Charger for the colorblind

[erinspeed]

I originally posted this in the eGo specific thread. I have red/greed colorblindness. I can't tell the color of the LED on my charger. At all. Ever. I'm not colorblind in a "old movie black and white" way. More of a "knob adjusted wrong on your display" way.

Any way, I was wondering if anybody has the skills to make (modify) a charger so that it shows one LED for charging, and ANOTHER, SEPARATE ONE for fully charged. The way my Joye eGo charger is now, the LED changes from red to green (so I'm told). I have no idea if I have connected the battery correctly, if it is charging, or when it is finished.

Here's the deal: I have money. I am willing to spend it. Not enough to fund your retirement, mind you, but enough to pay someone to do this on three brand new chargers (one to use daily, two spares).

Lemme know.

 

[Dalton63841]

Ohhh this is interesting... I know a couple people who are red/green colorblind. I've never gathered the specifics of it though... What if, instead of red/green it were red/blue? If that would work it should be as simple as swapping one bicolor LED for a different one.

 

[erinspeed]

Changing the color would be similar to playing a different song for the tone deaf. I'm looking for two separate LEDs. People that see color correctly have no idea what it means to stop everything (seriously) to figure out what color a light is. If you will notice, traffic lights have one light for stop, and a different one for go, always in the same orientation. If I had to figure out what color the light was, i would be (even more of) a menace of the road.

Its gotta be two LEDs. Color doesnt matter.

 

[Dougiestyle]

Wow! Sorry about your impairment! This is a consideration I never made! I hope someone comes through for ya! You may hit up one of the modders (JamesW from Krimson Kustoms could probably hook you up) in a PM. There are a few Electronic Engineers on the modders/suppliers section. Good luck!

Just curious, how does driving at night affect your ability to judge traffic signals?

Good luck from a fellow visually impaired (blind in one eye) member!

 

[erinspeed]

The only trouble I have driving at night has to do with flashing lights at intersections. I have no trouble discerning red lights from green lights on a traffic light. The green light is much more blue than the green of LEDs. Plus, most traffic lights are incandescent. Green incandescent and green LEDs are different animals. The flashing red and flashing yellow are the confusing ones. Unless I can see the position of the flashing on the three-position light, I honestly can't tell red from yellow. I have stopped at flashing yellows before, but have never ran a flashing red. I have been honked at for stopping when I didn't need to.

Confusing, I know.

If you look into color coding for the visually impaired, blue, yellow, black and white are the only truly effective discernable ones.

Anyhoo, I'm still wondering about the two LED thing on my charger. Simply LEDon/LEDoff. not color coded.

 

[erinspeed]

Oh,yeah. My optometrist informed me that colorblindness is an"eye thing" and not a "brain thing". Glad to know my brain is okay.

 

[Illiteratti]

I myself have the exact same issue, red/green colorblindness, and I have the same problem with my eGo charger, modem, streetlights at night, etc...

You did give a good idea, with the two separate LED solution, I think...

It is my understanding that the bi-color LED's have three leads, a common and one for the red and one for the green...maybe someone can look into putting two LED's into the charger, sharing the common and then having a separate lead going to the respective "charge" or "charging" LED. I am no electronics expert but I think this may be a viable solution for anyone interested into looking into the actual mechanics of it...

I know I would also be willing to pay to have someone modify my charger in this way also

 

[AzPlumber]

Sounds like you can tell that the light is on, just can't tell what color it is? What if the light was on when charging and just went out when charged. Might be easy to do that.

 

[erinspeed]

The LED should tell us 1) that it is connected and charging, and 2) that it is finished. No light would mean no contact/no charging.

 

[denali_41]

my dad and his brothers had different levels of color blindness,,i was 30 before i ever found out,,but things were a lot different then...

now as far as your problem goes ?? it might actually be an easy fix that you can do yourself ??

there are actually 2 totally separate little{i mean little} lights side by side under that clear lens ....one red and one green

sure you could de-solder one and move further away ,so you could distinguish the lights real easy

i know it can be done,but my eyes just aren't good enough to do that now

 

[erinspeed]

The problem comes in with my small-scale soldering skills. I, uh, don't have any. I "can" solder, but my last attemp at soldering on a circuit board ended up with buying a new device to replace the one I killed with my hamfisted soldering. I guess I'm saying that I would rather pay a more skilled pro to do this properly.

 

[JamesW]

Basically most LEDs that are attached to battery chargers have 2 separate power lines running to them, all you would need to do is detach the power from the green one or "fully charged" and attach it to a separate LED which you can just drill a hole and place it in the case next to the one that's already there.

I haven't done it but it isn't a hard objective, if you wish I could do a diagram with pictures or do a few for you. If you wish you can PM me for details. I saw that someone had pointed my name out so I figured I'd drop in. I'm kind of known for doing random things.

James