LED Lighting with RF remote control

[Dale Reed]

Okay, so I was dinking around on Amazon and I found these spools of LED (shipped to my desk direct from China) (300 LEDs for six bucks!!!) :

http://www.amazon.com/Strip-light-Water ... led+lights

And I found these RF remote LED controllers (good for 5V to 24V):

http://www.amazon.com/Controller-Dimmer ... te+control

So, I laid out two same-length strings of LEDs on my M2, wired from the power connector to the LED dimmer, and from the dimmer to the two strings IN SERIES (two 12 volt strings in series, same length, to split the voltage evenly 12 + 12). I cleaned up the desk and the M2, pulled off my old LEDs and mounted the new ones (NO double-face foam tape needed, they are waterproof and have their own adhesive strip on the back). And VOILA!

LEDs at 100% brightness

LEDs100percent.jpg (146.45 KiB) Viewed 26545 times

LEDs at 50% brightness

LEDs50percent.jpg (138.97 KiB) Viewed 26545 times

LEDs at 25% brightness

LEDs25percent.jpg (142.64 KiB) Viewed 26545 times

LEDs off

LEDsOff.jpg (147.44 KiB) Viewed 26545 times

Wiring:
+24 V -------- + IN red [ Dimmer ] red OUT + ------------ + red [ LED Strip #1 ] black - ------------- + red [ LED Strip #2 ] black - ----------- - OUT black [ Dimmer ] black IN - --------------- 24V common


NOW I can see what I'm doing on the first few layers (I also have two 3-LED strips under the extruder fan wired with it), and I can back off the lighting to save energy when I'm not in the room. Plus it's way cool 'cause now I can lose the remote, just like with my TV!

Dale

[Dale Reed]

One more picture: Here's how it looks printing the first few layers with lighting up full:

PrintingWithLEDsFull.JPG (86.15 KiB) Viewed 26538 times

This really lets you see how well the first few layers are put down. If things don't look good here, you can kill the print before you waste a whole lot of filament. Pays for the LEDs pretty quick!
Dale

p.s.: I think that's rsilvers's replacement Z-knob ( http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:266807 ) and Jin's knob stay ( http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:267185 ) for the M2. If I attributed the wrong designers, I apologize. Please reply and set me straight if I got either one wrong.

[jsc]

Looks good. How did you tap power? I did something similar, but plugged into one of the unused MOSFET outputs and dim through PWM.

Dimming is very handy when remote viewing a print through a web cam in an otherwise dark room. Webcam can't deal with too much contrast.

[Dale Reed]

Looks good. How did you tap power? I did something similar, but plugged into one of the unused MOSFET outputs and dim through PWM.

I just wired into the last two terminals (the ones that only have one wire each) on the 6-pin Phoenix connector that powers the RAMBo board. When you first power up, the LEDs come up OFF (though they might blink just a bit to let you know they're working). The little receiver/controller is inline with the wires -- I just tucked it behind the electronics enclosure and tied up the wiring with a nylon wire tie.

Dimming is very handy when remote viewing a print through a web cam in an otherwise dark room. Webcam can't deal with too much contrast.

You'd like this, Jin. The controller has on/off and presets for 100%, 50% and 25% (buttons shown in photos), but it is variable from full bright to almost off in 20 steps using the remote (Bright+, Bright- buttons --- you can just make them out in the "100%" photo in my first post).

And for Rick (or anyone doing a demo) for drawing attention to the M2 at MakerFaires and other events, there are also numerous repeating blink / dim patterns (Mode+, Mode- buttons) that can be adjusted for speed (Speed+, Speed- buttons) via the remote. Sort of like some digitally controlled Christmas lights I bought several years ago. (But I like my Christmas lights warm and steady, for the most part...)

Dale

[markb]

This looks great. I had been thinking about adding some lighting. Your solution looks like a good way to go.

[JonHughes]

I did this too, but used these LEDs. http://www.radioshack.com/radioshack-le ... 0&tab=tab3
They are a bit pricey but warmer and way brighter then the ones mentioned above (which I also tried)
Also added a 3 strip wired into fan1 on a custom fan bracket. awesome super bright

IMG_4049.JPG (95.87 KiB) Viewed 26029 times

IMG_4050.JPG (91.41 KiB) Viewed 26029 times

IMG_4051.JPG (88.26 KiB) Viewed 26029 times

[insta]

Looks good. How did you tap power? I did something similar, but plugged into one of the unused MOSFET outputs and dim through PWM.

I just wired into the last two terminals (the ones that only have one wire each) on the 6-pin Phoenix connector that powers the RAMBo board. When you first power up, the LEDs come up OFF (though they might blink just a bit to let you know they're working). The little receiver/controller is inline with the wires -- I just tucked it behind the electronics enclosure and tied up the wiring with a nylon wire tie.

Dimming is very handy when remote viewing a print through a web cam in an otherwise dark room. Webcam can't deal with too much contrast.

You'd like this, Jin. The controller has on/off and presets for 100%, 50% and 25% (buttons shown in photos), but it is variable from full bright to almost off in 20 steps using the remote (Bright+, Bright- buttons --- you can just make them out in the "100%" photo in my first post).

And for Rick (or anyone doing a demo) for drawing attention to the M2 at MakerFaires and other events, there are also numerous repeating blink / dim patterns (Mode+, Mode- buttons) that can be adjusted for speed (Speed+, Speed- buttons) via the remote. Sort of like some digitally controlled Christmas lights I bought several years ago. (But I like my Christmas lights warm and steady, for the most part...)

Dale

Woah woah woah, you tapped the bed power for these? I would *highly suggest* you do not do that. Even on 24v (although I think you have a 12v system based on that description), the bed draws a lot of power, and you want that connection to be as gas-tight as possible. Please move them to the middle two plugs!

[jsc]

I did this too, but used these LEDs. http://www.radioshack.com/radioshack-le ... 0&tab=tab3
They are a bit pricey but warmer and way brighter then the ones mentioned above (which I also tried)
Also added a 3 strip wired into fan1 on a custom fan bracket. awesome super bright

Those look to be 5050 LEDs, which are brighter than the monochrome 3528s. An interesting fact of 5050s is that they are RGB, which means you should be able to make them any color you want. You will need a specialized controller to change the colors.

(Also, you can get 5m 5050 LED strips off Amazon for cheaper than RS sells their 1m strip.)

[JonHughes]

They are two equal strips wired in series directly to the mosfets 24v main junction block.
Although it doesn't matter which terminals because they are all fed by jumpers from the 1st pair of terminals.

It'll be nice to be able to turn the big strips off once my dimmer arrives. The 3 fan mounted leds will always be on.

[Dale Reed]

Insta,

Negative. I have a 24 volt M2. The power is fed to the far LEFT terminals (bed power) directly from PS, but it also jumpers to the next pair (middle, extruder etc.) and then jumpers to the right-hand pair (electronics power). The LEDs tie into this last pair. There are no more than two wires on any terminal.

The three "users" of 24 volt power from the single power supply are all in parallel, so it doesn't matter where you tie them in on the RAMBo power connector (assuming the wire gauge is sufficient --- we can discuss that in a new Subject --- and the connector will accept the wires) -- but there's no way I'm going to try to shoehorn those wires into the left-hand screws on that little Phoenix connector! I had single wires in the right-hand pair (electronics power), so I tied in there.

Actually, I'm thinking of taking all those big pairs of wires that don't really fit in the Phoenix connector holes all that well and doing all the wire splitting external to the M2, so that there's only ONE (hopefully, 14 AWG or larger fine-stranded) wire in each hole.

And I'm considering removing the Phoenix connectors altogether and working out a way to use 30A Anderson Powerpole connectors to get removable connections -- a much better designed connector for power. The Phoenix connectors are really designed for signal wiring, not power, AFAIK. We use them all the time for control system and industrial fieldbus type connections --- never more than 4A of current.

Dale