DIY LED-Illuminated Sleep Chamber

Bulldozer2003 writes "'Finally something both nerdy AND sexy engineers can do.' It sounds like an oxymoron but this guy took a cue from The Vos Pad and decked out his own dorm room bed with Light Emitting Diodes. They're even fully adjustable 'allowing me to create every color of the rainbow.' Total cost, according to him in an email: 'Around $25, the LEDs cost me about $0.25 a piece in bulk, and the potentiometers cost about $6 a piece from digikey. I got the LM317 voltage regulators as a free sample from Texas Instruments. Lots of companies will ship you free samples, its a good deal for college students.'"

Comments

The LED Pimp Bed...

[truesaer]

...guaranteed to be sex free, no doubt!

It's simple...

[hwoolery]

Step 1: Light up dorm room with ludicrous light display.

Step 2: ...

Step 3: Women!

Reminds me...

[flatface]

Reminds me a lot of this guy's projects. He made some damn cool things out of LEDs there, complete with howtos.

What the guy is probably thinking....

[Neo-Rio-101]

"Why should I go to a club when I can stay at home, avoid long queues, drink cheaper alcohol, set up my own light show, and have the chance to choose your own music?"

ummm.......

Re:What the guy is probably thinking....

[Lumpy]

actually, I did this in the theatre room in the basement for my daughter. spent less than $1000.00 and got enough club effects lights to make it look exactly like a dance club, espically with a xmms vis running on the 10 foot screen.

It's great, the kids all want to come here, I know where she is and I know that there is no booze or other naughty things going on.

(OMFG! I am opressing my daughters right to illegally drink, do drugs and have sex! I am so fricking evil!!)

I remember being a teen, and if my parents made the basement cool at home I would have spent more time there instead of other people's parties.

Re:What the guy is probably thinking....

[Dr. Evil]

I disagree about the immaturity and stupidity part. People forget what it was like to be a teenager. Teenagers do more living between 15 and 16 than most people do between 30 and 40... and I mean that.

The biggest difference between teenagers and adults is that kids have nothing to live for. Yes, nothing. They have some vauge "future" people talk about, but they've always had that, they didn't have to earn it, and it's many times their current adult lifetimes away.

Imagine if you had no money, no house, no reputation, no education, no kids, no spouse... nothing in your life which you've had to earn, nothing in your life which you'd be afraid to lose. Now multiply out your horomones, shrink your freedom to nearly zero... what little shelter, food and money you haev is entirely dependant upon the whims of your parents.

Hiding from unreasonable parents becomes suddenly very important. Suddenly getting a condom or taking a pill becomes very dangerous to your immediate well being... well, for your forseeable future anyways (it's unreasonable to see past 5-10 times your adult life out to age 25 or so)

Giving your kids a place to hang out is great, I think it is a HUGE help. Make sure that if you have multiple kids, you aren't going to create conflict if they don't like hanging out around one another, and as tough as it might be, you've got to accept that they will have sex down there... else they'll just go into the back seat of their friend's car, or to the drunken party down the street. Not supplying condoms down there is using the fear of pregnancy or disease to keep them absinent. That doesn't work.

Obligatory Pun

[nijk]

So do you mean free as in speech, or free as in beer?

HTTPS?

[nick0909]

Are they trying to shoot themselves in the head by using HTTPS?

It sounds like an oxymoron...

[sexysciencegirl]

and it still is, take my word as a girl for it :-)

Re:It sounds like an oxymoron...

[JaJ_D]

errr what? "Sexy engineer" or " sexysciencegirl " :-]

with tongue firmly in cheek
Jaj

[OT] Security Info warning!!!

[advocate_one]

got this for that guy's page...

This page contains both secure and nonsecure items

Do you want to display the nonsecure items

Clicking on no has no major effect that I can discern except for the guy's last box where the "Get Firefox!" icon/image is missing...

Step 2

[Polarism]

Plastic Surgery!

Re:"sexy engineer" (with working link)

[JaJ_D]

the link wasn't working so I'll try again!

Pot signing out

Jaj

Re:Electric bill?

[Gordonjcp]

Practically nothing. The whole thing probably draws less power than one low-energy lightbulb.

Haiku

[Ligur]

Man who lights his bed
with a multicoloured led
will never get head

Re:Haiku

[DJCF]

Ok, no way is that a haiku.

1. A Japanese lyric verse form having three unrhymed lines of five, seven, and five syllables, traditionally invoking an aspect of nature or the seasons.

2. A poem written in this form.

Let me see if I got this right....

[Vladan]

So this light display -- it's like a warning beacon of sorts, right? A light house, if you will, to warn the woman that the sexy guy she met at the club is an engineer and it's time to start preparing her excuses and leave, lest she crash against the inexperienced rock of his virginity.

Samples

[vectra14]

The fact that the writeup included the bit about samples is really kinda dumb. Moderation is key. Samples are great but if every idiot starts sampling everything (which i'm sure will be a side effect of the present article) companies will stop sampling or make it more difficult.

in general, the state of slashdot is shameful these days. i dont have a solution (aside from simple obvious things like submission moderation, etc)... maybe i've just changed enough that it isnt the place for me anymore. which is a shame. cause from my POV slashdot aspires to be about Cool Things. the latest microsoft bug isnt a cool thing. it isnt news. (to adapt what John Stewart said about a transmission from Hussein).

and all of this Geek Nerd etc shit. I think the US population is nuts about trying to group people (including themselves!) into groups of like scales. I havent seen anything like it anywhere else (i live in US and have lived in other places).

anyway what was i gonna say? oh yeah:
to anyone who reads it - if you sample, please, PLEASE sample in moderation so that people that actually build prototypes and such (like *this) continue to have this wonderful resourse availible.

Re:Samples

[Lisandro]

Actually, most semiconductor companies are very liberal when it comes to sampling. TI, for once, ships three samples of almost anything on their catalog, to anywhere over the world, as long as you fill some personal info and state what are you intending to do with the devices (or atleast they used to). They once shipped me a very high quality opamp IC that i turned into a beautiful headphone amp. I can't recall the price, but it's surely wasn't cheap, if not unavaiable.
Maxim does the same, and i got from them a couple of LCD display drivers that would've costed me a sum here in South America.

Of course, they don't want the service to be abused. But for them it's a neat way to do advertising amongst designers (i sure regard both companies better after that) for cheap. Anwyay, 90% has no use for electronic parts anyway, it's not like it's free T-shirts.

Re:Samples

[Ghostgate]

Samples are great but if every idiot starts sampling everything

Every idiot already does. I mean, just listen to the radio. ;)

Re:Samples

[eclectro]

I agree. It's being pretty cheap sampling LM317s when you can get them anywhere, unlike exotic new parts.

But maybe that's why he got them. They are cheap enough to throw a couple to a college student, and TI gets good publicity from it.

I have had mixed luck getting samples in the past telling companies I was a college student. Sometimes I got them, sometimes not. Most companies at the time wanted to know how many thousands you were going to buy. Not if you were doing a college project. My friends had similar experiences. But this was twenty years ago. Things are different now with the internets.

Now I much rather prototype with off the shelf, because that means most likely that the part is widely available and you won't have problems getting production quantities.

It started with PIC (and Dallas) making things easier by selling onesy twosy to anybody.

It paid off by their chips gaining wide popularity.

I also think that is what lead to thicker digi-key catalogs. I remember when they were pamphlets.

Re:with all those lights...

[Bitsy Boffin]

The Cheat throws a pretty good rave.

agh

[miseryinmotion]

I bet his roomate absolutely hates him

Re:agh

[JayTeeUK]

Not as much as his University's network administrators:

"Forbidden
Available bandwidth quota for this filesystem has been exceeded.
(/bkpeters/www/LEDBed/index.html)

Please, try again later."

How long do LEDs last?

[falzer]

25$ for 50,000 hours worth of birth control. What a bargain!

what a dork

[Britz]

what a dork:
https://netfiles.uiuc.edu/bkpeters/www/Prom /imagep ages/image1.html
what a girl:
https://netfiles.uiuc.edu/bkpeters/www/Prom /imagep ages/image11.html
what a dork?
https://netfiles.uiuc.edu/bkpeters/www/Prom /imagep ages/image4.html

Re:Electric bill?

[Lisandro]

Very little. LEDs are very efficient power-wise and suck relatively little current; normal LEDs light at maximum with about 10-15mA, after that
they burn out pretty quickly.

The power depends on the voltage, but, say, if you use a 12v power supply and light a 100 of those you'd be using just a tad under 20 watts. That's less than a cheap bulb, and trust me, it would light just a bit brighter ;)

As a matter of fact, LEDs are quite a neat lighting solution; they're cheap, awfully efficient and have a long working life. The thing is that, atleast until recently, clear light LEDs were unavaiable. Those are hard to make, and even then, white light LEDs are not very pure, color wise. Flashlights are beggining to carry LED diodes, for one.

Re:Electric bill?

[spdt]

Most LEDs operate at a relatively low current (~20mA) and voltage (~3V). This amounts to maybe .06 Watts (60mW) per LED. It looks like he has 5 panels of 4 LEDs and a 6-LED reading lamp, from the pictures; this makes 26 LEDs, consuming around 1.5 Watts in total. This is 1/40th of the power consumption of a single 60-Watt light bulb. If we say that electricity costs $.06/kWh ("US Federal Average"), then it would cost approximately $.09 to run these lights for 1000 hours.

The kinds of LEDs will probably have different operating characteristics than those I have in my head (like those UV LEDs, which are higher frequency -and energy- than I'm used to).

Whatever it is, it will not exceed the power output of the wall wart he's using.

Not true

[Anonymous Coward]

EE Projects got me laid by some pretty damn hot chicks more than a few times - Especially if you offer to "pimp" their room with something cool for fun ;-) ...and no, it's not paying - I would have done it regardless. It's fun to add a vent that'll allow smoking, and put set-up projectors just to play Super Smash Bros on N64 (another chick magnet). Me and my roommate had our dorm on lockdown from day one! Me-Fi-Me!

what the hell has /. become

[DJCF]

Ok, I'm gonna do it. I'm gonna post a "what the hell is this place comming too" post. Jesus, here's some guy who has done a rather awesome thing. Can we please just admire it for what it is without all the name calling? Jesus the tagline is "news for NERDS" - basicly everyone here so can we just stop it with the cheapshots and one-liners? And please, no more smart areses talking about getting laid. With that attitude you never will.

For those who were seriously interested in this project can I refer you to the link a fellow poster posted: it s more interesting.

Re:Electric bill?

[Hognoxious]

The big problem is, they throw a narrow beam of light.

There's these things called lenses that can affect the width of a beam, and some other things called diffusers that you can use to, well, diffuse the light. Oh, and there's reflectors too.

not my cup of tea

[Anonymous Coward]

Sex by any kind of electric light just does not work for me. Gotta be candles, I'm afraid.

Not bad but...

[Len Budney]

Interesting! This guy's project basically connects a dimmer switch each to red, green and blue LED strings. The colors sorta mix, sorta producing colored light, but as you can see in his pictures there are major fringing effects (multicolored bands of light). The howto on this page, suggested by another poster, gives a much cleaner result.

The link above uses a microcontroller and pulse-width modulation to vary each color's intensity, producing a much more even color effect.

Now, of course, I want to redo the apartment with them. Eternal lighting with no more power consumption than a couple of flashlights...yum...

Re:Not bad but...

[Bishop]

For LED control pulse width modulation is the proper way to do it. A dimmer switch is a poor hack, as LEDs are really only on or off. There is very little in between.

You can also make a quick adjustable PWM controller with a 555, a potentiometer, and a comparator like an LM111. (and a few caps, and other resistors) Hook up a 555 in ocsilator mode. Aim for a frequency faster then 120Hz. I would start with 1kHz and see what it looked like. That might be too fast for the LEDs to properly turn off. Connect one input of the comparator to the RC circuit on the 555. Connect the other imput to the sweeper pin on the pot. Connect the pot between Vcc and ground. Adjusting the pot will change the duty cycle of the comparator output from 0% to 100%. You could drive the leds directly from the comparator, but it is better to use a bjt or fet.

Obviously there is some fine tunning that you can do, but that is the general idea.

This circuit is nice because you only need one 555 which can drive many comparators. You only need one pot and comparator per colour of led. The microcontroller is nice because you can preprogram a number of pleasing colours, as well as automatically sweep throught those colours.

LEDs for Barbie house?

[rduke15]

My daughter wants lights in her Barbie house (seriously!), and I thought it should probably be easy with these newer bright LEDs and a battery, but I really know nothing about this.

Wouldn't have thougt of asking /. about that, but since the topic came up...

Anyway, I'd rather find the solution than send my daughter asking that guy for advice... :-)

Can I directly connect these to a battery, or do I need some circuit in-between?

Which sort of LED is it that I want? I mean, how do I recognise and select the right type in a catalogue? Or what more specific keyword do I add to "LED" to find relevant information on Google?

Re:LEDs for Barbie house?

[sifi]

You can use any sort of LED you like - It basically comes down to:
a) The colour you want.
b) How bright you want it.
c) How big you want it.

You shouldn't connect LED's straight to a battery.

You need a series resistor (In between the battery and the LED). The value of the resistor is calculated using

R = (Vb-Vf)/I.

Vb = Battery Voltage
Vf = Forward Voltage (On Data Sheet)
I = Current (On Data Sheet)

so for this 5mm white LED using a 9V battery Vf = 3.6, I = 30mA => R = 180 Ohms.

Make sure that you connect the LED the correct way round (The long lead should be connected to the '+' terminal on the battery, the short lead to one end of the resistor and the other end of the resistor to the '-' terminal on the battery. If you get it the wrong way round it don't worry the LED won't blow up, the LED just won't work!

Good Luck.

Re:LEDs for Barbie house?

[ajs318]

Don't use batteries, they pollute the environment something shocking. Use a mains adaptor instead, possibly even an old phone recharger or similar. Note that the voltage ratings quoted on the label are only for show and don't reflect what your trusty AVO will indicate.

Measure the output voltage, subtract the forward voltage of the LEDs {add together if wiring several in series} to get the "excess" voltage {guess 2V if you don't know it, 3V for blue or white diodes} to find out the excess voltage.

Select a suitable resistor to give about 20mA of current, it is not critical that this be spot on or anything, using the formula R = V / I -- where V is the excess voltage that needs to be dropped, I = 0.02 {because we said 20 milliamps but the formula wants whole amps} and R will be in ohms. Now resistors are made only in certain values, usually multiples of 10, 12, 15, 18, 22, 27, 33, 39, 47, 56, 68 and 82, so choose the nearest; eg. if your power supply is putting out 4.9V and your LED wants 2V, you have to drop 2.9V at 0.02A so R = 2.9 / 0.02 = 290 / 2 = 145, so use a 150 ohm resistor.

Finally, work out the power rating required, by multiplying the voltage dropped across the resistor by the current through it. In this case, P = 2.9 * 0.02 = 0.058 watts, so a 0.25W resistor will do fine.

Each room will need a separate switch and resistor, but if you have the volts available you can put multiple LEDs in series from the same switch. Watch the current consumption doesn't exceed the power supply rating: as you get close to it, the voltage will start to fall and the LEDs will get dim. But power supplies of this kind must be short-circuit-safe by law, so you won't burn your house down even if you do actually overload it.

Re:what the hell has /. become

[eclectro]

And please, no more smart areses talking about getting laid. With that attitude you never will

Dude, this story was posted at 2:39 am.

Need I state the obvious for you???

If we are reading slashdot at 3:00 a.m. in the morning, there is a rather (extremely) high likelyhood that readers here do not have the company of a female.

Unless it's a mother telling us to turn out the lights.

And the score is...

[pylonz]

8 points for creativity 10 points for lustful intentions 1 point for soldering

correction.

[Pandora's Vox]

*looks at linux server in one corner*

*looks at linux laptop as recently reviewed on slashdot*

*looks at LED star canopy over bed*

most girls would run from such things. some have their own, thankyouverymuch :-)

-Leigh

ps. Ubuntu is love.

Check out the LED lights at Fry's

[cyrus007]

Better still, Fry's has Christmas lights made of LEDs going for $9.99 for a box of 50/100, I don't remeber exactly. It has different colors but a constant illumination. Maybe you can just work on it to make interesting things and would be more safe also, and they also provide some warranty too.