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How to: Wire 2-6 red LEDs to a home outlet or batteries

C

CaptainKahuna

Platinum Member
I know this is a bit off topic, but I thought this would be a great place to ask about something like this.

I need to wire up 2 to 6 (haven't decided how many yet) small (as small as I can find) LEDs to an AC plug for use in my house. I want to use as thin gauge wire as possible to connect the LEDs.

As reference, I'm trying to decorate KingNothing's rose with red LEDs to make it look more "rose-like". So I want it to be as elegant as possible.

I can handle that though, I just need help as to what parts I need and where to buy them. Thanks.

Note: My experience with this kind of thing is limited, so I need a bit of hand holding. I'm trying to learn by doing here.

EDIT: Would this wall wart from eBay be a good start (after being hacked up). Is 3VDC 1000mA "close" to where I want to be?

EDIT2: How about these red LEDs? Look good?
 
Well, umm.. first you're going to have to convert the AC into DC..... and then reduce it to an appropriate voltage.

May I suggest a 6V wal-wart and some resistors? lol
 
Actually, you can power LED's off of AC, just as long as it's at the appropriate voltage. Obviously the LED's won't like 120VAC, but if you can use a transformer to step the voltage down to, say, 12VAC, then that might be all you need (with the exception of current limiting resistors on the LEDs).

JW
 
Originally posted by: JW310
Actually, you can power LED's off of AC, just as long as it's at the appropriate voltage. Obviously the LED's won't like 120VAC, but if you can use a transformer to step the voltage down to, say, 12VAC, then that might be all you need (with the exception of current limiting resistors on the LEDs).

JW
Click to expand...

Thanks for the help, but I need a bit more hand holding than that 🙂 See my edits to the OP
 
Originally posted by: CaptainKahuna
Originally posted by: JW310
Actually, you can power LED's off of AC, just as long as it's at the appropriate voltage. Obviously the LED's won't like 120VAC, but if you can use a transformer to step the voltage down to, say, 12VAC, then that might be all you need (with the exception of current limiting resistors on the LEDs).

JW
Click to expand...

Thanks for the help, but I need a bit more hand holding than that 🙂 See my edits to the OP
Click to expand...

Working on it as we speak... give me like 10 minutes and I'll see if I can come up with something for you.

With respect to your OP: You'll probably need a wall wart with more voltage, but fewer amps. Something that'll do 5VDC at 500mA should be good for running LEDs. Those LEDs look like they would do the job.

JW
 
Originally posted by: CaptainKahuna
I've got 6VDC at 100mA. Hows that?
Click to expand...

Depends on how many LEDs you want to power. If you're only doing one or two, then 100mA should be plenty. Three LEDs would be the absolute limit for a 100mA power supply. Something like thie one: 6V, 300mA should be what you need for this.

As for how to wire them up, give me another minute or so, and I'll come up with a diagram that should work for you.

JW
 
Did you actually make a rose? Pics? I'm gonna pick up a couple LEDs from Radio Shack tomorrow (today I guess), I'll post pics when I'm done.
 
Originally posted by: KingNothing
Did you actually make a rose? Pics? I'm gonna pick up a couple LEDs from Radio Shack tomorrow (today I guess), I'll post pics when I'm done.
Click to expand...

Making the rose tomorrow, but I'm gonna try to build the LEDs into it somehow, so it looks really nice. So I want to have everything before I start.

Gonna give it to my girlfriend
rose.gif
 
I'm not even sure the LEDs will look nice, it might make it look cheap and the wiring could detract from the clean lines. Try to leave yourself a way to remove them if it doesn't look that great.

BTW, I'm probably going to go for battery power on mine. 4 AAs and a 100 ohm resistor for this LED. That's what my electrical engineering friend told me to use anyway. I don't really like the idea of having to plug the thing in.
 
Originally posted by: JW310
Originally posted by: CaptainKahuna
I've got 6VDC at 100mA. Hows that?
Click to expand...

Depends on how many LEDs you want to power. If you're only doing one or two, then 100mA should be plenty. Three LEDs would be the absolute limit for a 100mA power supply. Something like thie one: 6V, 300mA should be what you need for this.

As for how to wire them up, give me another minute or so, and I'll come up with a diagram that should work for you.

JW
Click to expand...

This circuit diagram should be how you wire the LEDs to the wallwart. That's using the 6V, 300mA wall wart. As mentioned above, using 4 AA batteries would also provide the same voltage you would need to power this. Each resistor is 150 ohms (a commonly available value, as is 100 ohms). To hook it up, what you can do is put the first resistor/LED combo at the end of the wire on the wall wart, then have another pair of wires come out to the next LED, and then wire the next LED/resistor combo at the end of that wire. You can keep adding onto the end of the wires as you need to.

The line on the diagram at the bottom of each LED should correspond to the wire that's on the flattened side of the LED. Make sure you have that wired correctly, or else the LED won't light. If you have everything wired, and the LED's don't light, try flipping them around, and see if that does the trick.

JW
 
Also, depending on how many LEDs you plan on hooking up, you may be able to get away with using a couple 3V lithium batteries such as these: 3V Lithium Batteries to power the circuit. These would help keep the size to a minimum. With using batteries, you'll probably want some sort of on/off switch as well. A switch such as this one from Radio Shack would be a good way to put a switch on it. Just mount it somewhere where it won't be easily seen.

JW
 
Originally posted by: CaptainKahuna
Originally posted by: Ryuson99
also make sure you do your wiring in Parallel that way the intensity won't degrade with each LED you introduce



click here for wiring make sure you do parallel
Click to expand...

Yeah, was already planning on that, thats for the reminder. Bummer is that this will use more wire. Oh well, I'll try to find a way to hide it.

Maybe silver paint?
Click to expand...

you can use 18 gauge speaker wire if you want and also you can tape the whole thing together so that it looks like a singel wire with leds, just make sure you use enought tape to cover it.

painting it silver would hide most of it IMO
 
Originally posted by: JW310
Also, depending on how many LEDs you plan on hooking up, you may be able to get away with using a couple 3V lithium batteries such as these: 3V Lithium Batteries to power the circuit. These would help keep the size to a minimum. With using batteries, you'll probably want some sort of on/off switch as well. A switch such as this one from Radio Shack would be a good way to put a switch on it. Just mount it somewhere where it won't be easily seen.

JW
Click to expand...

After thinking for a while, I think I want to go with batteries. Do I put the 3Vs in series or parallel? It's been a while since I had physics E&M. Can you give me a break down of how many mA/VDC I need for each LED, in case I want to scale to more LEDs? How did you determine the resistor values? Thanks for the help JW, you're input is really helpful.

EDIT: Also, how long do you think those two 3Vs would last?
 
Here is a stupid question:

Since the whole rose is metallic, could you not just use one wire and the rose itself as the other?

-MC
 
Originally posted by: MercenaryForHire
Originally posted by: MattCo
Here is a stupid question:

Since the whole rose is metallic, could you not just use one wire and the rose itself as the other?

-MC
Click to expand...

Yeah, if you never want to touch the rose. 😛

- M4H
Click to expand...

I dont think the voltage/currents we are talking about here would hurt you, would it?
I guess they could test it on the girlfriend first. 😛

-MC
 
Originally posted by: MercenaryForHire
Originally posted by: MattCo
Here is a stupid question:

Since the whole rose is metallic, could you not just use one wire and the rose itself as the other?

-MC
Click to expand...

Yeah, if you never want to touch the rose. 😛

- M4H
Click to expand...


Ever touched metal in a car?
 
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