Technostalgia taillights flashing randomly when car is off and locked. What the hell.

[tom7322]

Why would this setup draw power with the ignition and lights off ?
Are the stock lights drawing currant with the ignition off ? This just seem's like a deign flaw in the controler to me. Just saying!
p.s. I hav'nt read the hole thread so if this has been asked before sorry.

[Cmlloveless]

Originally Posted by spd2612

The BCM is back in the trunk I am sure there is a ignition feed on it

If anyone finds an ignition feed in the trunk please let me know. I am going to make a wire splitter that has quick connects on it in order to tap into the ignition line, but be able to remove it and connect the original wireing again if needed.

[tom7322]

Has anyone check for a ground short at the battery ?

[SSMOKN]

Does anyone have a copy of the installation instructions I no longer have mine and I just got one of my lights back from getting repaired and I remember it saying something like white mark to the ramp or something like that!

[IH8OPEC]

The instructions are on the product page at Phastek.

http://www.phastekperformance.com/20...taillights.htm

[SSMOKN]

Thanks IH8OPEC!

[pannhead51]

I really want these lights, I also don't want the drama ..this thread has me firmly on the fence

[Mistah SS]

I left mine sitting for a week while I was travelling and it was fine.

If I leave the car sitting longer than that, she calls me wanting to know why I deserted her. Whining about not loving her anymore and asking if the couple pounds of dust and extra weight in the trunk made her unattractive. I have to drive her really hard when i get back to let her know I still care.

If I have to leave it a couple weeks, I'd probably use my OnStar app to run it every 2-3 days. I'm waiting for a couple of warm days and some time to kill so I can install my halos now.

[The 2010 Sin]

Reverse does not work FYI.. DOA when I arrived back on a 5 day trip.

[Mistah SS]

Originally Posted by The 2010 Sin

Reverse does not work FYI.. DOA when I arrived back on a 5 day trip.

That's odd mine sat for a week and yours was dead after 5 days.

[The 2010 Sin]

No more TechLights now. Back with the factory setup. not as pretty but couldnt be happier.

[GVA 45TH 2SS]

Sorry to hear that, that sucks.
The tech lights having a wire go directly to the battery made me wonder.
I thought that was only to apply power when you use the other wire for show mode.
But it sounds like this is not the case.
Wondering aloud---- why techno cant just use the factory power harness that we plug into anyway to supply all power to the lights

[TCAT]

Originally Posted by The 2010 Sin

Reverse does not work FYI.. DOA when I arrived back on a 5 day trip.

Originally Posted by The 2010 Sin

No more TechLights now. Back with the factory setup. not as pretty but couldnt be happier.

Sorry to hear about that. It's amazing how fast some people's batteries are draining. It really is the weirdest situation we all have, and it's incredibly hard to track down why. At least you won't have to worry about it with the stock lights. Let us know how the stock ones go in regards to battery life just to ensure everything is fine.

[HubStep]

Originally Posted by TCAT

Lucky me, my car is now dead. I got home, went into the garage to see the lights and they were still flashing. So, I hit the door unlock button, and the car doesn't have enough battery power to open the door, or show any dash lights. So, I used my key and opened it manually, and I had to crawl in the back seat after folding it down to use the emergency trunk release latch to open the trunk lid. Now that I was finally able to check the battery and wiring, I looked to see if that purple wire (the show mode activation wire) was touching, and it IS NOT. Now THAT made me worried because now I have no damn idea as to why the car is drawing power, and it must be enough power to make the battery die. Something is seriously wrong, and I need to troubleshoot it fast. This is the second damn battery I'll have to purchase in the last 2.5 months because I came home to a dead or barely functioning battery.

How can I pinpoint where exactly what part of the car is draining all the battery power? It's like the life is being sucked out of it when it's not being driven. I can't have this happen again. This situation neverrrrr occured until I installed these taillights. So, there is no way I could ever blame any of my LED's that I've had installed for a long time. These lights have to go if I have to deal with this bullcrap again.

In the meantime.... you should consider purchasing a trickle-charger of some kind and hook it up in the garage (just to save the battery). May also come in handy at shows.

Oh and btw, I've had the technostalgia lights for 6+ months with zero issues (knock on wood!).

Can you describe the flashing? Is it the braking animation or the show-mode animation? Is it the turn signal? Hazard animation? If they all just flash in a way you haven't seen before it's definitely the lights.

As a general rule of thumb many of these vendors that ship us products (AAC/technostalgia/anyone who does anything with LEDs) don't make the electrical components themselves, they buy them from chinese wholesalers and assemble a packageable product. The issue is the quality of most chinese electrical components is crap. They're famous for using cheap/fake electrolytic components that fail very early. As an EE major currently doing digital systems design, I can assure you that losing a resistor or capacitor somewhere in a circuit with hundreds of thousands of individual gates (possibly millions) can cause the darn-dest things to happen. Combine that with the thermal cycling all of our cars get and that only compounds the problem.

As a result these companies get the product back, swap it, and send you the same thing back. There are minor things they can do (like waterproofing etc) but they are as much at the mercy of some chinese company as you are.

If it was American it would do better and last 30 years, but it'd be 3x the cost (ironic when you factor in the cost of replacement :( )