LED cubes are a pleasing ornament and still something of a talking point, but now they have reached the point of being available as inexpensive kits from China. The simpler ones don’t have quite the cachet they used to. It’s still a project that can deliver a few surprises though, as [Moritz v. Sivers] shows us very well with his glass LED cube. Instead of the usual wire frame construction he’s employed a novel technique of applying each layer of WS2812 LEDs to its own glass PCB.
The PCBs are created with self-adhesive copper foil, cut out with a CNC cutter and painstakingly transferred to the glass substrate with the help of a piece of transfer paper. The LEDs are soldered on, and once each board has been tested they are mounted in the manner of a toast rack to laser cut acrylic corner pieces. There are four layers of 16 LEDs each, which might not make for the largest cube, but still makes for a respectable show. The addressable LEDs take it a level above the 3D matrix type of cube with which you might already be familiar, and the extra time required to load each value into them doesn’t seem to slow the display down.
There are a couple of videos we’ve placed below the break, one showing it in action and the other taking us through the build process. This last one should provide plenty of inspiration for anyone with an interest in creating this type of PCB on glass or any other unusual substrate.
WOaaa, this is awesome.
Weather cube?
Have it display current conditions, e.g. falling rain (blue) falling or windblown snow (white with some side movement).
bright yellow (sunny), cloudy (white on top), etc. white or green layer on bottom for surface temps, red (hot!).
Would love to see something like this done with ITO so the electrical traces are invisible to the eye. Not sure if that can handle the current though.
What does ITO stand for?
Ito was the judge of the first O.J. Simpson trial.
From wikipedia:
Indium tin oxide is one of the most widely used transparent conducting oxides because of its two main properties
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indium_tin_oxide
Now this is art. (But I won’t be buying the soundtrack.)
Would filling it with resin make the plates disappear?
that would depend on the difference between refraction index of the resin and the plates. i’m sure you could find one that matched close enough to not be a problem but at the same time you could just do a dead bug style cube with thin wire and make it easier on yourself.
Came here to say something very similar… pot the entire thing in clear polyurethane and then have a solid LED cube that is easy to build and highly robust.
Go a step further an put a qi and controlling CPU on the bottom layer to make it entirely self contained and waterproof.
…or make it a sphere, put the (tiny) controller on the top, and make Xmas ornaments where power comes from wires wrapped around the hanger..