On Sep 18, 11:36 am, william perry <[email protected]> wrote: > Hey all, I'm working on a couple of gift projects that have identical > lighting needs. I need to light a couple of large LEDs with a battery > pack and a on/off push button. What I have to work with is a AA > battery for the power source. Any suggestions?
This almost belongs in an electronics group, but here goes: An AA battery obviously supplies only 1.5 volts, but LEDs need different voltages depending on their color- red wants 1.7 or so up to bright white, green, and blue needing 3.4 volts. You'll need to boost the battery voltage just to light the LED (or you could bite the bullet and use more batteries assuming there's room) and limit the current (usually with a resistor) to keep from burning up the LED (and draining the battery). Rather than write a long tutorial I'll refer you to Don Klipstein. He's a reliable authority on matters electrical/electronic and does this better than me anyway- http://donklipstein.com/ledd.html If you absolutely can't fit more batteries in, there's always the so- called "Joule thief": http://www.emanator.demon.co.uk/bigclive/joule.htm High-brightness LEDs will of course drain the battery fairly quickly so make the battery accessible for replacement. I'm assuming you can handle some light soldering? Hope that helped. Mark L. Fergerson -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Papermodels II" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected]. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/papermodels?hl=en.
