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Old 03-19-2013, 08:17 AM   #1
Joe@NightOwlLEDs
 
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Drives: 2011 SS Convertible
Join Date: Mar 2013
Location: Suwanee, GA
Posts: 373
Introducing NightOwl LED Systems

*** Halo Kits Thread ***



Before I begin, I’d like to express my gratitude to Camaro5.com for creating and bringing together one of the best online communites ever.

THE SHORT STORY
NightOwl LED Systems is about to launch some really exciting lighting controllers and products for your camaro.

THE LONG STORY...

WHO WE ARE
My name is Joe, and I’ve been a camaro5.com member since September 2010, shortly after buying my first camaro. (That line sounds like an AA meeting introduction ) I still maintain a personal account, under the handle 572HP. I have also participated in several threads on helping members: Project Cleaning the Clutter in Our Engine Bay, DIY Change LEDs in Speed/Tach Gauge, DIY Change Radio LEDs, and several other threads. Camaro5.com is where I spend a majority of my online time.

HISTORY
I have an electrical engineering background, and have been working in software engineering for 20 some years. My oldest son is about to turn 17, and is very interested in engineering as well. We started a project together back in August of 2011. We wanted to control some lights on our camaro using our iPhones. So we worked on the project together, and in October of that year, showed off some of our work at Pony Wars where other camaros gathered for a weekend at the drag strip in Valdosta GA (the site of the first Camaro Fest.) We met many great folks and showed off what we could do. Norm and Maria (garcmol) were instant fans, and encouraged us to make it into a product.

CAMARO FEST
We continued to work on the system on and off together until the time school got out in 2012. At that point, we started heavily focusing on it, with a goal to show it off at CamaroFest 3 in Indianapolis. We worked on it over the summer, and had a demo prepared for the fest. We took the car up and had a great time showing it off. We received a lot of great feedback and encouragement to make it into products.

GOALS
Our main goal has been to create the best system available for our cars. Our main interest is to manufacture LED controllers to run our software to control the lights. We don’t really care to resell lights. We don’t care where you buy your lights. We are fans of many vendors on this website as well. A few shout-outs to Jordan and Jeremy at JDP, Tony at SJMAutoProd, Ofer at Gen5Diy, Chase at Apex, and AAC. I’ve worked with all of these people, and hope we’ll be able to work together to create some amazing products.

COMPETITION
We know that there will be cheaper products available. Unfortunately we live in a country that makes it next to impossible to compete in price with products coming from other countries. We cannot compete on price alone. We know this. We feel that we can compete on the features, software, and good ‘ole American engineering. We are going to do our best to keep the costs down so that we can sell to more people.

COMPARISON
The majority of the controllers on the market are single-device controllers. While this may work for simple systems, to be able to get the controllability you would have to use a lot of controllers. Our controllers will control a minimum of 4 devices. Besides having at least 4 times the outputs, our features and controllability won’t be matched. Sure there are other WiFi controllers on the market now, but the word “WiFi” is about the only thing similar.

PRODUCTS
Our website does a good job at explaining our current controller lineup. So I won’t try to explain it here. Instead, please visit our website at: www.NightOwlLEDs.com. The products section explains our initial product lineup.

While we tried to keep our website directed to all car owners, all of our products were designed specifically with the Camaro in mind. For instance, our LP modules will be able to be simply plugged into our ambient lighting connectors inside the door and dash. You won’t need to go fishing for a power source inside the door. You also won’t need to figure out how you are going to turn them on and off. They just work with your car, like a feature that could have come from the factory. When your ambient lighting in the car comes on, so do the controllers and LEDs. When you dim your ambient lighting, the lights in the doors dim. There is no other product out there that can do that. Want to choose the color that fits your mood, or for a special holiday? Just do it.

Another example is for the floorboard lighting. You can tie our controller into the dome circuit. We’ll show you how and provide what you need. When your dome light comes on, so does your floorboard lights. They ramp up and down with the dome light, with the default color that you choose if you have full-colored LEDs.

Only want or have single-colored LEDs? No problem. That will give you 3 times more ports to plug in your lights. Want to mix multi-colored LEDs and single-colored LEDs? No problem.

There are several trend-setting features that will come with every module. One of which is very precise control over individual colors. Do you want a white that matches your driving lights? No problem. While every competing system that we know about uses 256 brightness levels for each color, we give you 4096. That means that you can dial in your perfect white.

One other outstanding feature is the ability to color-correct mutli-colored LEDs. Every multi-colored LED has a different mix of brightnesses for each red, green and blue that makes up the LEDs. When you turn them to white, some LEDs look pink, or purple, or blue. You want them all to match. With our system, you can make them all match. We’re going to demonstrate this for you in the coming days.

EXPANDABILITY
All of our modules work together in the system. You can add up to 16 modules. I actually cannot imagine any car having this many modules. That would be a minimum of 64 full-colored devices. My car has 6 controllers now, and I have a lot of lights. I could imagine a couple more controllers though. Modules can be added at any time. It is simple to pair a new controller to a system.

COMING UP
We are preparing to launch all of our controllers. Pricing will be available shortly. I know this is on everyone’s mind. Our first product to launch will be a halo kit using our HP module. This kit will include the wiring harnesses and LEDs for the halos in RS cars. The install method will be a no-bake method. We love this method, and have been an early advocate for it. We will be offering this kit directly and we will be doing pre-sales. We plan to deliver these kits before the end of April. An upgrade kit for one of the other vendor’s RGB Halo kits will also be available. This will allow owners of the kit to upgrade the controller, while leaving the wiring harness and LEDs in place. The other modules will be coming online shortly as well.

As we are offering products directly at this point, helping us get off the gound. We have been in contact with several vendors on camaro5.com to carry the products for us. We don’t want to be in the business of selling direct. We want to focus on making the best products. We are also starting here on Camaro5, but will soon be expanding to other car types and markets.

We have several ideas for new products in the future, as well as enhancements. But many of you have been banging on our doors to get these products out to you, so we’re going to focus on that for now. We’re excited to be a part of the Camaro5 community, and hope that you’ll support us as we grow. We look forward to working with the other Camaro5 vendors as well.

STAY TUNED!

I’m really sorry this was so long, but I felt it was important for people to know who we are, and what we are about. We have so much information to share, but very little time to get it organized and presented.

Our motto is: “Night It Up!” (my 12-year-old son Alex came up with that!)
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Last edited by Joe@NightOwlLEDs; 08-01-2014 at 05:59 AM. Reason: Added app badges.
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