Backlight OC ovh panels

[airupthere]

Hey everyone. I thought I had a great strategy.. the OC cards come with a 5mm thick or so clear acrylic as a backplate. I thought I could drill 3mm holes spaced apart and put 3mm through hole LEDS.. well, you can guess what happened. Lots of "hot spots" right where the LED is..

I see everyone uses the strips.. does that avoid the hot spots? Do I just need to place the LEDS a lot closer together? Should I build another standoff that holds the LEDS so they're not pressed right up against the panel?

[jackpilot]

Leds are to be placed away from the engravings never under them.
As you can see on your picture , inscriptions away from the leds are OK

[airupthere]

Thanks jack! Learning this stuff the hard way. 

[jackpilot]

Nothing real hard here ! just ask 

[paulnd]

The viewing angle of various types of LEDs also makes a difference. Standard dome LEDs have a narrow viewing angle of about 20 to 30 degrees which will give a small circle of light whereas straw hat LEDs have a viewing angle of about 170 degrees which will give a wider spread of light. Flat top LEDs have a viewing angle of about 120 degrees.

Fortunately LEDs are quite cheap as I have 100s of unused dome LEDs which I bought before experimenting with the different types.

Similar to Jack's good advice, the bulbs are positioned away from the engraving in OEM panels. 

Paul

[airupthere]

Thanks Paul, Yeah I bought dome, and flat-top LED's.. The dome have a warm white, the flat-top a 6,000K give or take.. so they're much "whiter" (is that a word?) Yeah, i sure wish I would have asked this question on this board first, but like I said - I like to learn from the school of hard knocks. I'll be figuring out a way to undo my mistake for the next few days.

Randy

[jackpilot]

You can also try to sand down the top of the led with grit paper.
Could help diffuse the light better.
Real backlighting is usually orange in color.
Jack

[Flying_Fox]

I see everyone uses the strips.. does that avoid the hot spots?

LED stripes are far easier to use than single leds, and yes, they provide better light distribution, however youneed to carefully plan the stripes pieces arrangements.

You can take a look how I did backlighting in my sim if you did not see it already.

http://elephantair737.blogspot.ca/p/backlighting.html



Nick

[airupthere]

ELEPHANTAIR!!! I have checked your stuff out, and love your site.. I'm geeking out a bit that you're responding to one my posts.

I've been thinking standing the LED's off the back plate a bit will help with the diffusion of the light. I like what you're doing with the corrugated board. Thanks for the awesome site and all the advice.

Randy