RGB PF insert lighting board (7 colours)

[swinks]

I have been wanting to design and make this board for a while and quietly working away at it. This little board could be used as an option to replace the light socket and globe / coloured led that lights up inserts in a playfield as well as use in mods or tricky places needing some extra light as the board is fairly small. This can be used in many games like 80's & 90's SS and DMD games and requires no programming (but a little soldering).

- it measures 14mm x 39mm
- it has a 1/2" and 3/4" mounting holes from the light source (centre to centre) to be used in most existing globe holder holes in playfields
- it has a 3 position dip switch that faces the operator when you have the playfield up allowing you to quickly choose 1 of the 7 colours - red, green, blue, cyan, magenta, orange / yellow (sort of a mix), and white (the dip switch will be a slimmer design for the production run)
- it is connected via 6.3 vdc and even though + and - are defined I had an extra component put in meaning that it technically does not matter which way the wires are connected so still allows the board / rgb to work even in reverse polarity.
- using a super bright rgb with 50000hr life expectancy.
- soldering experience required

So now with one of these boards you can select 1 of 7 different colours without having an arsenal of leds in a tray as spares.

Price will be dependent on interest.

Anyway thought it would be fun to share and Adam was kind enough to check them out and test, and he said just one led on this insert was brighter than the x wing inserts that had a regular ghost buster led / globe holder so they light up a insert well.

These are still under going some testing and then depends on interest will determine if these are sold.

photo 1 shows old and new setup (a spacer & screw would be included to offset it from the playfield)
photo 2 shows some of the colours
photo 3 shows the boards used in a prototype stern apron light bar allowing some additional GI in 1 of 7 colours of mix it up

[Cursed]

Awesome job Jady, they look great

[Crashramp]

These things sure throw out a lot of light. My pics don't really show how bright and vibrant the colours are but as Jady said, compared to the other LED lights around it, these were definatly brighter.

If you can solder they are an easy install as well, pretty much idiot proof actually. It doesn't matter which way you wire them they still work. Once installed I had good fun trying out the different colours at the flick of a switch.

Great design Jady. 

[swinks]

here is a early v1 design in a 3D box with different colour inserts to show the concept of quick changing of light colours and the effects it has with different coloured inserts. The video doesn't quite show the colours the best but you can see the colour shining on my hand.

[swinks]

These things sure throw out a lot of light. My pics don't really show how bright and vibrant the colours are but as Jady said, compared to the other LED lights around it, these were definatly brighter.

If you can solder they are an easy install as well, pretty much idiot proof actually. It doesn't matter which way you wire them they still work. Once installed I had good fun trying out the different colours at the flick of a switch.

Great design Jady.  

cheers mate, glad you like them, and for the record I allowed Crashramp to be super honest and give what ever feedback he liked, and if there was any we would of then went back to the drawing board on version 4, but I am pretty happy with these and will do some comparison shots of a few installed in my CFTBL soon.

thanks again  

[pinball god]

The big question Jady is price. How do they compare to standard leds price wise and if more expensive, what do they provide to warrant the extra expenditure? Would dumping the dip sw and colour changing option make them more attractive price wise or will that make it pointless as an alternative?

I can see a real use under star rollovers or inserts near flipper mechs where I worry about the light sockets maybe touching metals parts.

[andypinboy]

Swinksy I love the colour changing ability - I actually switch my insert colours around now & then (espcly white, blue, purple). Price is big ? as PG noted - definitely interested in giving it a try. Is the white warm or cold?

[swinks]

If I were to get 1000 the price would be equivalent roughly to a led and globe holder roughly give or take $0.50. It was more of an idea and a challenge to design a working small electronic component myself.

The dip switch and small bridge diode for the polarity protection do push the price up but they are the 2 features that I mainly wanted and needed for this design. Due to recent issues and a warning from Stern / Kiss I am a bit burnt out so I just thought to share what I have done instead of locking it up in a vault never to be seen and not sure if there is interest for them.

I sent it out for quote to 10 companies around the world, China never replied back with any quotes (which was surprising), Australia was absolutely insanely priced at 5 x the price of the US and I ended up having a company in the US make these. I was hoping that these would be cheaper than what they are or would be at 1000 so sort of killed my hopes as would of loved to sell these at the cost of $2 - $2.50 led.

is what it is, and learnt alot.

edit...
the white is definitely not warm white and at a guess would be around the white to cool white - it's bright

[pinball god]

Price at $2.00 is ok as standard colour changers $1.70 with no option to choose a colour. So that can be handy when experimenting with colour schemes. Getting rid of metal holders is a good thing to minimize shorts by screws etc coming off. The big benefit is no more loose connections between bulb and socket. Downer is a lot of dmd's have banks of pcbs for thing like large groups of mission inserts ie. Tz. So all is not lost but I'll be looking under the hoods of a few of my games to see where these would be an advantage. Brightness has already been proven by crashramp.

[Pinballer]

Perhaps Mike (Homepin) could have these run for you in China, it might make the pricing much better per a larger order.  It would be the type of thing you could potentially sell 1000's of if the price is right.

[pinball god]

Perhaps Mike (Homepin) could have these run for you in China, it might make the pricing much better per a larger order.  It would be the type of thing you could potentially sell 1000's of if the price is right.

+1