Standard of lighting for modular buildings

[nuno2500]

The Lamp:

How to:

1 - Material: stranded wire / led 3mm yellow / utility knife / Parts LEGO

2 - With a utility knife, a sharp one, stick the wire in half as possible leaving a space between the hole and the tip of the wire.

3 - Insert a terminal of the LED into the hole so it does not come off lose.

4 - Insert the other end the same way. Check polarity.

5 - Pass the other ends of the wires up through the pieces of the lamp.

6 - Carefully put the LED inside the PIN TECHNIC.

7 - Assemble all of the candle.

8 - Use a holder for two AA 1.5 V and connect the wires to the led to the polarity. With this supply voltage (3V) you can check polarity by trial and error. Connecting the two wires, if it fails is because the polarity is reversed and just switch one wire to each other.

My street:

The power flows in parallel from building to building.

Edited May 7, 2011 by nuno2500

[AussieJimbo]

Great little light modification.

Those tiny LEDs work really well.

:classic:

[Lorentzen]

That is pretty friggin' awesome.

How much would that cost to do for maybe ten lamps?

[F0NIX]

Nice modification. This requires no soldering and no modification of any bricks. Well done!

But I'm recomending using a Warm White color, it looks much more realistic.

I have also used LED's in my buildings. Look at this thread about it: http://www.eurobricks.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=47675

And as you see I started of by modify my street lamp posts.

Now I have even tried using a strip of SMD LED inside the buildings. That gives a realy nice effect of interior lightning:

Sorry, I have no images of how I mounted the LED strip inside the building yet, but it is self adhesive and easy to stick to any wall or ceiling. You will find more information about it here.

Edited May 7, 2011 by F0NIX

[Treadwah]

All of the lighting designs and implementations are very impressive; and I hope you don't mind me appropriating a few of the ideas.

I've been ogling the eLite sets as base units. However I did wire up my GE sign with 3 yellow SMDs.

[LEGO Guy Bri]

Great work on this simple light mod. This tutorial makes it look so easy. I may give it a go. I assume the components are from a hobby store?

[BrickUpdate]

This is very helpful - I have been thinking about this topic. Is there an on/off switch here though? Or do you pull the batteries to turn them off? Is there a way to string together multiple lights to one power supply (battery box)?

Thanks!

[Gregorovich]

Those look fantastic! Well done, and thank for sharing.

[Legoist]

Very small, great work! Thanks a lot for sharing your solution!

Nice modification. This requires no soldering and no modification of any bricks. Well done!

Ditto, this is pretty much as essential feature if you ask me

[nuno2500]

All of the lighting designs and implementations are very impressive; and I hope you don't mind me appropriating a few of the ideas.

I've been ogling the eLite sets as base units. However I did wire up my GE sign with 3 yellow SMDs.

Thanks.

I´m here to share ;)

Thanks to everyone.

I´m here to share ;)

That is pretty friggin' awesome.

How much would that cost to do for maybe ten lamps?

Hi. 0.8 € each. Brighter leds are more expensive and last less time.

This is very helpful - I have been thinking about this topic. Is there an on/off switch here though? Or do you pull the batteries to turn them off? Is there a way to string together multiple lights to one power supply (battery box)?

Thanks!

Hi. There are some small switches on electronics stores that fit right into the 2x1 Technic brick hole or into a 1x1 headlight brick.

In my photo, all light are conected to only one power supply on corner building, like this:

In each modular thera are 2 wires that receive power and 2 wires that send power to the next modular. They are not welded too. Conected by hand only.

Sorry for my poor english :(

Nice modification. This requires no soldering and no modification of any bricks. Well done!

But I'm recomending using a Warm White color, it looks much more realistic.

I have also used LED's in my buildings. Look at this thread about it: http://www.eurobricks.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=47675

And as you see I started of by modify my street lamp posts.

Now I have even tried using a strip of SMD LED inside the buildings. That gives a realy nice effect of interior lightning:

Sorry, I have no images of how I mounted the LED strip inside the building yet, but it is self adhesive and easy to stick to any wall or ceiling. You will find more information about it here.

Thanks for your tips.

Great work on this simple light mod. This tutorial makes it look so easy. I may give it a go. I assume the components are from a hobby store?

Thanks.

Yes, they are very easy to find at an electronics store.

Edited May 7, 2011 by nuno2500

[JopieK]

Nice one! But, you should include a resistor.

The voltage of a Yellow LED : 2.10 < ΔV < 2.18

Ohms law says you then need a resistor of 47 ohms when applying 3 volt (2x 1,5V) to it.

[nuno2500]

Nice one! But, you should include a resistor.

The voltage of a Yellow LED : 2.10 < ΔV < 2.18

Ohms law says you then need a resistor of 47 ohms when applying 3 volt (2x 1,5V) to it.

It depends on the LED. Those work near 3 v (2.8). Sometimes i used 2 AA rechargeable batteries supplying 2.8 v.

Any way, my leds have been working 10-12 hours under 3V with no problems.

[Ferrik]

:classic:Look's amazing!

[nuno2500]

Very small, great work! Thanks a lot for sharing your solution!

Ditto, this is pretty much as essential feature if you ask me

Thanks

[lightningtiger]

Excellent work 'nuno2500', though depending on the incomming voltage a resistor is series is needed to restrict the amount of current flowing....you don't want to blow the semiconductor now do you !

I'm going to give these a go when I build my Mega-MOC !

Brick On !

[F0NIX]

This is a good site for calculating the resistor if you use higher voltage then the LED-voltage. http://led.linear1.org/1led.wiz

Todays LED's seem to start emitting light with very low voltage level and the current is very low. But for safety reason I always put on a resistor in series with the LED.

I have tested a bit with different LED's in different colors too. But I like to use the LED with high brightness and a warm white color around 3000-3500 Kelvin (color temperature).

With a brightness around 10000mcd they light up very well and can be seen even in rooms with normal light levels. And in my opinion the reason for having lights in or around a LEGO creation is to make some extra effects when its on display like on shows and events.

I also like to use a fixed power supply since the power from a battery pack does not last long if you got many LED's in your town. Of course you can put many battery packs around in every house or creation...

Has anyone found a clever way to make a connector? Or do you just twist the leads together with no soldering or anything else?

I have up to now used the old 9v LEGO 2x2 connector, then it is a bit easier to connect and disconnect, and easier to use different types of LEGO power supplies. Can even power some LED from the Mindstorm RCX and program them to flash in a specific order if I like to :)

[arator]

Has anyone found a clever way to make a connector? Or do you just twist the leads together with no soldering or anything else?

In Belgium you can buy (or it used to be, long time i've been in a elektro store) these connectors

It is sold as a strip and you can cut off the disired connectors. I think the pictured one is about the size of a 2x2 plate, and 5 plates high

[Rob Klingberg]

These are great discussions! I love seeing the creativity of Lego fans out there. Adding lighting to buildings and trains is a passion of mine, and I am about to start a project to write a comprehensive book on the subject. I've done quite a bit of experimenting myself and have some ideas, but I'd really like to connect with fans around the world who have added lighting to their creations using custom solutions. Specifically, I'd like to gather best practices for things like:

* Mounting lights in small spaces

* Running wires inside buildings so they don't show (building conduits in the walls, etc.)

* Specific types of lights, connectors, and power supply systems used

* Any electric or electronic automation people have implemented in their creations

* Designing for large numbers of lights (i.e., high current applications)

I'd like to start talking with people who have information and advice to share-- again my goal is to collect these into a book that could be shared with the community. And of course I'd love to showcase photos of the best and most creative implementations!

If you would like to participate in this project, please contact me at: rob(at)theklingbergs.com.

Brick (and light) on!

--Rob

[Jed]

What's the heat output of the various LEDs people are using? Anything I need to be careful of?

I'm fancying replacing the lightbrick in my Winter Toyshop this Christmas with something that'll stay on all evening, definitely.

In Belgium you can buy (or it used to be, long time i've been in a elektro store) these connectors

Yep, those are still widely available, or you can buy small covered connector boxes which is safer if anyone's going to be going / playing near the connectors.

Edited May 19, 2011 by Jed

[F0NIX]

What's the heat output of the various LEDs people are using? Anything I need to be careful of?

The heat is so low that you normally do not need to think about it. It is just the brightest and largest LED that are giving of some significant amount of heat.

[Lego Otaku]

I noticed in the first post the picture showed a 1x1 brick with 2 studs on sides. When mounted, it leaves a stud on "front" of the lamp. Maybe some decorative element?

[nuno2500]

I noticed in the first post the picture showed a 1x1 brick with 2 studs on sides. When mounted, it leaves a stud on "front" of the lamp. Maybe some decorative element?

Yes if you want but the true is that the brick modifid 1x1 with stud on one side was not available in the software.

The heat is so low that you normally do not need to think about it. It is just the brightest and largest LED that are giving of some significant amount of heat.

No, there is no problem, even with high bright leds (3 mm)