Simple Midnight Security Light

Most thefts happen after midnight hours when people enter the second phase of sleep called ‘paradoxical’ sleep. Here is an energy-saving circuit that causes the thieves to abort the theft attempt by lighting up the possible sites of intrusion (such as kitchen or backyard of your house) at around 1:00 am. It automatically resets in the morning. The circuit is fully automatic and uses a CMOS IC CD 4060 to get the desired time delay. Light-dependent resistor LDR1 controls reset pin 12 of IC1 for its automatic action. During day time, the low resistance of LDR1 makes pin 12 of IC1 ‘high,’ so it doesn’t oscillate. After sunset, the high resistance of LDR1 makes pin 12 of IC1 ‘low’ and it starts oscillating, which is indicated by the fashing of LED2 connected to pin 7 of IC1. The values of oscillator components (resistors R1 and R2 and capacitor C4) are chosen such that output pin 3 of IC1 goes ‘high’ after seven hours, i.e., around 1 am. Midnight Security Light Circuit Diagram: This high ou...