Lights

[idiotflyer]

Hello
I have a small electric modell and I need some lights on it becase i want to fly in the dark.
How chuld I make them?I have 10 dollars so I dont have money to buy them now.

[Norman Adlam]

Hiya,

The simplest, and cheapest lights (but only permanently on) would be a couple of ultra-bright LEDs and a resistor, running off the power pack.

Do you need to know details of values etc? If so you'll need to specify the battery pack voltage you intend to use.

Cheers,

[Mr.RC-CAM]

BASIC LED info for R/C use is described here: http://www.rc-cam.com/led_info.htm

There is an online LED resistor calculator there too.

RC-CAM

[phat23]

Cheap, easy and quick.

I used an old set of Xmas lights, the small ones. I use 3 paralleled sets of 2 lights in series. They only pull .4 amp total and are plenty bright enough. My T-52 has red and green on the wing tips, 2 "landing lights" on each side of the fuse, a white light on the vertical stab and a red light under the fuse.

Cost - $0

[x-boy]

There is a circuit diagram in velleman-kit.com for DUAL WHITE LED STROBOSCOPE.

[Grejen]

If you just want some light up there and are not fussy about color/flash etc, and are handy with a soldering gun you can cabbage one of those bicycle safety flashers. I had one but they can be found at garage sales etc with a broken switch or battery connector.

Take it apart and toss the case, battery holder etc. You should be left with only a small light circuit board with LEDs soldered to it.
Carefully take note of the + and - sides of the LEDs and de-solder them from the board.
Cabbage a dead electric motor for some magnet wire and cut pairs of wire long enough to reach from the Receiver to the wingtip or wherever your putting the LEDs.
Solder the pairs of wire where the LEDs were on the board. Keep them in pairs for each LED.
Solder the LEDs to the other end of your pairs of magnet wire. KEEP track of the + and - and be sure its the same as it was for each LED when they were mounted to the board.
Similarly for the switch. The switch is likely a momentary so you can either replace with a momentary or just leave the pair of wires hanging out where you can get at them.
Solder a suitable plug for the Receiver battery or battery connection from the Receiver to the board. Again + and - are important. Be careful. My flasher was originally powered by a pair of AAA dry cells (3volts) but seems very happy running on 4.8 from the Receiver. I think this is because the small IC on the board is regulating the voltage for the LEDs automatically.
Tape the LEDs lights out to wherever you want on the airframe.
Plug it in and momentarily touch the switch wires or press your switch and it should start flashing.

[Grejen]

Note: I have noticed that the servos faintly chirp as the lights flash so there IS some minor RF noise from the long wires. Twisting the wires may help if this is a problem but solder the LED onto them before so you can keep the + and - correct.

Also: Rather than the IC regulating I'm thinking that the thin magnet wire used is inducing some resistance and is probably reducing the voltage at the LEDs

[idiotflyer]

Thanks

:D :D :D

[Grejen]

Don't forget you need to sand the insulating coating off the ends of that magnet wire. It won't solder if you leave it there.