Selecting, Sizing, and Buying Diodes

[Vinish]

I suspect someone out there knows a lot more about diodes than I do especially since I know very little :) Anyway, I want to put a small fairly dim LED fixture on the vertical roof support on our golf cart. This LED will light up whenever the turn signal blinker is on. Yes, the golf carts here in the Villages, FL all have blinkers, brake lights, headlights, horns, etc. since they are often used for more than just golf and drive around on the regular roads. The turn signal lights on the instrument cluster are hidden by the steering wheel and the turn signals are not self-cancelling. This makes golf carts much like when you are riding with a pack of motorcycles without self-cancelling turn signals... someone always has their turn signal on for miles and miles :).

I plan to put the aforementioned LED in a location highly visible to the cart driver. I only plan to put up one LED on the driver side roof support. I plan to wire this to BOTH turn signal wires so the LED will blink whenever either the left or right front turn signal is blinking. The driver will see this, be reminded that they left their blinker on, and can easily figure out if it is right or left and turn the blinker control lever to the center/off position.

In order to power one LED from both blinker circuits, I need to run each power wire through a diode and then to the LED. If I don't do this, the left and right blinker power will light up both blinkers and this is obviously a bad idea. The voltage in a gas golf cart (which is what I have) is 12 volts DC just like a motorcycle or car. You probably all know this background info better than I do but it can't hurt to provide a thorough description of my problem.

So this brings me to my question. How are diodes sized? I need two of them that will allow the small current necessary to light a small not very bright four LED cluster to pass and will handle 12 volts DC. Can anyone recommend what size diode I need or even how diodes are sized? I would also appreciate any recommendations for places to buy the recommended diodes. Radio Shacks which used to me my go-to place for electronics are all closed in this area.

Thanks for any help you can offer.

G'day,

Vinish

[sformal]

I found it simpler to use the back buzzer... Even simpler, change the flasher to one including its own buzzer.

To answer your question, you need a simple diode 1N4xxx (1N5xxxx) which are sized by Volts (the smaller being 50V, it is ok) and Amps (minimum is 1A). To calculate the amps: Watts divided by Volts.

Perhap a good idea is to use a relay and you can connect something needing more power now (or in the future, we never know in advance what toys we shall install ).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1N400x...purpose_diodes

[Vinish]

Thanks. I don't want a buzzer. The cart is loud enough already and the back up beeper is VERY loud. I have searched all over Google and not been able to find the lights I want. They are very common on carts here in The Villages. A friend told me he bought some at a local Walmart but they did no have them yesterday when I looked. I will try another Walmart. Besides, this is a good excuse to get on my motorcycle and ride :)