LED Information I have found that running LED's in Series works best for me, however depending on the application a parallel circuit of LED's may work better. Here is some info to help you decide on the best route for you and provide you with some knowledge on the subject ;)
Light Emitting Diodes (LEDs) Research your Project Best thing to do is go to your local Radio Shack/Frys Electronics/Local Electronics store and write down the specs of a LED your interested in on the box/package.
What you need to be concerned with is the following: - V - Source Voltage : The current your supplying to the leds, most likely 12V for a computer application using a molex plug from the Power Supply.
- IV - or mcd/Luminous Intensity : the brightness of the LED eg. 2000 mcd @ 30mA, the higher the number before mcd, the brighter the LED will be.
- IF - maximum amount of current the LED can operate on safely usually in milliamps (mA).
- VF - Typical Forward Voltage this led should be taking up in the circuit.
After you gather this information return to your computer and
go here to find out what resistors your going to need for the circuits of LED's you will be creating. Resistors placed inline with the leds to use up the remaining voltage from the source voltage. To help you determine what Resistors you will need
go here and plug in the numbers you gathered and also the amount of LED's you want in the strand.
Using the Info Generated above From the information provided here, you can determine what Ohm resistor you will need and also what wattage your array needs to dispate (eg. 1/4W) your circuit is using. The bigger the number here means that the resistor must be bigger in size overall which in turn disipates more heat making it sometimes hot to the touch. This is the main reason I eliminated the parallel connection I initially had with my project.
Good Luck and let us know if you have any questions along the way ;)
-J
post edited by EVIIILJ - 2011/07/18 02:06:21
