making my own streetlights

[boppa]

pretty soso pics (my cellphone camera doesnt work so good up close)

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these are streelights I am currently making

the photo's are pretty lousy I know
but the keyboard is to give a scale

197 is an led I fitted to a copper tube (cut the copper tube so the led fitted, the tube will be the - and the + is soldered to the led and a very fine wire run down inside the tubing to be the + wire)

196 shows the overall size
(sorry about the blurryness- my cellphone camera just doesnt like working down this small...)

the streetlight `hood' is one size larger tube- with a fine ( <1mm) cut to fit the led inside
fitted to a smaller sized tube
after the bend (just slightly to the left of the righthand side of the f1 key (does that make any sense??))
to be as close to prototypical as possible you may see the step up in size

this is one of the leds I am using ( there are differnt colours and even different `hoods' that look very much like old fashioned fluro's and those yellow merc vapour lights as well)

[boppa]

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thats the led I am using as a `white light' streetlight (has a slightly blue tint- much like a fluro light fitting)

I have tried several of the amber/yellow ones to use as `freeway' yellow lights- haven't decided on which one looks most `freewayish' as yet tho....

[boppa]

2 more photos

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lit up against my finger(you can see the step up in size against my finger joint down next to the n key if you look closely)

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lighting up the keyboard for scale... thats in a completely black room- only light is from the streetlight itself

(sorry about the quality- the cellphone camera really doesnt work well for stuff like this, but its the only camera I own)

[nachoman]

you should wire them with photo-resistors so that when the room lights go out, the street lights go on.

[boppa]

you should wire them with photo-resistors so that when the room lights go out, the street lights go on.

hmm prototypical ops as well??

I'm actually quite pleased with the end result- and it works out relatively cheap in materials and even in time

I am still trying to figure out how to make working traffic lights as well(in ho the ones I have found are bloomin HUGE)

I have been looking through my electronics cattledogs and think i can make my own much more true to scale

(As some may have guessed- im a electronics type that works with surface mount components- my workbench has a 25x microscope and and rather expensive soldering station that can do from 150w/ 10mm tip down to 4w/.1mm tip )

if your screen is like mine- then the led I used in my streetlight is about half this size ( I ) in height and twice that in width, with the slot cut with a micro grinder in the hood (made of copper tube)

certainly I was impressed by the amount of light they could put out, certainly equal if not better than the old mini grain of wheat bulb's

I was almost tempted to try and do a drivein screen or something like that in them- common sense bashed me over the head tho and said- no- thats not gunna happen...

[jim currie]

http://australia.rs-online.com/web/searc...70&x=0&y=0

thats the led I am using as a `white light' streetlight (has a slightly blue tint- much like a fluro light fitting)

I have tried several of the amber/yellow ones to use as `freeway' yellow lights- haven't decided on which one looks most `freewayish' as yet tho....

sounds like a good idea , the picks are a bit blury but thik i might try some.

if you take the bluish white leds and paint the end with Tamia clear(x22) mixed with clear orange (x26) mixed one drop of orange to 7 to 10 drops of clear the bluish tent tones down.
jim

[boppa]

I have bought several different types- there are a wide range of whites available (6200k to 8200k in several steps)- I chose that one as I wanted a `fluro lamp' look for those lights as used in back streets in Australia which is a very white,with a slight blueish tinge light, and I bought several different grades of yellow/amber as well for `freeway' lights (here they tend to be several different shades of amber, often right next to each other).
It's still just a bit of playing around to see how many differnt styles I can make- I am thinking of making some older styled ones as well with curled support arms on wooden poles- it's all just a bit of fun for me

[shaygetz]

Nice work...

I am still trying to figure out how to make working traffic lights as well(in ho the ones I have found are bloomin HUGE)

I have been looking through my electronics cattledogs and think i can make my own much more true to scale

(As some may have guessed- im a electronics type that works with surface mount components- my workbench has a 25x microscope and and rather expensive soldering station that can do from 150w/ 10mm tip down to 4w/.1mm tip )

Being an electronics type, you could probably simplify how I took a Bakatronics traffic light circuit and modified it to make N scale lights...

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[boppa]

I found some rather nice leds that in ho are almost exactly the same size as the ones here locally, that will be the next lunchtime project (I do all this during my lunchbreak at work LOL) The hardest part will be finding both transformer winding wire with heavy enough insulation and small enough copper tubing for them (the streetlights use 1mm diameter, but that would be oversized for a traffic light post, about 0.6mm dia would be perfect)

[sgtcarl1]

Okay, I gotta admit....I'm VERY impressed by both of you!!!!!

[boppa]

got some very tiny leds, soldered together and made up as a `traffic light' top section (hood)

wiring (common cathode) and a realistically sized `post' still to be sourced

(what I wanted was transformer wire 0.1mm or smaller, enamelled or litnz, both could be used- 10 years ago, I could buy it at any electronics store, now I can only buy it by the 1km roll at several hundred bucks...)

grrr

[boppa]

6mm hood from top light to bottom light (which measured against my local traffic lights is about 25 cm out)

now if I can just find a copper tube small enough for the post, and make some hoods for each of the lamps...

(this is starting to stretch even `my' abilities in the microworld!!!!)

[boppa]

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tries a bucket link?? the hood is the bit i want (the black `post' is a heatshrink so I didnt break the wires off.... and they are 4 times thicker than the ones I want to use...!!!)

2nd try



(sorry for the low quality- but if i go back where my phone camera is clear its a dot, and if i get closer its blurry!!)

[boppa]

I have been asked why I put most of my stuff against my keyboard...

it is (afaik) pretty much a worldwide standard- if my keys are a certain size, then its a pretty safe bet most other peoples keys are the same size

(I simply cant work in inches- and others cant work in mm)
so I like to use a `backdrop' that everyone can relate to

to see a cm/inch comparison to the keyboard



thats my first `aussie fluro streetlight' (now have made 6 in total- with the usual `grey' finish as seen around here for everything but the `cap' thats silver