this is amazingly cool :-)

interesting idea Jeri, have you considered using some conductive thread in place of the ECW, it would increase the flexibility manyfold.

also, i wondered about spin coating the thread on a jig with some sort of insulating plastic such as car automotive sealant (good to a couple KV or so) etc.

One time, in band camp, we made EL Wire.

Very cool, nice work. Begs for a more detailed writeup/vid.

any one else strangely drawn to that green dead pixel?

heh, this gives me a 1337 idea. get some enamelled copper wire and using two out of phase CCFL transformers and drivers run with a differential frequency of 300 Hz make a OAUGDP “plasma” panel.

i think jean-louis naudin did this on a model aircraft but the drag reduction is only a few percent at best, better used for flight surface control… :-)

@biozz Do you mean there was something else apart from the dot going on ??

@incognito53 fapaday.com

what is the lifetime of such wires though ?

whos with me in saying Jeri Ellsworth is the new keri byron for hot shegeeks?
not that keri isnt still hot
awesome hack, why not mix some acetone, goop glue and phosfer into a thin watery paint?

i need some nichrome wire… that stuff is fun

i really wish half the comments on this awesome hack weren’t about the attractiveness of the hacker. HAD commenters: i am srsly dissapoint.

@sneakypoo

Put some hot glue or silicone goop around (and underneath) the transformer in the driver, that should dampen the whine down a lot.

My comment had nothing to do about her attractiveness. It had everything to do with her being brilliant.

For the rest of everyone’s sake, I’m happily married to a brilliant young woman already.

The rest of you are trying to comprehend what Jeri accomplishes with every post, but I’m pretty sure she’s on a completely different level than most of the people here. In fact I would put money on it.

@ Octel- How about you shut up?

The whine referred to in an earlier post, and that heard in the video, comes from the inductors in the drive circuitry. Encasing the inductors in some sort of epoxy or other liquid->solid compound should quiet them nicely. I wonder if the EL wire itself, with the helical wrap she shows here, produces any audible noise, :).

By the way, I love how she makes these excellent drawings to convey her design and ideas, and then tosses them away as though they are pieces of scrap. If a drawing like that came from my hand, I would be babying it in a plastic sleeve rather than throwing it on the floor, :P.

I wonder what’s the max length you can make using this method. I’d imagine the luminosity would drop towards the far end of the wire, if it’s long enough.

hey HaD editors, i thought you are modding the comments to curb racist and creepy sexist shit?

or i guess hackaday finds these comments acceptable?

A human with an X and a Y chromosome is considered male. Just thought I’d point that out.

Physical attraction is entirely normal and acceptable, why shouldn’t someone mention someone is attractive, regardless of sex. It’s only a problem if it’s held in higher regard than any of their other abilities or assumed to be their only worthy attribute. She’s obviously smart, and obviously attractive – that’s fairly acceptable, no?

I think some people on here are over-sensitive, and others are not quite as tactful as they could be. That’s life in general.

..and what about Luminous paint. could you use that as a coating ?

Very cool, I had considered EL wire for backlighting on a laptop keyboad, but it’s too thick. But if I could make my own, and keep it thin then it’s certainly a possibility. Thanks Jeri and HAD for posting! :)
also my eyes kept gravitating back to that green pixel. lol

This is way too cool. I wish there was a way to create individually addressable segments of el wire to create something like those nixie tube VI meters.

It would seem like the ability to modify the wire at this level would put us well on the way.

I noticed that the wire she used was pretty short, but it looked bright, would it get dimmer if the wire was say a few feet long?

@osgeld
Good to know. I actually didn’t look at all, I made a silly presumption that EL wire was one size only. Thanks

yeah, clear heatshrink should work..

interestingly making ZnS:Cu at home is feasible but you need a source of zinc sulphate (made from zinc and sulphuric acid) and hydrogen sulphide (which is highly toxic and flammable!!)
however it does work if you can’t get the phosphors directly.
Supposedly you can also use ground up luminous glow stars or paint, making sure it is the infrared quenched sort not the newer Sr2AlEuO5.

I know now I’m not the only one that thought they had a dead pixel! Lol! We all made a new tab to check and see if it was real! Dammit!