Wiring illuminated Happ & Atari buttons

[jagnogg]

I am looking for a way to wire some illuminated buttons for the MAME cabinet I am building and I found the following helpful information on a power supply hack for 5V and 12 V connections: http://www.blakesmame.com/power.htm

I'm pretty sure that I understand what I'll need to do, but being an absolute novice when it comes to electricity, I'm a bit nervous about continuing. I've seen others on these discussion boards talk about resistors, amps, ohms, flux capacitors, etc, and that's where I get totally lost.

I have 4 buttons that I'd like to wire up: 2 Happ Illuminated buttons, that are 14V, as seen here:
http://www.happcontrols.com/pushbuttons/710004tx.htm

and two illuminated Atari Start buttons (from an old Millepede cabinet). They say "3V max" on them, I think.

The way I understand it, to connect my Happ buttons, I'd use a Power-Y Splitter and I'd connect the Yellow(+12V) wire to the "+" side on the Happ button's light. Then I'd connect one of the black ground wires to the other side to complete the circuit? (I'm not even sure I'm using the correct terminology here). Then I'd use the other Yellow wire (on the other half of the Y-Splitter) to wire the second Happ button and use one of the ground wires from the same half of the Y. Does this all sound correct? They'd each have their own 12V connection? That won't burn out the bulbs, start my house on fire, or electrocute me will it? It seems like overkill to me, but I'm clueless, as I've said. Could I daisy chain them together somehow and only use one of the Y-Splitter 12V wires? Is that wiring them in series? See - I'm clueless.

As for the "3V max" Atari buttons - Is there a way to use the +5V wires to light both of those? Would I need a resistor? Can I daisy chain the two Atari buttons together?

I'd appreciate any help, and please respond in terms that an absolute idiot like myself could understand.  

- J. Nogg

[MinerAl]

You do need a resistor.  OSCAR told me how to do it back when I blew one up.

Here's the thread.

[jagnogg]

You do need a resistor.  OSCAR told me how to do it back when I blew one up.

Here's the thread.

Thanks for the information. Can anyone else help me out with the wiring of the illuminated happ buttons? Some basic advice would be very helpful! Thanks.

[Ted_Striker]

You do need a resistor.  OSCAR told me how to do it back when I blew one up.

Here's the thread.

Thanks for the information. Can anyone else help me out with the wiring of the illuminated happ buttons? Some basic advice would be very helpful! Thanks.

I really don't think you need any help ....   What you typed above will work just fine.  Sounds like you just need some confidence, your info is solid.  

To wire up the 12V lights, get your Y splitter (this is so you don't lose a power connector on your power supply... technically you don't need it.)  cut off 1 end of it.  tape up the red wire and the black wire next to it (individually,  this is just safety so they don't accidentally short).  Then take the yellow wire to one side of the bulb and the black wire to the opposite bulb.  Then just daisy chain the yellow and black wires from the first bulb to the second and the third etc.  just don't wire the yellow and black directly together or cross them up when daisy chaining them or you can blow the fuse in your power supply.  

Also this is the same procedure to wire up lights in your coin door.  

This info only applies to 12V bulbs and not LED's.  Polarity matters for LED's and LED's require resistors.

[allroy1975]

So..I'm doing the same thing and know just as little as Jagnogg knew.

I have 7 of those Happ Lighted Pushbuttons that I want lit. 

It seems like a bad idea not to have some kind of diode in there someplace. 

will the 14v lights pull so much from the 1 12v wire that it'll noticably dim the lights?  especially if it's a 14v lamp and you're only giving it 12 to start with?

Thanks
Allroy