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Comments
Karl.A
Dave
That LED in FDR's eye now looks as big as a toaster! I moved a pin beside it and the point on the pin looked like the nose cone of an Atlas rocket. Tomorrow I'll try to flare an .018" tube and bend it in the Ngineering jig.
Steve, this stereo microscope is one price bump up ( maybe $60 ) from your recommendation and it included two of the Barlow lenses ( $96 each? ) and a round mini fluorescent lamp. It was like getting the two lenses for free . . .
Dave, having the right tools is frequently the answer isn't it! Please don't hold your breath waiting for completion though. Who is that said it should be the journey . . . . .
After you got the microscope, do you think it was necessary to bump the magnification up? I am trying the No. 10 lens for the optivisor. I did not want to spend that much money. Amazon had a stereo microscope with less magnification than the one Tim recommended and about half the price. I wonder if that one will work OK.
Nah, I don't think your wife will notice. I am going to do some practice soldering tomorrow or Friday.
Steve
Ngineering's hold down tool is essential, or something similar. 390C for a couple of seconds to tin the wire and 250C for attachment were found to be perfect. In either case, more than a couple of seconds would be too much. I also have a liquid flux that I dab on the wire/LED attach point. It really helps a lot. The work is so tiny I don't trust my normal rosin core solder.
Marty, maybe you could divert your beer money . . .
Respectfully,
John
Brings a whole new meaning to "detail"!!
By the way, what solder did you use?
Bryan, I'd like to see what you have been working on. Could you please lead me to it? I look forward to the higher comfort level you describe. Today, my third attempt and the first lamp construction took all afternoon. I made errors and ruined some of my .018" tubing and .012 stainless wire but I think I've worked out a technique that will work for me. I ended up a couple of hours late for Happy Hour to my chagrin . . . To the extent that I might need to dim some of the LEDs I plan to do it electrically with resistors. I bought the entire range I would need and have a small linear pot that I can use to visually see how much light I want, read the resistance then put a fixed value into the circuit.
Alan and Ken, thank you for following along. I am excited to see how lighting enhances the project. I hope some of you will give me ideas on where to add outside lights and what styles. Please put your thinking caps on for me. I bought "conduit" so I can do the saw shed <?> the way Paul has.
Here is a micro wired warm incandescent LED. It gets totally buried deep up in the lamp shade. There is no need for a nano, in my estimation.
I didn't photograph my progress. I am here to get instruction from you folks, not try to give it to experts. I made too many errors anyway.
Here are a couple of different views.
I should have painted it first but didn't because I was anxious to see how it looked and if it would work out with the two roof lines - it appears that it will easily clear both roofs and is minimally above the top of the door were it to open.
I'll have to paint it with my 00 size brushes. What color/s?
Thank you for looking in, thank you for suggestions and thank you for your patience with my project.
Respectfully,
John
Looks good, very good.
Steve
It took my about four hours to make one gooseneck without the jigs, etc. (I ended up not using it.) i'm told it should take only 30 minutes when you get in the rhythm. So how many more to go? Or, how many more missed Happy Hours?
(BTW: all the beverage funds have already been re-directed to buy more modelling supplies/kits.)
Marty
Thanks for the solder information and for the detailed description of your techniques. It is clear that your stereo zoom microscope has made a significant difference to the ease of fabrication and the consequent results of your lamp building endeavors are really superb. Well done!
My suggestion for shade colors would be white inside and very dark green (or maybe dark grey if you do not like green) outside. That is as I remember that specific style of lamp shade that we still used in industry in the '60's and that had originally been installed pre-WWII. I distinctly recall the inside of the shade being a bright white baked enamel finish (similar to a kitchen appliance of that era).
http://www.sierrawestscalemodels.com/vanforum/discussion/240/tractor-repair-shed-a-mirror-image/p2
There are 8 lights in the structures and 1 flicker in the forge. I used the ngineering products--lights, boards and power supply. I installed a switch on the layout facia.
I plan on lighting up my sawmill. I'll try to do a better job of documenting this one.
Brian, thank you for the color suggestion. As soon as I read your suggestion I thought, "of course". Thats what I'll do - thank you. Here it is without paint.
I changed my mind on soldering these LEDs. Rosin core is not good because sometimes the melted rosin coats the job and makes work critique difficult until it is removed and that is not too easy. I have several low temp solders without rosin for some O scale brass train cars I want to build. It works best for me when I use liquid flux as mentioned earlier and now I use 140C plain solder. It is also best for me when I tin the LED tabs as well as the wire. That causes the solder to flow easily and produce a nice looking result. Having a destination in mind for each LED, I dress the wires appropriately then add a tiny drop of epoxy hoping that might lend a small amount of strength in case I accidentally strain the connection during installation.
This is the best photo I could get with my Canon by simply zooming. The clarity isn't the best but you can see the level of control that being able to see allows.
Bryan, your lighting is exquisite. Your buildings take on a great deal of life. It gives me great motivation to continue. What size LEDs are involved? By all means, please add details to your posts as you continue with your lighting.
I have spent the last couple of days dressing the wiring, trying to figure out how to transition from the hair size wire to the real world and retesting again. At this time my intention is to transition wire size at these small solder pads.
I added over door micro LEDs on the loading dock today and managed to orient them uniformly. As with the others, I am planning to adjust their luminosity as necessary. I think I visualize them as very dim but don't quite have the imagination to visualize in the abstract.
Repeating, I don't want to kill it by over lighting and that's why I plan to bring each LED away separately so that I can determine at a much later time how much to use and conceivably not use some if the visuals dictate.
Suggestions are solicited. Thank you for looking.
I also was wondering if you'd tried looking at using the microscope to help with painting small detail parts or perhaps doctoring any LP you might want in the scene.
I saw the 8200 LED planner at the show a couple of months ago. It looks very nice. I removed it from the large order I made a couple of weeks ago because I felt I am only interested in a couple of LED types and I know how to vary brilliancy. I truly saw essentially no personal gain, as opposed to the microscope. Then again, in choices, certainly beauty is in the eye of the beholder is it not?
I am loving being able to see what I'm doing to the LEDs with the microscope and in particular looking with both eyes.
Respectfully,
John
Thank you for your very detailed "how to" descriptions. This will be a useful tutorial/reminder for me in the future.
I like your solder pads for the wire size junction joint. Do you as yet have any feel for the maximum practical length of #38 magnet wire (assuming, of course, it is properly supported and protected) before you transition to a thicker wire size?
Here is an inspirational build log for shipyard aficionados:
John
Respectfully,
John
I just spent the last three days practicing the techniques for wiring the LED's. There was a lot of learning going on of what would work and what would not work even with the directions supplied by Ngineering.
In trying to tin the magnetic wire, a 30 amp soldering iron did not work. The coating on the wire would not burn off efficiently. I then tried a 40 amp soldering iron with different tips. I thought a smaller tip would work best, but it got to hot. I tried a larger chisel tip and I got the right temperature to burn the wire coating and get the solder to stick. When the bubbled solder on the tip could not be penetrated by the end of the wire, I had to clean the tip on the damp sponge and apply fresh solder to the tip.
The procedure for soldering the wire to the LED as described in Ngineering's directions worked OK. I wish the 12 amp soldering iron had a small screw driver tip instead of the pointed on. Once you have the LED and wire set up in the Ngineering holding tool, a sharp pointed tooth pick sure helped a lot to hold the wire onto the LED while solder was applied. I did use a non rosin liquid flux to apply on the gold solder tab on the LED instead of just relying on the properties of the gold to get the solder to stick.
Even at my age of 72, the optivisor with the No. 10 lens worked OK for me. It would be ideal to have the stereo microscope, but it is just to much money for this one application in the hobby and living on a retirement income.
Before this attempt to solder anything, I have not had much luck in the past with soldering anything.
Steve
This week I have been working on illumination and by today was ready to bring the four walls together at last. In one last check of the LEDs I was horrified to see that the micros under the large awning and above each of the three doors wick light up the interior of the boards immediately above them. Dimming was no help. Not acceptable . . . . They were epoxied in place so I had to dig them out and destroyed them in the process. In the photo below you can see the new scheme - I used lamp shades and attached them so that the rims are parallel to the ground. The first set of LEDs had been mounted above each door frame and right up against the bottom of the awning. This new solution looks better, illuminates better and is a total fix.
In operation it looks like this.
I added another lamp over the large dock level door in the left wall.
I felt that the main office sign deserved to be seen at night.
Tomorrow will be tidy up day and maybe I'll stand the walls. The following day I am leaving town for 8 days.
Respectfully,
John
Dave