was behind the unique design of those projectors, the vital factor is that the applying of some {hardware} from the components bin bought them up and dealing once more, which is one thing we by no means get bored with seeing.
