[alfa] Re: brake light upgrade, now CyberLight

[Tony Martie <tony@xxxxxxxx>]

I remember the pulsing brake light very well (I guess I'm getting on in 
years also), the mother of my closest childhood friend had one 
installed on her BMW touring motorcycle (R600/RS or something like 
that), sometime around 1980.

It seemed to like a great idea and worked as it was supposed to.  The 
harder you were braking, the more frantic the pulsing.  I believe it 
also got brighter with greater braking force.

It worked off of some kind of inertia sensing switch (mercury on a 
curved ramp?) so there was no plumbing involved.

I wonder if they were outlawed for some reason?  Still seems like a 
good idea to me.

Tony Martie
'78 Spider
Dallas, TX
http://tmpd.net

Subject: [alfa] brake light upgrade

I may be telling my age here, but I believe that there was a brake light
product that used to be advertised in the back of R&T , MotorTrend, etc 
that
was designed specifically to flash a supplemental brake light with a 
variable
frequency and/or intensity based upon the amount of pressure applied to 
the
brake pedal.  It was available in the 60's and 70's I believe possibly 
under
the trade name of "CyberLight" or some similar spelling.  It was 
pre-3rd brake
light legislation and mounted basically where the 3rd brake lights 
would now
be found, in the rear window or on the trunk lid.  I assumed that, 
since this
was all "pre-digital " as well, that the product operated from a 
pressure
switch, either in the brake line or attached to the brake pedal in some
fashion.  I believe that their marketing claimed that cab drivers used 
them to
great effect in city traffic.  I did a Google search, but apparently 
they are
no more, or my memory is bad, but did find a site
http://www.wixtools.com/html/led_lighting.html that offers LED cluster 
bulbs
designed to fit in conventional incandescent bulb sockets, so you may 
be able
to use for increased brightness, though apparently they don't have the
variable strobe effect that older concept offered.  Does anyone else 
out there
admit to being old enough to remember these ads?
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