anyone electronically knowlegable?

sde · 12-12-2002, 08:09 AM

i need to figure out what i need to make a simple light.

imagine a string of christmas lights, .. that plug into the wall. i need to make something that plugs into the wall with only 1 christmas light on the end of it.

when i figure out how to make one, then i need to make a bunch of them. basically this would just be a light with a plug.

the purpose for this is to program a midi light show without having to run up the electrical bill or setup big lighting trees.

was just curious about that this morning and thought someone might know. i have no electrical wirring experience

w00t · 12-12-2002, 03:10 PM

Do you want tiny led's, small christmas lights, or incandesent light bulbs?

sde · 12-12-2002, 03:37 PM

i need small and cheap .. LED's are pretty =) , .. but this project is low budget, so christmas lights will do... i can't find christmas light fixtures, .. i can only find large fixtures.

i have no clue how i would hook up an LED to a plug . all of these lights need to light up when plugged in.

revolution · 12-12-2002, 05:57 PM

i had to do this type of project when i started out in the industry. Its easy, goto your local electronic shop and pick up a pack of 20 6v LED's, and whatever length of #18 or #20 gauge dual wrapped wire (looks like speaker wire) and a 6v batery. One side is posotive and one is negitive (it doesnt matter which, just keep them the same all the way down the wire) hook up the wire to wire with a LED tied in, which is in parallel. meaning you have two wires and a LED tied together --> two wires and a LED --> two wires and a LED...and so on which will turn out with one wire on each end which you connect to the battery, and the other end tied together themselves. Make sure you wrap electrical tape around the connections or use the small orange 50v wire nuts. If you need to plug it into the wall, it gets a little more complex and there is a little more involved because of getting sockets and your dealing with 120v and not 50v or less which is low voltage. If thats not what you had in mind, let me know

sde · 12-12-2002, 10:36 PM

we definately needed to make something that plugs into the wall.

after running around home depot for an hour or so gathering light fixtures and mounting brackets, .. i had a wild idea....

instead of spending all this money on sockets and lights, .. just buy some crhistmas lights and cut the wires for each light.

well, we purchased 2 plugs. cut 1 christmas light off with 2 wires attached. stripped the end of the wires and attached them to the plug.

ummm... don't do that! both experiemnts we tried bew the lights across the garage.. the second one shot glass into my friends arm and gave him a few cuts

back to the drawing board, .. i think our problem was that 120v thing you mentioned.. i went to the electronics store and purchased a little how-to kit for a micro-processor which includes lots of resistors, potentiometers, and leds... we'll see what kinda trouble i can get into with that =)

Admin · 12-13-2002, 11:51 AM

wear safety goggles