Erk, it took me a while to notice that it was a google translation.

My tired brain spent waaaaay too long trying to understand what they were saying.

Posted at 9:10 am on Jan 29th, 2009 by paul

it looks to be retarded
material stress will kill those led connections quickly

Posted at 9:29 am on Jan 29th, 2009 by rasz

Actually, it is dutch…

They are commenting on the original topic, but due to the mistakes in writing and using typical dutch words it will be hard to understand.

small list of dutch translations:
Zoja = if so
Mooizo = Beautiful
brouwseltje = homebrew
toetsjes = buttons
ledhouder = ledholder
zorden(typo)/zorgen = making sure
schakelaar = switch

Hope that will help you a lot :)

Posted at 9:32 am on Jan 29th, 2009 by mr_seeker

Living in a country which uses a language which is not my first language. I use google translate *a lot*… and it can be substantially entertaining.

Posted at 9:35 am on Jan 29th, 2009 by Bhima

@rasz, I wouldn’t go as far as calling it retarded.
Sure the wires on the LED won’t last 500,000 presses like the buttons, but for a hobby project it should work very well.

Posted at 9:48 am on Jan 29th, 2009 by zapwiz

rasz: I can only assume you don’t have a degree in mechanical engineering, so I won’t blame you for a little ignorance.

LED legs are usually made (mostly) of iron, and iron is one of the materials that has a so-called “fatigue limit”, unlike, for example, aluminium.
If you stay below this stress level, the material will never fail due to metal fatigue. This is called the infinite life concept.

Now I don’t feel like calculating the stresses in the legs of the LEDs, but with a very small travel (say, 2mm) and the length and shape of the legs in this example, I think they are well below the fatigue limit.

The only thing I would worry about, are the brittle solder joints.

Posted at 9:57 am on Jan 29th, 2009 by Sparky

I agree with sparky and zapwiz. This is not a commercial solution, but should work well enough for one off devices you build yourself.

With that said, very nice work.

Posted at 10:16 am on Jan 29th, 2009 by tony

@sparky,
very interesting. That’s new to me.

Posted at 10:31 am on Jan 29th, 2009 by Caleb Kraft

one of those genius little tricks I’ll keep up my sleeve. Should come in handy for a custom car headunit.

Posted at 10:36 am on Jan 29th, 2009 by jerm

Hey sparky, Most of my led’s legs are made of copper or brass. I just checked. non magnetic and inside is copper when clipped.

Posted at 10:41 am on Jan 29th, 2009 by fartface

And anyway I’d guess its probably the solder joint that would fail, not the legs themselves. But who cares if its just for a hack, its a neat way to use these components.

Posted at 10:45 am on Jan 29th, 2009 by loststeve

cool idea!

Posted at 11:50 am on Jan 29th, 2009 by plokko

As many have already said, I see stress being a major issue with it. Hate to see what it would do when rapidly pressed. heh

Posted at 11:50 am on Jan 29th, 2009 by weasel

IMHO, after looking at the picture, those LED’s should hold up nicely with the little amount of movement that they will be traveling. They have enough room to move and not have any stress, although i would make sure that the ends are soldered down well enough so that the solder point doesn’t break off if it is a cold solder

Posted at 12:48 pm on Jan 29th, 2009 by pferland

I like the hack where you turn an led into a touch sensor better… not as straightforward though. :P

Posted at 1:19 pm on Jan 29th, 2009 by az1324

Looking at those initially I thought that they were being used like a two-way momentary rocket switch, so pushing the LED up a tad would push one switch, and down, the other…
Evidently not, but I’m sure as hell going to try doing that!

Posted at 1:44 pm on Jan 29th, 2009 by Moggie100

I’m sure you could figure out a way to connect the LED leads to wires to the solder joints. I think it would be a bit more work getting them to stay in the enclosure, though.

Posted at 1:47 pm on Jan 29th, 2009 by hooooooooorj

As a fellow ME, I can soundly agree with what Sparky said above. However, for you nay-sayers, you could easily modify this by making a sharper bend in the led leads immediately upon it passing through the board, thus preventing the led from moving far away from the buttons. Then, instead of using the remaining leads from the LED to connect to the solder point, you simply use a small length of thin wire. This setup would still function properly with no fear of stress on the solder point, although the LED might jiggle around more than you want.

Posted at 1:53 pm on Jan 29th, 2009 by K1ngfunK

neat idea…

Posted at 3:55 pm on Jan 29th, 2009 by fractalrock

hey guys,

I really love that idea but when you thing about it, it does not make sense.

Has a user, would you think of pressing an LED?
The first thing you will think is ” There is not emboss button on the panel, I guest I need to press something else…”

Second, you have your finger over the LED, you won’t even see it light up! :P

Ultra bright LED might and will light up the tip of your finger.

I will try it out.

Posted at 7:44 pm on Jan 29th, 2009 by Jerome

…rocket switch?

Posted at 8:09 pm on Jan 29th, 2009 by strider_mt2k

I really like this. Yes it has a few issues but it’s a good idea. I will try it out next time I build something.

Posted at 8:13 pm on Jan 29th, 2009 by Sammy

funny, I was looking at lighted switches today, snap dome switches and reverse firing LEDS

http://www.snaptron.com/domesdomesstanblserzxqL3159.cfm

and

http://www.aopled.com/index.php?cPath=44_73

(of course this wouldn’t work on perf boards :-)

Posted at 8:21 pm on Jan 29th, 2009 by Andrew

I can’t believe all the hate on a sweet hack!?!

Anyway, as was mentioned, just add some flexible wire, it isn’t rocket science.

I was kind of hoping it was a lighted mini toggle with up and down separate.

My addition would be to glue/epoxy the LED to the button so that you can easily add the flexible wires.

Or better yet, make a hole in the panel large enough to move the LED, but small enough that the LED base can’t make it through. LED restraint problem solved.

Posted at 8:56 pm on Jan 29th, 2009 by nubie

The original poster, as translated from their language even mentioned the possibility of using wires instead.

They also suggested possibly using the LED as an indicator rather than flashing with the button push.

Say, have it latch on or off, depending on the state of the function the button controls?

Posted at 1:15 am on Jan 30th, 2009 by heyallen

Some of the translated sentences are really hilarious. There is clearly space for improvement of the translation software.

Disadvantage: low arch variants are ugly, and pretty costly.
>Disadvantage: cheap variants are very ugly and nice ones are expensive.

You must be a complete fool for something to remember!
>You must be nuts to come up with such a thing!

toetsjes pressure
>pushbuttons

Does there PROF. uit! off
>looks very professional

and legs with transparent varnish
>spraypainted with transparent varnish

Also out for a little less convenient when I dilettante
>can even be done by a less experienced do-it-your-selfer that I am

the best long-lasting I think
>it can last for a long time, I think

would be a pity if this topic depth collapses
>it would be a pity if this topic fades away (or: will get burried)

just a nice clean gatboren (= gat boren)
>just drilling a clean hole

especially for the genes that are not so handy with syringes
>especially for those that are not so handy with (paint)spraying

and you also have generous square holes drilling
>and you don’t have to drill square holes

(yes, this last one is exactly the opposite…)

Posted at 4:30 am on Jan 30th, 2009 by jef

an alternative to this could maybe be to use the LEDs as light sensors as well as light emitters, detecting when one is covered by a finger in order to trigger a response:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/leds_as_photodiode_light_sensors

Posted at 4:34 am on Jan 30th, 2009 by dan

Regarding mechanical durability, leads should be as long as possible (which means smaller deformations). Just coil the “redundant” piece in a manner of a spring.

Posted at 4:35 am on Jan 30th, 2009 by saimhe

an alternative to this could maybe be to use the LEDs as light sensors as well as light emitters, detecting when one is covered by a finger in order to trigger a response:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/leds_as_photodiode_light_sensors

Posted at 4:36 am on Jan 30th, 2009 by dan

an alternative to this could maybe be to use the LEDs as light sensors as well as light emitters, detecting when one is covered by a finger in order to trigger a response:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/leds_as_photodiode_light_sensors

Posted at 4:38 am on Jan 30th, 2009 by dan

Funny how people are so alarmist about metal fatigue then as a solution suggest wires, and what are wires? Thin strands of.. -that’s right- metal.

Incidentally the patent office must have thousands of ways to connect those LED, which nicely gives me an excuse to share this interesting yet deceivingly simple link:
http://www.google.com/patents
Be careful though, it’s a link that can really engross some people and before you know it an hour has passed.

Oh and of course there are ready-made buttons with LED, so this projects is designed to do it on the cheap for people on a low budget, and thinking up expensive fixes is defeating the purpose.

Posted at 5:15 am on Jan 30th, 2009 by Wwhat

very nice.

finally something usefull on hackaday

Posted at 6:03 am on Jan 30th, 2009 by l

there has been extensive ‘research’ on this and other methods over at midibox.org, with a variation of this method coming in over two years ago.
If I remember right, the led leads were bent out, and the led base was epoxied to the button cap, making one unit. wires connected the leads to the pcb. on a midibox, the dout is usually NOT built onto the interface panel, and all of those leds have to be individually wired to the dout board anyway, so fatigue is not much of an issue.

The button caps were taller, such that there was room to cut a notch on top to let the leads out of the sides.

anyway, if you are in need of button making ideas, there is several over there.. check it out.

Posted at 10:37 am on Jan 30th, 2009 by MRE

if project use some micro controller then I would go one step further to eliminate mechanical parts and use LED for output and input

Posted at 1:37 pm on Jan 30th, 2009 by therian

@ Wwhat:

I did suggest finely stranded wire. It is wrapped internally, thus reducing the amount of bending any one strand endures.

Also since the wire is stranded a fatigue forming in one strand doesn’t travel to the next strand.

Also there are special wires designed for flexibility.

Posted at 4:16 pm on Jan 30th, 2009 by nubie

@nubie

I realise that, but I just think the feeling the pins will break in the configuration the guy uses is a bit panicky, and just as wire although it’s metal is pretty bend-proof so I expect is the setup with loops combined with the short traveldistance, but I guess only trial and error can tell, and it’s dependant, how many hundred times you can press it, on the material of the pins of the LED, which I don’t think are always the exact same composition amongst various manufacturers, at least that is my impression from the LED I’ve seen, sometimes the leads seem slightly different in composition to me, but I might be imagining things.

Posted at 8:25 pm on Jan 30th, 2009 by Wwhat

I think the LEDs will survive about a gazillion presses. The displacement is about a mm, or less (depends on how far you have to press the underlying buttons). This millimeter is spread over 3 cm of LED legs. I doubt it will ever break.
Nonetheless, the physics behind metal fatigue are interesting, but that isn’t what this hack is about.

Posted at 12:47 pm on Feb 1st, 2009 by Tom

Next time you see a nice concept like this in dutch, let me know, ill translate it for you guys, could be easier to read for all english-speaking (reading) readers.
Btw, nice project.

Posted at 4:58 am on Feb 2nd, 2009 by S_aver

just curious, this is from 2007, how come it took so long to show up here…..maybe Ted Stevens emails clogging the nets?

Posted at 12:00 am on Sep 16th, 2009 by 3Djesus