Anyone work with led's?

[hh_woodworking]

I am working on a sign to point the direction to our High School. It will be in an area the has no power. I was thinking of outlining with Red led's to be seen at night using battery power and solar panel to recharge system. Sign will be V carved in exterior mdf. any thought would be helpful
Ed Harrall

[hh_woodworking]

Here simple sign
5549

[jseiler]

If you don't want to spend a lot of time mucking with the electronics, it would be relatively easy to gut some solar pathway lights or a solar address sign and swap out the white led. Leds have different forward voltages (white and blue being usually higher than red), so you might be able to run two reds in series instead of the one white led. You'll have to hook a voltmeter across the led to find out, or easier yet, just play around because red leds are pretty cheap.

http://www.harborfreight.com/cpi/ctaf/Displayitem.taf?itemnumber=92650

http://www.harborfreight.com/cpi/ctaf/Displayitem.taf?itemnumber=90729

[joewino]

Or you could cover the background with Scotchlite reflective material.

[hh_woodworking]

The sign will be 4'x8' so the harbor freight light will not be enough. Wiring them is not a problem and good for the students to learn on. Just not sure how far apart I need to place them. I found 5mm bright red ones for .12 each in large quantitys.
Thanks
Ed

[myxpykalix]

Ed,
Check this out and start looking under "LED's"
http://www.instructables.com/tag/?q=LED&limit%3Atype%3Aid=on&type%3Aid=on&type%3Aus er=on&type%3Acomment=on&type%3Agroup=on&type%3Afor umTopic=on&sort=none

[butch]

http://www.glowire.com/
and
http://coolneon.com/

I have been looking at the glow wire. I ordered a few feet from Funhouse Productions, www.coolneon.com, to see how it works. I purchased some solar cells to recharge the battery and will see how it works. My idea is to take and carve a V at the bottom of the letters I want to highlight, then lay the firewire in there and light up the letters.Like I said, I haven't used it yet, but excited to try it out.
Butch

[procarve]

reflective vinyl.... brighter and more readable - more reliable - easier - cheaper -

Bill
www.RocketfuelSigns.com (http://www.RocketfuelSigns.com)

[procarve]

also - the glowire states a lifespan of 5600 hours max - that means a little over a year and you will be replacing it - you'll also want to be sure of the minimum bend radius - getting a sharp 90 deg bend is probably not going to be possible

Bill
www.RocketfuelSigns.com (http://www.RocketfuelSigns.com)