Modern Buddy

When braking my brake light is rapidly flickering on/off. Anyone heard of this happening before? Any guesses on what would cause it? My first guess is good LED's gone bad, but that is totally a guess.

Hey, people pay top dollar for brake light modulators!!

But yeah, sounds like either something in the LED module is failing, or there's a bum connection. Follow Michelle's disassembly instructions, unhook the brake/tail light connector, and use a voltmeter to check for a steady voltage. The black wire is ground, so between the black and yellow should be a steady 12v or so for the taillight, and between black and blue you should get roughly the same voltage when the brake is on. If there's a nice steady voltage between black and blue when braking, the problem is up in the LED module. If flaky voltage, perhaps the brake switch is bad.

Skootz Kabootz wrote:When braking my brake light is rapidly flickering on/off. Anyone heard of this happening before? Any guesses on what would cause it? My first guess is good LED's gone bad, but that is totally a guess.

Does it happen when using either brake lever? If only one, could be the switch up in the controls.

Tocsik wrote:

Skootz Kabootz wrote:When braking my brake light is rapidly flickering on/off. Anyone heard of this happening before? Any guesses on what would cause it? My first guess is good LED's gone bad, but that is totally a guess.

Does it happen when using either brake lever? If only one, could be the switch up in the controls.

I'll check that first.
I guess having recently learned a bunch about diagnosing mechanical fixes it's time to start learning some electrical stuff! No rest for the weary

I know on my vintage car this was usually a bad bulb, flasher unit or bad ground. If you have a bulb try using some dielectric grease in the socket
to prevent any corrosion after cleaning any contacts.

Heh, OK totally false alarm. Oops!

I first saw the flickering brake light this morning in the video Eric made of our ride this weekend. But when I took a look at the scooter today everything was working perfectly. Weird. Turns out the flickering was an optical illusion created by the differing frequency of the LED's and the frame rate of the camera! Ha! A total fake out.

Well, at least it was an easy fix!

If you look at your LED's and quickly move your eyes left and right, you'll detect the flickering. I notice it on recent model Cadillacs' tail lights when I'm in my cage.