The best compliments Terry Stiles receives are from customers who wonder why no one invented his wireless taillights years ago.
For Stiles, a rancher and contractor, the Easy On Wireless Tail Lights were invented out of necessity.
Every morning at 7 a.m., his staff would arrive at the shop to pick up a trailer or material and every day he repaired trailer lights while the carpenters, who were being paid $40 an hour, stood around and watched.
It was the same story on his Montana cattle ranch.
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“On the ranch we couldn’t keep lights working on farm equipment,” said Stiles of Malta, Mont.
“Lights are everyone’s biggest headache. There is so much traffic and people don’t pay as much attention as they used to to farm equipment and it’s a big safety concern.”
“The biggest problem with trailers is you can have a trailer light working when you leave home, but it may not be working when you go home. If you have these things stored in your pick up, you can be ready when you go home.”
Stiles won the Best Agriculture Innovation award at the Farm and Ranch show in Edmonton at the end of March. After winning the award in Edmonton, he has been invited to the Farm Progress show in Regina to showcase his lights this summer.
The idea for portable, wireless lights that could be transferred between trailers, tractors, combines or any equipment and would run on a remote signal took about six months to develop and in 2008 he started selling lights.
Stiles finds the parts for his lights from various locations around the world, but the lights themselves are made in Elbow, Sask.
He has made several modifications to the lights since the first prototype, including the addition of three heavy duty magnets that ensure the portable lights stick to anything including cattle chutes, cultivator shakes or on the edge of any metal equipment.
The lights operate with two D size batteries in each light and AA batteries in the transmitter, which is stuck with Velcro to the steering wheel.
A button changes the functions to brake, signal, hazard and running lights.
“When you know you don’t have any lights back there, except these, you don’t have a speck of trouble running them,” he said.
For more information, see www.easyontaillights.com.
