Friday, December 28, 2007

Smart Cycle: How To Attach An AC Adapter


One of the top Smart Cycle consumer complaints is that the stationary plastic tot exercise toy operates on batteries. D. Monty "SkyGator" posted the below "How To Hook Up An AC Adapter To A Smart Cycle" on the Amazon consumer feedback forum.

I bought this product for my 5 year old for Christmas. I also hope my soon to be 3 year old will use it at some point. My son played with it for 3 straight hours when he got it. He preferred it over anything else he got for Christmas. Obviously the 3 major positives are the bike's reasonable price, educational games and its physical fitness benefit.

There is however one major flaw with the bike. The new batteries (Duracell) we used went dead after one day. The following day same story, although he may have left it on when he stop using it. I could foresee this getting expensive, so I decided to hook it up to an A/C adapter.

It is fairly simple to do this. Knowing how to use a drill, a screw driver and basic soldering skill is all that is required.

I went to radio shack for the power adapter (6 volt 800 amps) and size N panel mount DC power jack. I also used a little wire I had around from an old A/C adapter I didn't use any more. This all cost about $26.00 plus tax.

The first thing to do is seperate the two halves of the exterior body.

This includes removing the two base stands. After removing all the screws the body easily comes apart.

Then remove the battery compartment cover and any batteries.

Using a drill create a hole big enough to attach the power jack into the battery compartment cover then another smaller hole in the top of the battery compartment to pass the spare wire through.

Attach the power jack then solder the wire to it and then to the connectors on the outside of the battery compartment.

I connected the positive lead to the tip of the power jack as is my preference, however, since the adapter connector can switch polarity this really doesn't matter.

Just remember whether the power jacks tip is connected to the positve or negative lead.

Then I screwed everything back together and gave it a try.

I didn't realize the bike had to be completely connected to start up, so I was a little concerned that it didn't immediately start when I plugged it into the outlet. However once it was connected to the TV it started right away.

My son has been riding for the last two hours with no problems. I hope this helps.

14 comments:

Unknown said...

thanks man, I will definitely try this,

Unknown said...

Thank you so much!

Terry said...

This works great however I can give you a hint how not to have to take out about 20 screws a fight the body of the toy. Take the neck off and in front of the body drill an 11/64 hole. Run the wires through here and fish them up. Cut the black and red power lead and solder the new plug inline. The black and white lead on the plug is the positive lead so solder it to the two ends of the red wire and so on for the negative lead. The plug will be in the front of the toy. There is a indented place on the front that says tip and the + side from the power adapter matches up to this. $25.68 was the total cost of the parts. Here are the sku numbers from radio shack.
Power leads.. 273-1742
power adapter..273-1766.
This is a 6 volt 800 milli-amp not 6 volt 800 amp. Thanks to JOlmsted for the idea on doing this.
I can take a picture and email it to anyone who would like to see where the plug is attached. I glued it in place with a good plastic glue.

BUDA said...

hey terry, can u send me those pix?

Unknown said...

terry,
I don't know what I'm doing. I cut the black and red line and connect it to the AC adapter line. It doesn't work. Can you send me some pictures. Thanks

spiffyrodent said...

Thanks for the help and an old 5 volt 800ma adapter will work also, I just used one from an old cell phone and stripped the wires back and wedged/wrapped them to the + and - battery terminals and used two dead batteries to wedge the wires in to the battery spots on the top and bottom end. I also used some long nose pliers to rip out a bit of the plastic on the battery holder so as to make room for the wire. Then check the polarity with a multimeter before attaching the wires, so as to not get them backwards. or in a pinch attach the wires to a small dc computer fan and if the fan blows air in the correct direction (look for the arrows on the fans outer edge)then you wired it right.

Anonymous said...

Spiffyrodent..be careful to insulate one or both ends of the dead battery with a piece of electrical tape etc. Otherwise the battery because it is conductive and will heat up and could be dangerous.
Don

Anonymous said...

Spiffyrodent..be careful to insulate one or both ends of the dead battery with a piece of electrical tape etc. Otherwise the battery because it is conductive and will heat up and could be dangerous.
Don

Jeff said...

Will a 6V 500mA adaptor work?

Jill said...

Terry, can you send me some pics of this. Thanks!

Unknown said...

Just used this blog to hook up my childrens smart bike with a motorola phone charger and IT WORKS GREAT!! It was a 5v 550ma charger and it seems to do the job, of course this is the older non vibrating smart bike so it probably doesn't use as much as the newer ones that vibrate. Great idea and now I don't have to buy out the store of D cells!

Unknown said...

Can someone send photo on how to connect pls

CuteRimi said...

My son received a Fisher-Price Smart Cycle for a Christmas gift and really enjoyed using it once he got the hang of it. Unfortunately one of the pedals broke (perhaps he was standing up too much or something but it sure doesn't handle the pedal work that a real bike does). I have since purchased a few new games for him including a Spongebob one. The games all help kids lean letters, numbers and shapes.
Sincerely, @Rimi from Best DC Adapter

Robert said...

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