Anyone ever use strobes from an automotive catologue?

I recently bought and installed a dual head NEOBE strobe system for
my UL. Made by Tomar. You see them in nearly every police and EMS
vehicle. Got the entire system with shielded 15' cables for $100.
Only thing I had to do was build heads for the tubes. Simple and
cheap. A 2.5" PVC pipe cap and a Perko marine fresnel lens.

Whats the difference between auto strobes and aircraft?

Price. Plus, it depends on what kind of auto strobe you're looking
at. If you're looking at the cheap $20 magnetic base type units,
then the BIG difference is wattage or joules. Aviation strobes use
25 joule, double loop U-tubes, while nearly all auto units use a 4
joule horse-shoe U-tube. Obviously, the 25 joule/watt unit is 6
times brighter.

The Tomar NEOBE power supply uses a new method of firing 25-joule
tubes. Instead of dumping several amps of juice all at once into
a xenon tube, NEOBE strobes the strobe by firing lower current
levels thru the tube via 6 rapid pulses over 1/2 second. The
effect is a nearly continous, but pulsed light that appears twice
as bright as regular strobes. Much longer tube life as well.

Instead of the power supply making a rising swept high-pitched whine
in an unsquelched radio, the business card sized Tomar NEOBE unit
(that's right... 2" x 3" x 1.5") makes a continous stream of 12 ticks/
clicks per second. The unit also makes the same sound audibly due
to the charge/discharge of the supply capacitors.

Since the Tomar unit was designed for EMS use, it is shielded to
reduce RFI in the AM police/EMS radio bands, which are not far
away from the aviation spectrum.

However, I found it neccessary to wrap the power lead going to my
Icom A4 radio as many times around and through one of those clamp
on "clam shell" ferrite RFI chokes as possible. You can get them
at Radio Snack or on-line for much cheaper. Putting chokes on the
lamp cables exiting the power unit also helped in being able to
turn radio squelch down to level 3 (of 9) though I normally operate
the radio at level 5.

It basically takes a VERY weak signal at squelch level 2 or 3 to be
able to hear the NEOBE pulses. Anything stronger and the radio is
just as clear of noise as with everything Off.

Get the kit here...
http://strobesforless.com/store/prod...products_id=38




Dean A. Scott, mfa
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School of Visual Art and Design
southern adventist university
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http://www.southern.edu/~dascott