Interesting idea, splynncryth, but I have already ordered switches (metal ones) for um... alot of money, and I plan on using those. I think I will make only the front of the control panel (and maybe the back) acrylic, and wood for the rest. I think that would look best. I could use white LEDs for illuminating the control panel, actually. I have a lot of those left, and I think it would look sharp. I want to try using DDK's (and Smilodon's) method of illuminating text on a tinted piece of acrylic. Btw, I'm eating glowing grapes now
the control panel might look very nice with some uv lights and uv reactive letters...hope u know what i want to say...would be very visible in the dark...just a thought
I have a bag of UV LEDs somewhere... Wonder where I put it. Anyway, I want it to look kind of like the dashboard of a car/plane, with illuminated letters. So UV might do, if not, I'll use white or seagreen.
hmmm...for iluminated letters ub will do just fine...you can try it out with a flourescent marker...worked great for me...and it s quite reflective
Good idea. I can print out on transparency foil or something, and stick a piece of something fluorescent behind it. I will experiment with different techniques.
A question I cant be bothered looking for so sorry in advance if it's already been answered, How do you intend on connecting the middle shelf to both legs? Will you be using a single dowell to go into both legs and through the shelf? Or will you be screwing the bottom leg in place and then bonding a dowell or steel rod into the upper leg?
Don't know if I understood you correctly, but the steel legs go into two wooden "brackets", both on the bottom and middle shelf. When the steel legs are in their brackets, I run nails through them, thus making them connected safely. You can see the square "brackets" in this pic: Sorry if that didn't answer the question, though...
On the middle shelf you have wooden legs to the top and to the bottom Code: || <--- wooden leg ======== <--- Middle Shelf || <--- wooden Leg get what I mean now?
Oh, sorry. I understand now. The legs are screwed to the shelves from underneath, and connected in the top with brackets. To explain better, I drew this in paint.
hey bard....sorry for the off topic but do those guys in Oregon still ship leds ...i mailed them but no answer so far.
lol, bard this is your best yet gotta love your stuff, this would go well with my "ikea" styled wooden media pc: ttuser
I have been working on the control panel and electronics the past few weeks. It takes alot of time, I must say. Today I made one of the fading/flashing circuits, using this circuit from Metku mods. I tested it out on the top piece of plexi, just randomly connecting the wires. I have not decided on a certain speed for it yet either, but here's a video to prove that it works at least: View video (700kB, some dumb quicktime thing required).
I think I will be having the flashing lights a bit slower, and I might have them fading instead of flashing. Here's an update on the control box. I made a tilted box (angled top) out of 6mm plexi and attached the 3mm switchfront plexi on top: The top will mostly be covered with text telling what the switches are for, but the sides are clear: I plan on having different color LEDs (not white) in the lower half of the control box. Here's the DC input jack, mounted with lots of hot glue... The circuit dangling from the circuit board looking like it's only a capacitor is in fact the voltage converter circuit, giving me a stable 5V.
