LED Cube

[ITman496]

If this isn't the place for it, I'm sorry. I saw LED's in this forums description, realized that I have an interesting LED thing, so I figured that I'd post it. Hope you all like it!


It is a 512 blue led cube, controlled via micro controller, but can tie into a computer through a serial connection.

A lot of work went into this thing. Maybe I should make it out of lasers next time.

If this forum is about led's for use in lighting and not like this then I apologize.

 

[daguin]

VERY cool!

Peace,
dave

 

[ITman496]

Thanks!

 

[AJ_Dual]

Wow. This is indeed right on topic.

How did you make them all individually addressable with them in a cubical grid like th... ah, on closer inspection I see not all the laterals are connected etc. Gotcha.

Now, for your next trick, you need to make a 4096 three-color LED array.

 

[ITman496]

Haha, thanks!

I made them all individually addressable like this:

There are 64 columns going straight up like pillars, each has 8 leds, all the positive leads.

Then, there are 8 layers, where all the grounds are connected.

In order to work it goes insanely fast, and one at a time grounds a layer using two transistors, then sends positive flow up to each column to light up each led. It then turns off, un-grounds that layer, moves up one, repeats. It does this roughly 1000 times a second so that it appears to the human eye that its all lit up at once. It picks and chooses which ones it wants to light up to make the animations.

Oh and oh god.. This was a nightmare to solder. I cringe at thinking of 2 more pins to worry about and.. that would cost a lot. Anyone want to cover the cost of that many RGB leds?

 

[Elektrotechniker]

Everything light related is welcome here It's better than nothing anyway. Excellent thing. Interesting design on that circuit board

 

[ITman496]

Thanks! I was trying to reduce the wiring as much as I could. And make it look awesome at the same time. I think I succeeded.

 

[ARG]

Wow! I had a hard time making a 4x4x4 cube, this is incredible! It didn't end up on an angle either. Good work!

 

[ITman496]

Oh it took much bending to fix the angle issues that I had on the first few layers.. :gun:

 

[AJ_Dual]

Haha, thanks!

Oh and oh god.. This was a nightmare to solder. I cringe at thinking of 2 more pins to worry about and.. that would cost a lot. Anyone want to cover the cost of that many RGB leds?

What's your address?

 

[AJ_Dual]

Just kidding!

 

[ITman496]

Haha, I figured as much

 

[Elektrotechniker]

What if a LED close to the center breaks? :shhh:

 

[LaZeRz]

haha, thats awesome!

+1

 

[HIMNL9]

Just wondering about a 16x16x16 RGB leds cube ..... it must be easy to do, after all there's only 16384 points to solder .....

 

[ITman496]

@silvershot Uh.. well, you invent your way through that when it happens. I had two fail, but they were on the outside.. thank god. You're supposed to test it as you build it, which I did. Every layer you solder you clip a ground lead to and put 3v into each column.

@Himnl Yeah, plus the control board, which isn't a cakewalk either. XD Just imagine how many outputs you need. For monochrome 8x8x8 you need 64+8. For that... 256+16. ._.