LED Light strips for night fishing - Now with Pictures!

[cyberflexx]

attached the LEDS to the gutter with the clips for the waterproof strips and the other 2 strips have 3M adhesive backing thats pretty strong. Wired all the negatives together as well.

The top is Blacklight wide the middle is Moonglow blue, and the bottom long strips are blacklight narrow

Notice how we trimmed the edge of the cutter off to make it more of an "L" shape instead of a "[" shape? We thought by cutting that off, it would block some of the light and it made it easier to get the wing nut on the bolt on the upper side.

 

[cyberflexx]

LED 1st light test in the daylight.. making sure my switches work like the should

 

[cyberflexx]

There is 12 volt lighter adapter plug that plugs into the outet behind my drivers seat. this goes to the control box and all the negatives are connected to it and all the postives run through the control box and through the switches

 

[cyberflexx]

Here is a test in the garage. this boat is stored in a friends garage since my ranger is in the garage at the house.

We ended up closing the door and turning off the lights and testing each strip of lights.. the blue by itself really lit up the wall, the UV narrow beam lit up the wall really good by itself, and the UV wide beam lit up closer to the boat but up higher in the air. With all 3 of the strip lights on, the wall was lit up really good at 6 feet, so I figure these would have no problem lighting up the bank for night fishing. All I can say is WOW!..I am impressed for sure.

This is no way completed as I need to clean up the wiring some and I have a couple ideas I am going to add.

Tell me what you think for Version 1.0

 

[cyberflexx]

The back of the gutter where the screws for the light clips are needs to be coated with something as the screw tips are popping through just a tad. I am going to spray flex seal or something on them as I dont want my boat scratched up.

The adhesive that holds the 2 strips without the clips, may need a little help. I am hoping that over 24 hours the adhesive will be stronger but I might have to use hot glue or something to help it stick some.

I need to put the wires in the flex loom to make it all neat

I did not get to make it hinged so I can colapse it for storage as I forgot during the build.

 

[cyberflexx]

If anyone has any other thoughts or ideas for this, let me know..

I'd like to know your thoughts..

Thanks!

 

[highgeardaddy]

Looks like its coming together well.
Can you clarify how you attached the modified gutter bracket to the boat?
How did you make the smooth long cuts to the gutter?

 

[cyberflexx]

Looks like its coming together well.
Can you clarify how you attached the modified gutter bracket to the boat?
How did you make the smooth long cuts to the gutter?

We used a dremel rotary type tool with a cut blade to make the slice in the gutter. We cut it right along the seam so that gave us a straight line to use. Then we used a sander tip and sanded the edge, the best we could..

The way we attached the gutter to the side of the boat was kinda by luck. On the Carolina Skiff J12-16 models, the deck and benches bolt to the gunnel edges. The underside where the gutter is located has the tag end of the bolt with enough threads to screw on a wing nut. We just marked these bolt locations on the gutter, drilled them out, then put the gutter on and tightened it down with the wingnuts. There is 1 bolt on the rear bench and 1 bolt at the front deck that we used, no other supports between these to points and its pretty solid. This idea was a great find as it made these lights easily removable.

I am not sure how I am going to attach them to my Ranger though.. Haven't gotten that far yet.. LOL :lol:

 

[JMichael]

I wonder if putting a reflective coating on the inside of the gutter would add much to the brightness and distance the LED's shined.

 

[TheBreeze]

If anyone has any other thoughts or ideas for this, let me know..

I'd like to know your thoughts..

Thanks!

This project is exactly what I plan to do with my rig for night fishing. I looked at the links where you got your lights and other eBay led's and I'd like to know your thoughts on the RGB strips. If I understand correctly, the ones that come with the remote allow you to pretty much change to the color to whatever, whenever? I really don't have a color preference, but the blue shining from under the top rail down onto the deck looks sharp, but I'm not sure what color would offer enough task light without a glare (if that makes sense). I plan to put some on the outside of the boat also, still in the research stage myself.

 

[cyberflexx]

This project is exactly what I plan to do with my rig for night fishing. I looked at the links where you got your lights and other eBay led's and I'd like to know your thoughts on the RGB strips. If I understand correctly, the ones that come with the remote allow you to pretty much change to the color to whatever, whenever? I really don't have a color preference, but the blue shining from under the top rail down onto the deck looks sharp, but I'm not sure what color would offer enough task light without a glare (if that makes sense). I plan to put some on the outside of the boat also, still in the research stage myself.

I'd be careful on the colors as those bugs will be very annoying. I dont really know anything about the RGB lights and the remote. Becareful of the ebay LEDS that say UV Blacklight, I've read where some vendors sell them that arent really blacklight. I trust the ones from my link.

I'd do some research on light colors and bug attraction before buying anything.. I have my lights down below the edges to keep the bugs low and out of my face.

I havent tried these yet as its been too cold in the nights now..

 

[cyberflexx]

Hopefully I can test these lights this week. I'll try to take some pictures..

 

[RiverBottomOutdoors]

I have 2 Nucli-Eye Atoms in UV mounted to my transom. I use them for catfishing at night. I use UV line that glows in the blacklight/UV. That way, I can turn off all lights except the Atoms.

I will say that the Nucli-Eye products are well built and I can understand the price. These aren't plastic pieces of junk. They are built to last.

 

[Redleg62]

got these off ebay. Just interior lighting for now. Storage areas coming soon. $45.00 or so

 

[cyberflexx]

I've held the Nucli-Eye's in my hand, seen them work, and not saying they are a peice of crap, but I do know LEDs only cost a few bucks each and there is only 6 in each unit, then you have the machining of the metal housing and the nice little jacks and toggle switches and stuff, that still does'nt justify the high dollar price tag. I'm not saying they are junk and no one should buy them. One of my hobbies is electronics and I love to tinker around and make things and I'm just trying to find something a little more in my price point that does the same thing. I'll find out thursday ( weather pending ) how these things workout.

 

[JMichael]

I have 2 Nucli-Eye Atoms in UV mounted to my transom. I use them for catfishing at night. I use UV line that glows in the blacklight/UV. That way, I can turn off all lights except the Atoms.

You're not required to keep a white light/anchor light on when anchored in your state?

 

[RiverBottomOutdoors]

I have 2 Nucli-Eye Atoms in UV mounted to my transom. I use them for catfishing at night. I use UV line that glows in the blacklight/UV. That way, I can turn off all lights except the Atoms.

You're not required to keep a white light/anchor light on when anchored in your state?

Indeed we are. Where I fish and when I fish lends itself to minimal boat traffic so I tend to only cut the anchor light on when a boat is approaching. So, far no ticket.

 

[cyberflexx]

I was able to use these lights last night and all I can say is WOW!.. These work better than what I had expected. I tried to get pictures of the glow and the line with my cell phone camera and the images we just all black. Here are my results.

We tied the boat off to a couple of trees. Once it got dark and our eyes adjusted, we kicked on the wide, narrow and blue LEDS.

We could see stumps out of the water at approx 35 feet and cast to them and see our glowing line with no issue. The blue LEDS lit the bank up at about 80 feet and we could see a little blue light about 15 feet up the tree trunks. After we fished in that location, we decided to see how it would do when we would fish like normal, going down the bank with the trolling motor. We were about 40 feet off the bank and it was perfect. We could see everything and managed to pull a LMB off a beaver hut. At approx 40 feet off the bank, the grass and trees lit up really good too and that's plenty far enough away to fish when going down the bank. We were even able to navigate through some standing timber with no issues.
My friend told me that we could see to fish just as good in the night as we could in the daylight with these turned on.

I HIGHLY recommend giving this a try!

Here are a couple pictures taken from my cell phone. One is of the boat on the water. Looks like there is only 1 light strip on, but all three were on. My cell phone couldnt focus in very well on the light source. The other picture is of my friend about 25 feet away, standing on the parking lot at the boat and ramp, I was on the opposite side of the boat from where the lights were located when the picture was taken.

Tell me what you all think!

 

[JMichael]

Certainly makes his shirt show up well enough but I can't make out anything else like his legs or arms. Is that because of the quality of the pic or could you not see them in person either in that situation?

 

[cyberflexx]

Certainly makes his shirt show up well enough but I can't make out anything else like his legs or arms. Is that because of the quality of the pic or could you not see them in person either in that situation?

Remember, I took the picture with a cell phone, not a high quality camera and I only had the blacklight narrow beams turned on, not the blue or the wide beam blacklights. In person, you can see his pants a little. I should have taken another picture with all the lights turned on but we were eager to get home. When we were fishing, it was so awesome, and could see trees, brushpiles, and the bank really really good. We trolled down the bank as you would when bass fishing, and even stopped to hit a beaver hut and we were about 40 feet from the bank, plenty enough distance for a good cast. We could see pretty much everything.

I highly recommend giving this a try.