[ 3 / biz / cgl / ck / diy / fa / ic / jp / lit / sci / vr / vt ] [ index / top / reports ] [ become a patron ] [ status ]

2023-11: Warosu is now out of extended maintenance.

/diy/ - Do It Yourself

File: 34 KB, 355x355, 71krYUTyD+L._SY355_.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]

1296446

Anonymous Thu Dec 14 19:33:58 2017 No.1296446 [Reply] [Original]

Greetings /diy/, mind helping me with a christmas conundrum?

I'm making my mom a faux neon sign out of EL wires. The sign itself is 3 words. First one stays lit, but the other two will pulse. It would be greatly preferred if the last 2 words pulses at the same rate but different times. Or rather, when one goes off, the other goes on, and so on and so forth. Lastly, I want to be able to plug this into a wall. So far from what I understand, I need to get

>EL Wires

>9V Driver
https://www.amazon.com/Inverter-Blink-Speed-Brightness-Controls/dp/B00VZH9REM/ref=sr_1_3?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1513297379&sr=1-3&keywords=El+wire+driver

>9v Power Supply
https://www.amazon.com/Planet-Waves-9V-Power-Adapter/dp/B00191WVF6/ref=sr_1_3?s=musical-instruments&ie=UTF8&qid=1513297613&sr=1-3&keywords=9v+300ma+power+supply

I'm kind of retarded when it comes to finangling with electricity, so the best I can think to do is wire them up so each has it's own 12v outlet, and I have to manually adjust the timing of the last two words to get the desired effect, but surely there's a better way to go about this. Help?

>>	Anonymous Thu Dec 14 20:04:40 2017 No.1296459 >>1296446 Use those plug ends that are on xmas lights so you can plug all three plugs into each other.

>>

Anonymous Thu Dec 14 20:07:25 2017 No.1296461
File: 761 KB, 2048x1536, 20150801_185604.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]

>>1296446
Light autist here.

First, I have to say that EL wire probably isn't your best bet for an easy faux neon sign. You should check out side emitting fiber optics. You can use a darlington driver and either a 555 timer or micro controller and you can change the pattern of the lights very easily with that.

Pic related is EL wire.

>>	Anonymous Thu Dec 14 20:16:31 2017 No.1296466 File: 2.48 MB, 4128x2322, 20161117_170831.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] >>1296461 Pic related is the side emitting fiber optics.

>>

Anonymous Thu Dec 14 20:18:33 2017 No.1296469

>>1296461

You've got to give me a little bit to go off of here, I'm sad to say my school taught me absolutely nothing about electronics, and what little I've picked up via hobbies is still woefully inadequate considering where I'd like to be.

So let's try it this way, can you spoonfeed me with (preferably amazon or somewhere that will ship this stuff relatively fast) links to buy exactly what I need, or better yet a tutorial to teach me?

>>

Anonymous Thu Dec 14 20:59:56 2017 No.1296487
File: 564 KB, 2322x4128, 20170409_141217.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]

>>1296469
Might be difficult in a short period of time.

https://www.amazon.com/ULN2003A-High-Voltage-High-Current-Darlington-Transistor/dp/B072JW9DY8/

You can hook these up with a micro controller like an Arduino or a Tiny and make simple code that when the uC goes high on a digital I/O pin it will connect that line to the 12V.

>>	Anonymous Thu Dec 14 21:12:15 2017 No.1296493 >>1296487 Yeah, I certainly decided to dive into this a bit late, so I'll prolly stick with the EL Wire this time, but I certainly intend to play around with SECF in the future, thanks for the heads up!

>>	Anonymous Thu Dec 14 21:19:14 2017 No.1296497 File: 815 KB, 2322x4128, 20171022_173632.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] >>1296493 Unfortunate, but you can still make good faux neon signs with EL wire.

>>	Anonymous Thu Dec 14 22:06:45 2017 No.1296513 >>1296446 I've played with sewing EL wire into clothes. Good times. You need some sort of flip flop controller for word 2 and 3. You'll want to play with timing so that it goes at correct rate... flip flops flip one circuit on while other flops off.

>>	Anonymous Thu Dec 14 22:25:51 2017 No.1296519 >>1296446 Okay, so what is this sign gonna say? Is it laced with profanity? Sexual innuendos? Copyrighted material that will get 4chan shut down via DMCA?

>>	Anonymous Thu Dec 14 23:40:45 2017 No.1296550 >>1296497 >>1296487 Any more pics of these? how were they made

>>	Anonymous Fri Dec 15 02:08:49 2017 No.1296605 >>1296550 Once done a useless box in Arduino, but I'm curious about those transistors and this tour of lights as well.

>>	Anonymous Fri Dec 15 07:55:16 2017 No.1296673 File: 1.00 MB, 2322x4128, 20170919_200349.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] >>1296550 >>1296605 Made by 3D printing and WS2812B LED strips. The Arduino controls the color pattern.