Need Help with LED Light Strip Selection

[nipsmg]

All,

For my Skeeball project, I want to add addressable LEDs for effects.

I'm looking for the following:

• Addressable LED light strips that can be cut to size (and connectors to connect the strips together
• Preferably something that is encased in plastic/epoxy or is impact resistant (if not I'll figure it out)
• Works with an LEDWiz or other LED controller

Can anyone recommend the LEDs, connectors, and which controller I should use?  I'll need a good 30 feet of it.

[05SRT4]

Adafruit has some cool stripes, they seem really expensive though and I am not sure about the compatibility with the LEDWiz

https://www.adafruit.com/category/886

[PL1]

For my Skeeball project, I want to add addressable LEDs for effects.

I'm looking for the following:

• Addressable LED light strips that can be cut to size (and connectors to connect the strips together
• Preferably something that is encased in plastic/epoxy or is impact resistant (if not I'll figure it out)
• Works with an LEDWiz or other LED controller

Can anyone recommend the LEDs, connectors, and which controller I should use?  I'll need a good 30 feet of it.

Not sure about addressable strips or even if the usual arcade-style LED controllers can handle addressable LEDs/strips.   

Sjaak has done some great work with addressable LEDs and Arduinos.



If you want addressable RGB LEDs for the target rings, Sparkfun has WS2812B breakout boards. (Amazon carries knockoffs here)

All you need to string these together is 5v, ground, Data In (DI) and Data Out. (DO)



They are really tiny. (~1/2" x 3/4")   

I'm working on a 3D printed 45-degree mount with 1/2" x 1/2" aluminum c-channel armor similar to the IR sensor mounts.




Scott

[Arroyo]

You can buy any addressable RGB strip that runs on the WS2811 standard and buy the Ultimarc Nano-LED to control it (plays nice with LED-blinky):



[url=http://www.ultimarc.com/nanoled.html]http://www.ultimarc.com/nanoled.html[/URL]

Adafruits “NeoPixel” line of strips is the WS2811 standard not to be confused with their DotStar line which is not.


[url=https://www.adafruit.com/category/183]https://www.adafruit.com/category/183[/URL]

Also you can get cheap strips by searching on Aliexpress.

[JudgeRob]

30 feet isn't too bad.  I would go with the Adafruit ones.  They are really fun to play around with.  You just have to decide on which type.  Some are denser (more LEDs per inch) than others, etc.  Go with the 4-wire type.  You can find cheaper ones from China, but no customer support.  The great thing about Adafruit is their fantastic customer support forums.  They will answer any questions you have and will probably help you write some code for them.  They can be driven by Arduino.  I can help you with some of the coding basics, since I stumbled my way through it a few years back. 

As I understand, Ultimarc has the one driver, but I have not played with it. 

[JudgeRob]

Here are some Adafruit lights I used.  Running off of a Arduino, controlled by an audio spectrum analyzer to sync with music.  These are the 8806 ones, which might have been upgraded by now...

[nipsmg]

Scott, 

Where would you expect to see this mounted?  Just outside the hole on the back with a 45-deg mount?  I know you’re saying it’s tiny, but there is not much clearance between the scoring board and the 100 pt ramps and the center chute.

I’d think weatherproofed addressible LED strips would work, but if wrapped around the inside of the pocket, I’d worry about constant impacts.

Still working out which way I want to go.

[PL1]

Where would you expect to see this mounted?  Just outside the hole on the back with a 45-deg mount?  I know you’re saying it’s tiny, but there is not much clearance between the scoring board and the 100 pt ramps and the center chute.

I’d think weatherproofed addressible LED strips would work, but if wrapped around the inside of the pocket, I’d worry about constant impacts.

I haven't worked out the angles and measurements or made a prototype yet, but it would be similar to this diagram.

- The IR LED and sensor (yellow and green) are mounted under the playfield (gold) on the right and left side of the scoring hole.

- Add a square notch to the bottom of the scoring hole and add two L-brackets covered by PVC tubing (blue)
-- Balls will roll from the rings on the front of the playfield, across the L-brackets, and through the hole.
-- Space between the L-brackets must be wide enough for light from the addressable LED (red) to light the numbers (black) and narrow enough that the ball won't hit the LED.

The last pic shows how the left L-bracket is mounted on the wood playfield to protect the addressable LED -- right L-bracket not shown.


Scott

[PL1]

Here's a better view of the 1-1/2" L-bracket and tubing.

The tubing is cut so the side of the bracket that passes through the playfield is fully covered, but the part above the playfield is only covered on the top side.


Scott

[nipsmg]

You can buy any addressable RGB strip that runs on the WS2811 standard and buy the Ultimarc Nano-LED to control it (plays nice with LED-blinky):



[url=http://www.ultimarc.com/nanoled.html]http://www.ultimarc.com/nanoled.html[/URL]

Adafruits “NeoPixel” line of strips is the WS2811 standard not to be confused with their DotStar line which is not.


[url=https://www.adafruit.com/category/183]https://www.adafruit.com/category/183[/URL]

Also you can get cheap strips by searching on Aliexpress.

Forgive the ignorance on this, but I'm trying to figure out how this works.

If I get 5m (16.4 ft) of WS2811 addressable LEDs, at 30led /meter, that's 150*3 channels, correct?  How oculd I use the ultimarc controller to control that if it only supports 60 channels?

Do I group LEDs together and have them addressed as one led with 3 channels?

[Arroyo]

Forgive the ignorance on this, but I'm trying to figure out how this works.

If I get 5m (16.4 ft) of WS2811 addressable LEDs, at 30led /meter, that's 150*3 channels, correct?  How oculd I use the ultimarc controller to control that if it only supports 60 channels?

Do I group LEDs together and have them addressed as one led with 3 channels?

It’s a good question, here’s the limit of my knowledge on it.  The controller supports 60 channels but with RGB being 3 channels per LED the maximum number the controller will support is 20 RGB LED’s.  To the best of my knowledge if you wanted to use this controller you would need to cut the strip (all strips have cut points usually every 3 LED’s) and run wires with a new controller.  In other words for your application you would need 8 of these controllers for that many LED’s.

You may be able to run the wiring from more than one controller to the inputs at the 1st LED (rather than having to cut the strip).  The answer to that is beyond my knowledge, but I’m sure Andy at Ultimarc could answer the question.

[JudgeRob]

Are your LEDs going to run standalone, or are they going to be controlled by another program (ie like MAME would do)?

It looks like the Ultimarc software can assign separate IDs for multiple boards.  I'm not sure why the channels are limited to 20 RGB unless there is a memory limitation on the boards. 

[nipsmg]

Must be.  I might just go with an arduino board from adafruit that can be controlled via serial-over-usb.  Might make the most sense.

[JudgeRob]

You can get the board from anywhere.  Sparkfun has some nice affordable ones.  The downer is that you won't have a nice easy GUI to run sequences.  You'd have to bust out some C++.  But totally doable depending on what you're trying to do.