Recycle LCDs Into LEDs

July 21, 2018 by Al Williams 12 Comments

We always find it funny when we see ads for modern LED TVs. These TVs don’t use LEDs to show the picture. They are nothing more than LCD screens with LED backlighting instead of cold cathode fluorescent lamps. [Akshaylals] had a few LCD laptop and phone panels that were defunct and decided to recycle them to get to the LEDs within.

Most panels are lit from one or two edges with a bar of LEDs. You only have to peel off some tape and plastic. If you wonder what all those plastic sheets do, see the [Engineer Guy’s] video, below.

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Arduino Powered Arcade Button Lighting Effects

July 20, 2018 by Tom Nardi 4 Comments

As if you already weren’t agonizing over whether or not you should build your own arcade cabinet, add this one to the list of compelling reasons why you should dedicate an unreasonable amount of physical space to playing games you’ve probably already got emulated on your phone. [Rodrigo] writes in to show off his project to add some flair to the lighted buttons on his arcade controller. (Google Translate)

The wiring for this project is about as easy as you’d expect: the buttons connect to the digital inputs on the Arduino, and the LEDs on the digital outputs. When the Arduino code sees the button getting pressed, it brings the corresponding LED pin high and starts a fade out timer using the SoftPWM library by [Brett Hagman].

It’s worth noting that the actual USB interface is being done with a stand-alone controller, so the Arduino here is being used purely to drive the lighting effects. The more critical reader might argue that you could do both with a single microcontroller, but [Rodrigo] was in a classic “Use what you’ve got” situation, and already had a USB controller on hand.

Of course, fancy lit arcade buttons won’t do you much good without something to put them in. Luckily we’ve covered some fantastic looking arcade cabinets to get you inspired.

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Blinging Buttons For Pick And Place

July 14, 2018 by Dan Maloney 7 Comments

With 3D-printing, cheap CNC machines, and the huge variety of hardware available these days, really slick-looking control panels are getting to be commonplace. We’re especially fond of those nice indicators with the chrome bezels, and the matching pushbuttons with LED backlighting; those can really make a statement on a panel.

Sadly for [Proto G], though, the LEDs in his indicator of choice were just boring old one-color units, so he swapped them out and made these addressable RGB indicators. The stock lamps are not cheap units, but they do have a certain look, and they’re big enough to allow room for a little modification. The original guts were removed with a Dremel to make way for a Neopixel board. [Proto G] wanted to bring the board’s pads out to screw terminals, so he had to adapt the 3.0-mm pitch blocks he had on hand to the 2.54-mm pitch on Neopixel board, but that actually came out neater than you’d think. With a little hot glue to stick it all back together, he now has fully-addressable indicators that can be daisy-chained together and only take up a single GPIO pin.

These indicators and the nice looking panel they’re on is part of a delta pick-and-place robot build [Proto G] has been working for a while. He’s had some interesting side projects too, like the clickiest digital clock in the world and easing ESP32 setup for end-users. While we like all his stuff, we can’t wait to write up the finished delta.

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Custom Circuit Makes For Better Battery Level Display

July 13, 2018 by Dan Maloney 10 Comments

Isn’t it always the way? There’s a circuit right out of the textbooks, or even a chip designed to do exactly what you want — almost exactly. It’s 80% perfect for your application, and rather than accept that 20%, you decide to start from scratch and design your own solution.

That’s the position [Great Scott!] found himself in with this custom LED battery level indicator. As the video below unfolds we learn that he didn’t start exactly from scratch, though. His first pass was the entirely sensible use of the LM3914 10-LED bar graph driver chip, a device that’s been running VU meters and the like for the better part of four decades. With an internal ladder of comparators and 1-kilohm resistors, the chip lights up the 10 LEDs according to an input voltage relative to an upper and lower limit set by external resistors. Unfortunately, the fixed internal resistors make that a linear scale, which does not match the discharge curve of the battery pack he’s monitoring. So, taking design elements from the LM3914 datasheet, [Great Scott!] rolled his own six-LED display from LM324 quad-op amps. Rather than a fixed resistance for each stage, trimmers let him tweak the curve to match the battery, and now he knows the remaining battery life with greater confidence.

Perhaps the 18650 battery pack [Great Scott!] is building is for the e-bike he has been working on lately. If it is, we’re glad to see that he spot-welded the terminals, unlike a recent e-bike battery pack build that may have some problems down the road.

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LEDs Make An “Analog” Wristwatch

July 5, 2018 by Lewin Day 6 Comments

If you just came down in the last shower, you’re probably used to living in a world where LEDs are cheap, awesome, and practically everywhere. Spare a thought for those of us who lived before the invention of high brightness LEDs – these things still amaze us! A great example of how far we’ve come is this “analog” watch build by [Kevin], featuring no less than 73 of the critters.

The microcontroller running the watch is an STM32, chosen for its easy programmability. It’s running the LEDs in an emulation of the dial of an analog clock, hence the high part count. Naturally, it’s no simple task to cram 73 LEDs and all the necessary connections into the confines of a watch-sized PCB. [Kevin] goes into great detail about the challenges involved, from routing the traces to a tricky power draw problem caused by some odd blue LEDs.

Watch builds are always fun, and they make great conversation pieces for when you want to amaze strangers with your tales of battles fought in the PCB design suite. Now check out this similar build with an entirely different style.

Wireless Ring Light For SMD Microscope

June 30, 2018 by Steven Dufresne 4 Comments

When [Felix Rusu], maker of the popular Moteino boards which started life as wireless Arduino compatibles, says he’s made a wireless ring light for his SMD microscope, we redirect our keystrokes to have a look. Of course, it’s a bit of wordplay on his part. What he’s done is made a new ring light which uses a battery instead of having annoying wires go to a wall wart. That’s important for someone who spends so much time hunched over the microscope. Oh, and he’s built the ring light on a rather nice looking SMD board.

The board offers a few power configurations. Normally he powers it from a 1650 mAh LiPo battery attached to the rear of his microscope. The battery can be charged using USB or through a DC jack for which there’s a place on the board, though he hasn’t soldered one on yet. In a pinch, he can instead power the light from the USB or the DC jack, but so far he’s getting over 6 hours on a single charge, good enough for an SMD session.

The video below shows his SMD board manufacturing process, from drawing up the board in Eagle, laser cutting holes for a stencil, pasting, populating the board, and doing the reflow, along with all sorts of tips along the way. Check it out, it makes for enjoyable viewing.

Here’s another microscope ring light with selectable lighting patterns for getting rid of those pesky shadows. What features would make your SMD sessions go a little easier?

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After The Sun Set On San Mateo, LED Takes Over Hackaday’s BAMF Meetup

June 27, 2018 by Roger Cheng 5 Comments

After this Spring’s Bay Area Maker Faire closed down for Saturday night and kicked everybody out, the fun moved on to O’Neill’s Irish Pub where Hackaday and Tindie held our fifth annual meetup for fellow Maker Faire attendees. How do we find like-minded hackers in a crowded bar? It’s easy: look for tables lit by LEDs and say hello. It was impossible to see everything people had brought, but here are a few interesting samples.

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