About LEDs

This page contains an archive of all entries posted to Gadget Master in the LEDs category. They are listed from oldest to newest.

Japan is the previous category.

Light flashers/blinkers is the next category.

Many more can be found on the main index page or by looking through the archives.

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LEDs Archives

September 3, 2007

Build a 7x7 monochrome LED display

Here is the circuit schematic as well as build instructions and parts list for an easy to build 7x7 LED matrix.

LEDs1.JPG

Continue reading "Build a 7x7 monochrome LED display" »

September 6, 2007

The not-so-bright LED night light

From our sister publication Made by Monkeys, a tale of what happened when engineer Dave Johnson felt ripped-off by the purchase of a cheap LED night light. He reconfigured the circuit and turned it into a much more expensive one - but at least it works.

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Continue reading "The not-so-bright LED night light" »

September 18, 2007

White-LED driver: I've got the power!

It seems the stage is set for world domination from the humble LED.

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Continue reading "White-LED driver: I've got the power!" »

September 24, 2007

When high fashion meets electronics engineering

At the height of her career, Marlene Dietrich - that famous woman in trousers - said, 'I dress for the image. Not for myself, not for the public, not for fashion, not for men.'

In an age where skinny jeans reign, and thousands flock to Top Shop hoping to emulate the style icon Kate Moss, dressing for image is a given. After all, wasn't former Givenchy svengali Alexander McQueen christened the 'enfant terrible' of British fashion?

Given the spirit of Gadget Master, we present the work of British fashion designer Hussein Chalayan MBE. Born in Cyprus, the Central St Martin alumnus showcased his Spring Summer 2007 collection which featured a vast array of garments that require an electrical engineer to operate them via a specially designed remote control.

Continue reading "When high fashion meets electronics engineering" »

September 27, 2007

Rainbow LED indicates voltage with colour

Who says you can't have fun with LEDs?

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Continue reading "Rainbow LED indicates voltage with colour" »

October 4, 2007

Fantastic atom expander

The fantastic atom expander produces an "exploding atom" effect using 98 LEDs.

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Continue reading "Fantastic atom expander" »

October 8, 2007

How to build a rotating LED display

Alan Parekh designed a rotating LED display.

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Continue reading "How to build a rotating LED display" »

October 18, 2007

White LED driver provides 64-step logarithmic dimming

This circuit for the white LED driver drives as many as four white LEDs from a 3.3V source and adjusts the total LED current from 1 to 106 mA in 64 steps of 1 dB each.

white%20LED%201.JPG

Continue reading "White LED driver provides 64-step logarithmic dimming" »

January 30, 2008

Les wears his silicon on his sleeve

Looking for cool way of wowing that special someone on Valentines Day? Build her a flashing heart made from LEDs driven by a programmable microcontroller. Les' gadget is simple to build and made from easily-obtainable parts. The unique thing about this design is the LEDs are in an X-Y matrix so each LED is addressable. This allows an unlimited combination of displayed patterns for the heart. Source code and schematics are all available here and if you're not into hand wiring, even the PCB can be had for a small fee. Diamonds may be a girl's best friend but gadgets are forever.

les1.JPG

Continue reading "Les wears his silicon on his sleeve" »

February 13, 2008

Pete decided to give his lamp a facelift

Making an ordinary lamp a work of art

Seeing great potential in a normal, off-the-shelf product, Pete Griffiths designed a circuit he popped into the lamp to give it a new lease of life. His design combines a PIC and three constant current buck converters to create the RGB LED controller. This controller drives the high power 350mA LEDs using PWM to control the LED brightness. By driving the red, green and blue LEDs with varying pulse widths the controller can generate up to 16 million colours using fades, strobe and static effects. Who says you can't give the humble lamp a nip and tuck?

pete.JPG

Continue reading "Pete decided to give his lamp a facelift" »

March 26, 2008

Trip the Light Fantastic with LED Gadget Masters

From their humble beginnings as little red dots that let the user know if household appliances are switched on, LEDs can now be ultra bright light sources capable of lighting up a room or illuminating the road ahead of a vehicle.

High performance LEDs are now being churned out from many manufacturers around the world like they're going out of fashion.

Here is a collection of the best LED gadgets that have made themselves home in Gadget Master.

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Continue reading "Trip the Light Fantastic with LED Gadget Masters" »

April 15, 2008

3D LED cube dazzles in amazing fashion

This little gem from gizmodo.com:

“Seekway has put together this spectacular 3D LED display, which is capable of displaying images in full 3D at an amazing 30 fps."

Continue reading "3D LED cube dazzles in amazing fashion" »

May 8, 2008

Super flashlight: When the humble torch just isn't enough

Thanks to Electronics Weekly's Technology Editor for sending us this gadget.

The super flashlight, from the CandlePower Forums, received rave reviews from visitors to the website. Link includes parts list and build instructions.

super%20flashlight.JPG

Continue reading "Super flashlight: When the humble torch just isn't enough" »

July 16, 2008

LED Jellyfish Mood Lamp

Jellyfish led.jpgWelcome to the "hypnotic, other-worldly appeal of the LED Jellyfish Mood Lamp".

This press release has just caught my attention - a light-hearted one for Gadget master, I thought.

How much of a challenge would it be to recreate such a device?... (The real challenge would be in circulating the jellyfish in an interesting manner, I think, rather than the lighting effect)

The ambient lighting device is described as having a "whisper-quiet" operation and features an auto-off safety function that kicks in after four hours of use.

Continue reading "LED Jellyfish Mood Lamp" »

August 15, 2008

Peter's F1 gantry start-lights race into position

gf aug 08 lights and board.jpg
Peter Griffiths - the man who turned a lamp into a work of art - moves into pole position with the featured Gadget master for August.

Based around LED cluster modules and a microcontroller, the circuit drives F1-style gantry race start lights.

Who wouldn't want to be the race controller, with their finger on the starting switch?

Fully documented in terms of parts and the build process, Peter has provided loads of photos to help navigate construction. And for those of you who don't have access to PCB making facilities, there are photos of building the project on stripboard.

Continue reading "Peter's F1 gantry start-lights race into position" »

October 24, 2008

500 LED 'extreme flashlight'

          Here's one for a Friday afternoon - a homemade 500 LED 'extreme flashlight', or torch, as we would say. As well as its operation, the video covers the build process for this device with 50 watt power consumption at full power.

See also: Electronics Weekly's roundup of content related to LEDs, with a special focus on both white LEDs and coloured LEDs:

LED technology - White LEDs

LED technology - Coloured LEDs

LED technology - LEDs general

LED technology - LEDs Lighting


Continue reading "500 LED 'extreme flashlight'" »

October 28, 2008

Peter plots an LED UFO chaser

      Peter Griffiths - the man who made a lamp into a work of art and turned to LEDs for F1 gantry start-lights - returns with some LED chasing.

This neat little circuit provides 8 LEDs directly driven from the PIC along with a single mode control switch. The firmware described drives the LEDs with a 5 bit PWM signal providing each of the 8 LED channels with four levels of intensity; off, dim, mid, bright. 

A number of sequences are programmed into the firmware to provide some interesting visual effects and chase sequences, including the classic effect seen on the car in the Knight Rider TV series.

Peter says that the design is deliberately simple with each LED being directly driven from a PIC I/O pin.  This and the inclusion of an in-circuit programming header (ICSP) make the circuit ideal for teaching/learning introductory PIC assembly language programming.

However, he writes, if you just want a cool LED chaser without having to write any code, a ready written LED chaser program with fully commented source code and programmer ready HEX files is provided at the bottom of this page.

The circuit has been constructed on a PCB but can easily be built on strip-board, or a solderless breadboard.

Possible apps include an Xmas Tree Chaser and, bending the LEDs through 90°, you have a UFO chaser.


Continue reading "Peter plots an LED UFO chaser" »

November 4, 2008

Ultra-bright and ultra-durable LED bicycle lights

LED mintduo1.jpgAs the last glimpses of autumn sunshine begin to fade into the long dark nights of winter, those athletic Gadget Master readers who avidly insist on cycling to work everyday are presented with a potentially dangerous problem.

When using a vehicle as fundamentally fragile as a bicycle it is incredibly important to both be seen and be able to see when travelling home at 6pm on a dark windy night sometime in late November.

Although bike lights are by no means a new invention and have been used successfully for years, the rapid evolution in LED design means increasingly more powerful and more durable lights can be manufactured.

Enter three bike light hobbyists from Australia who have taken particular advantage of this recent surge in LED design to create their own ultra-bright and ultra-durable light, dubbed the Min-T.

Continue reading "Ultra-bright and ultra-durable LED bicycle lights" »

December 9, 2008

Chipiplexing LEDs

led generic.jpg
We've written about Charlieplexing LEDs before - see Charlieplexing - Cylon-eyes and Holoclocks - but here is a new one: Chipiplexing LEDs!

Charlieplexing is an electronics technique - apparently named after one Charlie Allen, an engineer at Maxim - which minimises the use of I/O pins on a microcontroller to drive a maximum number of LEDs. It drives individual LEDs sequentially, whereas Chipiplexing - a term coined by the author of this Design Idea, from his own nickname - can drive a number of LEDs simultaneously.

With Charlieplexing, for example, using the same pin to alternate between driving digits (cathodes) and segments (anodes), Chipiplexing adds N cheap, bipolar transistors to the mix.

Author Guillermo Jaquenod writes:

Continue reading "Chipiplexing LEDs" »

January 6, 2009

LED Luminaries take a blogging bow

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Gadget Master now has a sister blog - LED Luminaries!
LED-related posts are always popular on Gadget Master - such as the year's most read posts, including such as the 500 LED 'extreme flashlight' and Pete decided to give his lamp a facelift - so do keep an eye on the new blog.

As its strapline says, "LED industry insiders, from Dialight, Carclo, Farnell and SKK Lighting share their insights on the issues shaping the development of LED technology in general and LED lighting in particular."

Posts already on the blog include:

Continue reading "LED Luminaries take a blogging bow" »

January 7, 2009

The Stribe - A DIY LED touch Interface



This one was flagged up for Gadget Master by our Technology Editor, Steve Bush - a Do-Itself-Yourself LED Touch Interface, Hi-Fi style.

Continue reading "The Stribe - A DIY LED touch Interface" »

January 20, 2009

SpikePOV - Bicycle LED persistence of vision

spokepov 2.gifThanks to our Technology Editor, Steve Bush, for spotting this one - SpokePOV, or "persistence of vision for your bike". It's a way to have a bit of fun, driving LED lights to improve your bike's visibility.

According to the website, "Spoke POV is an easy-to-make electronic kit toy that turns your bicycle wheel into a customized display!"

"The project includes a free schematic design, open software for uploading and editing stored bitmap images, and a high-quality kit with all the parts necessary to build your own."

It promises, with one spoke, total persistence at 15mph. Two spokes, 10mph. Three spokes, 7mph. (Assuming a mountain bike wheel).

Details of the specification include:

Continue reading "SpikePOV - Bicycle LED persistence of vision" »

March 20, 2009

White light colour rendering trial circuit

White Light Colour Rendering Trial Circuit 1 small.jpgThanks to Geoff for sharing this circuit with us. He decribes the circuit as "a simple way of panning between led colours, amber and cyan, to give white light with control over how warm it looks".  Will temperature control overcome colour rendering objections, he asks?

He was spurred on by a recent LED Luuminaries post - Why can LED not yet rival halogen?

Check out the two diagrams:

Continue reading "White light colour rendering trial circuit" »

May 7, 2009

Build your own LED cube

led cube 1.jpgThis month's featured Gadget Master is provided by an old favourite of the blog, Peter Griffiths. He shares all the details necessary to build your own 5 x 5 LED cube.

Construct your own programmed light display

Once again, the project is fully documented in terms of parts and the build process, and Peter provides a number of photos to help navigate construction.

The project also includes a ready to program HEX file with some demo cube animations and also the source code. The firmware implements a simple macro drawing processor command set, so if you've got some programming skills you can create your own animations for the cube, says Peter.

Although the project uses a PCB, the original prototype was constructed on a prototype pad board so if you're not able to make your own PCB it's still possible to make this project yourself.

Continue reading "Build your own LED cube" »

May 8, 2009

A DIY LED (SiC)

SiC pic 1.jpgThanks to our Technology Editor Steve Bush for flagging this one - Build a DIY LED - which continues the LED theme nicely, following our Build your own LED cube post.

It is a fascinating article by one Michael T. Lippert about making a light emitting diode from a pin and the mineral Moissanite.

He states that this is Silicon Carbide or Carborundum (compound of Silicon and Carbon - SiC) and that he used a less rare synthetic form of it:
Most of you will know this substance as the black "sand" splinters on sand paper. Due to its extreme hardness it is most often used in abrasive substances and tools. You could easily cut glass with it. I picked up four boxes with 1 cm big crystals for one Euro total on Ebay.

Continue reading "A DIY LED (SiC)" »

May 15, 2009

Cree Q5 LED Super Caplamp

Cree Q5 LED Super caplamp.jpg
A recent Engineer in Wonderland post on the Electronic Weekly Electro-rambling blog mentioned developing an LED helmet for underground cave explorers.

Whereas 'Alice' backed away from this potentially life-critical project - imagine the potential consequences of failure in critical conditions - a reader emailed to flag their own successful builds. These were based a project described on Mine Explorer - see Miles's Homemade Cree Q5 LED Super Caplamp!

As the name suggests, it's based on the Cree Q5, which produces 230 lumens of light when consuming about 3.7 watts of power. As no headlamps were available based on the new emitter, Miles decided to build his own, and he says it wasn't particularly difficult or expensive to do, but there were impressive results.

Continue reading "Cree Q5 LED Super Caplamp" »

May 21, 2009

Peggy 2 LED array becomes animated video




Peggy 2, I love you...

Thanks to our technology Editor, Steve Bush, for flagging this one. It dovetails nicely with our recent Build your own LED Cube post, and involves the programming of a colour LED array. A Peggy 2 LED matrix display, to be precise.

There are 625 LEDs in total, with red, green, blue and white LEDs making some giant pixels, and the idea is to create something approximating video, via animation of the "RGB pixels". Check out the video.

Continue reading "Peggy 2 LED array becomes animated video " »

June 4, 2009

LED Bulbdial Clock shadows the time

bulbdial clock built.jpg
Wow! What a strange but clever idea: a "Bulbdial clock" - applying the principles of a sundial to (adjustable) electric light.

Back in March 2008, David Friedman published the idea on his blog Ironic Sans*.

He writes:


The Bulbdial Clock [pictured, below] has no hands - just one pole in the center of the clock, and three light sources of varying heights which revolve around the pole casting shadows. In the model illustrated above, the light sources are each attached to a ring which rotates around the pole. The innermost ring rotates once per minute, casting a "second hand" shadow. The middle ring rotates once per hour, and casts the "minute hand" shadow. And the outer ring rotates once every 12 hours, casting the "little hand" shadow.
Well, the excellent evilmadscientist.com website picked up this bulb and ran with it, as it were, constructing a working, LED-based bulbdial clock that builds on the original concept.

Continue reading "LED Bulbdial Clock shadows the time" »

July 6, 2009

LED Lightlane increases bicycle safety at night



Bicycles and LEDs are always popular topics for Gadget Master and this one is an excellent combination of the two - LEDs to create a virtual bike path, ie give a visual indication to other road users of the width needed for the bike.

Thanks to Geeky Gadgets for this one. It writes:
This excellent idea was originally a concept in a design competition which we covered back in January 2009 but due to the fantastic response from cyclists all over the world the inventors have decide to produce and market a working product.

Continue reading "LED Lightlane increases bicycle safety at night" »

September 7, 2009

In the (LED) light

bulbdial clock 1.jpgAhead of September's imminent competition post, here is a roundup of some LED related posts on Gadget Master.

They range from a pot-holing cap lamp, and spoke-based bicycle displays, to full LED cube construction and the fantastic LED bulbdial clocks:

Continue reading "In the (LED) light" »

May 22, 2010

Lightsaber - Any colour you like

We've featured Lightsabers before, but no apologies for highlighting this video - a demo of the embedded setup for a Luxeon LED-based Lightsaber.

The creator, NBitWonder, promises complete RGB control to turn the 'blade' any colour you want...



Continue reading "Lightsaber - Any colour you like" »

June 15, 2010

Spinning up time on an LED hard drive clock

Wow. How cool is this? A spinning hard drive that displays the time.

LEDs positioned behind the disk will shine through the cut out numbers in the platter, with a custom controller circuit automatically coordinating the blinking LEDs. These will illuminate the appropriate number windows when they are lined up.

It takes time to warm up - patience, while watching - but when the platter hits the right speed, the time emerges... Magic.



Continue reading "Spinning up time on an LED hard drive clock" »

August 19, 2010

Arduino accelerometer hikes bike safety with LED brake lights



As mentioned in LED Lightlane increases bicycle safety at night we like combinations of LEDs and bicycling on Gadget Master...

Here is another example, drawn to our attention by Electronics Weekly's Technology Editor, Steve Bush. It is the Arduino-based BEBL (Bar End Brake Light).

Continue reading "Arduino accelerometer hikes bike safety with LED brake lights" »

October 13, 2010

LED Wizard calculates resistors and draws schematics

LED Wizard.jpgHere is an excellent resource, certainly worth bookmarking if you are creating your own LED lighting systems - the LED series/parallel array wizard.

It describes itself:
The LED series/parallel array wizard is a calculator that will help you design large arrays of LEDs. The LED calculator was great for single LEDs--but when you have several, the wizard will help you arrange them in a series or combined series/parallel configuration. The wizard determines the current limiting resistor value for each portion of the array and calculates power consumed. All you need to know are the specs of your LEDs and how many you'd like to use.
Check out the screen grab below for our example generation.

Continue reading "LED Wizard calculates resistors and draws schematics" »

November 25, 2010

LED table cards to lighten a reception

LED Wedding Table Cards.jpgHere's another interesting one from the ever-reliable Instructables. It's making your own, LED-based light-up table cards, befitting a wedding reception or special Christmas party or some such...

Materials required include: LEDs, binder clips, poster strips, CR2032 lithium batteries, a polypropylene rod, and paper.

Note that the cards they were inspired, says the creator JerseyJ, by the LED Throwies described by the Graffiti Research Lab.

Continue reading "LED table cards to lighten a reception" »

January 28, 2011

Video: DIY 12-foot LED matrix display

There's no mistaking the messages left in the office by one very ingenuous Gadget Master, "kitesurfer". He has built a 12-foot long and 20" high LED matrix, to display text across 512 blue LEDs, which sit behind some frosted acrylic.

Apparently the display runs the length of his home office and his website gives full details and pictures of the kit, so make sure you check out his website. But note - he stresses this - the rig is not for sale!


Continue reading "Video: DIY 12-foot LED matrix display" »

July 25, 2011

Penning silver ink circuitry

silver-ink penning.jpgHere's one I meant to highlight a while ago, and thanks to Sue P. for flagging it to our attention. It involves a rollerball pen, conductive ink and flexible electronics...

In what would be a dream bit of kit for a Gadget Master, a pen drawing silver ink could be used to draw functioning circuitry on paper and other surfaces, as well as breadboards...

How cool is that?

Continue reading "Penning silver ink circuitry" »

August 3, 2011

Microsoft Gadgeteer takes on Beagle Board and Arduino

FEZ Spider Starter Kit.jpgHere's a piece of news that may be of interest - Microsoft has announced the official launch of Gadgeteer, a set of electronic parts designed to be plugged together to build prototypes or working electronic devices. Remote controlled cars and cameras are given as possible examples.

It is aimed squarely at Gadget Masters - "hobbyists, electronic enthusiasts and educators" - and Microsoft says it does not require any specialist electronics knowledge or soldering. The idea is to make it simple for anyone to quickly design and build their own devices.

The platform is built on the .NET Micro Framework and the small devices can be programmed in the C# language.

Continue reading "Microsoft Gadgeteer takes on Beagle Board and Arduino" »

September 7, 2011

Cycle wheel rims + LEDs == Revolights


How cool is this one? Bikes and LEDs always get Gadget Master's attention!

It's a project, dubbed Revolights, to bring LED lighting to cycle wheel rims, initially inspired by the desire to bring bike lighting closer to the ground. Could it be on the wheel?

This evolved solution certainly looks the part, and increasing side-on visibility can only be good for safety. And the inventors of the patent-pending technology claim it does also help illuminate the forward path...

So, what are exactly are Revolights?

Continue reading "Cycle wheel rims + LEDs == Revolights" »