Luff
Enlightened
Hi all!
You good people should know that YOU are responsible for my downfall. All I did was a WWW search on flashlights and this forum looked interesting. That was a week ago and now I'm hooked. I've got 18 high power LED's on order, two from the Shack burning on NiCad's just to look at, a Sapphire in my pocket and a Brinkman came home last night. This LED thing has all the markings of a major obsession. Thank you!
This is my first post here and I know it is a bit wordy, so please forgive me this time around.
I intend to build a custom array of 9 Blue-Green 20,800 mcd LED's and mount them in a retrofited lantern case.
Some of you here can probably help me make a couple of decisions based on your experiences. I'd appreciate your input.
I want to use this lantern as both a bright area light (hiking at night, camp setup in the dark, etc.) and as a security light at low level (by the latrine so folks don't fall in). Being bright shouldn't be a problem with the blue-green LED's. Dimming them efficiently, however, is a different story.
If I use a 12 volt power supply (8 AA batteries), and wire each set of 3 LEDs in series so each LED gets 4 volts, I should be able to use one of the dimming circuits OddOne posted on his website at: OddOne White LED Information.
The thing is, I REALLY WANT to keep this thing compact and just use 3 AA's. That suggests I have to put the LED's in parallel and stick the 4.5 volts across them (yep, one resistor for each LED). But, I'm clueless on how to do the circuitry for a dimmer! I'm simply not smart enough to figure out if OddOne's circuitry will work at the lower voltage or what changes would need to be made. I've relentlessly searched the net for an answer to no avail. Maybe you can help.
Since the batteries really only need to make it through weekend campouts, I'm hoping the 3 AA's would have the capacity for about 8 hours of bright use and another 16 to 20 of dimmed use.
I invite you to shoot holes in any of this and will welcome all constructive criticism or suggestions. I'm not doing this for commercial gain, but to provide a specific lighting solution for some Boy Scouts.
This newbie thanks you for taking the time to wade through all this.
Most especially, I want to thank you for kindling this nascent insanity for things LED that's overtaken me ... lordy, I dreamed about the blasted things last night!
Random
<FONT COLOR="#000000" SIZE="1" FACE="Verdana, Arial">This message has been edited by Random on 01-20-2001 at 08:50 PM</font>
You good people should know that YOU are responsible for my downfall. All I did was a WWW search on flashlights and this forum looked interesting. That was a week ago and now I'm hooked. I've got 18 high power LED's on order, two from the Shack burning on NiCad's just to look at, a Sapphire in my pocket and a Brinkman came home last night. This LED thing has all the markings of a major obsession. Thank you!
This is my first post here and I know it is a bit wordy, so please forgive me this time around.
I intend to build a custom array of 9 Blue-Green 20,800 mcd LED's and mount them in a retrofited lantern case.
Some of you here can probably help me make a couple of decisions based on your experiences. I'd appreciate your input.
I want to use this lantern as both a bright area light (hiking at night, camp setup in the dark, etc.) and as a security light at low level (by the latrine so folks don't fall in). Being bright shouldn't be a problem with the blue-green LED's. Dimming them efficiently, however, is a different story.
If I use a 12 volt power supply (8 AA batteries), and wire each set of 3 LEDs in series so each LED gets 4 volts, I should be able to use one of the dimming circuits OddOne posted on his website at: OddOne White LED Information.
The thing is, I REALLY WANT to keep this thing compact and just use 3 AA's. That suggests I have to put the LED's in parallel and stick the 4.5 volts across them (yep, one resistor for each LED). But, I'm clueless on how to do the circuitry for a dimmer! I'm simply not smart enough to figure out if OddOne's circuitry will work at the lower voltage or what changes would need to be made. I've relentlessly searched the net for an answer to no avail. Maybe you can help.
Since the batteries really only need to make it through weekend campouts, I'm hoping the 3 AA's would have the capacity for about 8 hours of bright use and another 16 to 20 of dimmed use.
I invite you to shoot holes in any of this and will welcome all constructive criticism or suggestions. I'm not doing this for commercial gain, but to provide a specific lighting solution for some Boy Scouts.
This newbie thanks you for taking the time to wade through all this.
Most especially, I want to thank you for kindling this nascent insanity for things LED that's overtaken me ... lordy, I dreamed about the blasted things last night!
Random
<FONT COLOR="#000000" SIZE="1" FACE="Verdana, Arial">This message has been edited by Random on 01-20-2001 at 08:50 PM</font>