Light up Grass

[gizmomkr]

I bet some of you heard that way back at all those Greatfull Dead shows.

I have a thing for EL Wire, so I took about 20 feet of it, choped it all up and spent several hours soldering leads to 38 pieces of wire. Then I took about 3 feet of 1" PVc and drilled holes across it. a bit of hot glue, and I have a small chunk of EL Wire Grass.

Depending on how crazy I want to get, I can assign each strand to a channel ( I will likely split the pipe into two channels.

I think it would also look really neat to have one big bundel- might make a nice tree topper.


Attached files

[J_Plak]

Very Cool!!!

[Dan C]

Am I the only one that thought of something else when I read the Title to this thread?

I mean, come on. Lighting up grass????

[shfr26]

Dan C wrote:

Am I the only one that thought of something else when I read the Title to this thread?

I mean, come on. Lighting up grass????

Nope!

[WhitePlainsNY]

How did you cut it? With a mower or a string trimmer??

My first impression was that it reminded me of sea grass. Add some fish, Santa wearing a snorkel and you could have an underwater themed Christmas.

Looks great!

[Max-Paul]

yes, looks way cool. Now I would like to see how you are going to use this in your display. Need videos this winter. But back to the grass, very creative.

[George Simmons]

Max-Paul wrote:

But back to the grass, very creative.

Gee Max - this makes twice this month that I find myself agreeing with you. What's this world coming to? But yes, it does inspire creativity, doesn't it?

[shfr26]

George Simmons wrote:

Max-Paul wrote:

But back to the grass, very creative.

Gee Max - this makes twice this month that I find myself agreeing with you. What's this world coming to? But yes, it does inspire creativity, doesn't it?

Maybe older age is mellowing you out George. But maybe not.

[NWSanta]

Ok so gotta ask. Can you animate it? Left to right or anything like that. I've always wanted to toy with EL Wire and a DC LOR Controller...

[George Simmons]

shfr26 wrote:

Maybe older age is mellowing you out George.

Or maybe it's due to some of that "creative grass"...

[Max-Paul]

George Simmons wrote:

shfr26 wrote:

Maybe older age is mellowing you out George.

Or maybe it's due to some of that "creative grass"...

Na, I just won you over George by quoting you in my tag line. I worship your wit.

[gizmomkr]

To Jeff - Its called EL Wire. Its fairly thin, flexible wire that glows when voltage is applied. (the nerdy version has to do with phosphor and capacitance and high frequency inverters... but who really cares ?)

I buy most of my stuff from http://www.elwirepros.com. They have a kit that has everything you need for about 15.00 - It will give you a good idea of how it works, and what it looks like.

NWSanta - I can animate it. It just depends how many channels I want to give up. I COULD assign each strand its own channel on an AC or DC Controller. Each piece would require an "Inverter"that costs about 5.00 (Im not planning on this route)

I can buy a sequencer that would have 1 or 2 patterns pre-programmed, and that would allow some quick easy sequences (and only consume 1 channel of LOR)

But what I really want to do is make the strands "sway" to the beat. The easiest way I can think of is a servo motor connected to the PVC pipe - this would allow front to back rotation, but still not the horizontal movement I'm looking to create.

The next best thing would be fishing line with clear heatshrink attaching to another piece of PVC several inches above the strands. I could then attach solonoids or some other linear actuator to push/pull on the PVC. This would look fairly good.

The ULTIMATE goal would be Nitinol or Flexinol musscle wire with clear heatshrink attached to each strand of EL Wire. This would allow absolute control over EVERY strand of grass - I think it would look AMAZING to sequence the movement of each blade of grass to the beat of the music, I jsut dont think I have the time to put it all together - and sequence. Not this season anyway.

I am a HUGE fan of ELWIRE, love working with it, love the "neon" looking effect, and would love to see more folks using it... I will have 2 or 3 elements in my display this year, and am always happy to talk about it, or answer questions. Anything I can to get more people interested in it, or using it.

[scubado]

Very cool idea! My question is this: how's the life span? I used some years ago to bling my computer, but it's life span was rather short. Has it improved over the years? It'll kind of suck if you put all that work into it and not last as long as you hoped. Another question, does it work in the frozen Tundra?

I would love to bring a tropical look to Wisconsin with your idea:cool:

[scubado]

gizmomkr wrote:

But what I really want to do is make the strands "sway" to the beat. The easiest way I can think of is a servo motor connected to the PVC pipe - this would allow front to back rotation, but still not  the horizontal movement I'm looking to create.

The next best thing would be fishing line with clear heatshrink attaching to another piece of PVC several inches above the strands. I could then attach solonoids or some other linear actuator to push/pull on the PVC. This would look fairly good.

The ULTIMATE goal would be Nitinol or Flexinol musscle wire with clear heatshrink attached to each strand of EL Wire. This would allow absolute control over EVERY strand of grass - I think it would look AMAZING to sequence the movement of each blade of grass to the beat of the music, I jsut dont think I have the time to put it all together - and sequence. Not this season anyway.

I am a HUGE fan of ELWIRE, love working with it, love the "neon" looking effect, and would love to see more folks using it... I will have 2 or 3 elements in my display this year, and am always happy to talk about it, or answer questions. Anything I can to get more people interested in it, or using it.

What about a mini oscillating fan? It won't sway to the music though.

[chipwdw]

you could use some sort of pipe just above what you have now, have holes in the new pipe about 1or 2X the diameter of the el wire, you may want to use something to protect the wires from rubbing, not sure how durable they would be. maybe you could use small piece of tubing. now you can move the base pipe that the wires are in, and they will all sway the same direction, use 2 different motors and you can move in any 2D direction. have to make some kind of base/rail for the movement rail to rest or ride on, so it will only move 2D side to side(unless you add more control for up & down-haha says the mad scientist). just cover the up past the new pipe and no one will see how you did it. you can use muliple set ups and control smaller sections, down to individual wires. just stager the motion controllers by making 2 or 3 levels of the motion control motors and have the wires a little longer or shorter as needed. lots of ways to make this happen, just one idea.

[gizmomkr]

Chip - Thanks, I have considered something along those lines... I'm jus so far behind on sequencing ( this is my first year with Lor / S2) and to get the effect I REALLY WANT, would mean making another 20 feet of this - The short section I did probably took 6 - 8 hours. Soldering this stuff takes the hand and eyes of a surgeon ( and I LOVE to solder) but this stuff kicked my a$$. Making 20 feet would need to be a 3 - 6 month project. I could do it without cutting the wire, but it wouldnt give quite the same effect. the average rate to solder this stuff is about 4.50 per connection. Someone told me they can do 1 splice every 60 seconds. I think they have tasers and kids chained to a workbench.

To answer the other questions - The data sheet I found says 1600 hours, and -4 to +131 Deg F. I have no idea if its current or even related to what I bought though, just a random data sheet I found on the stuff. Much of the brightness and lifespan depends on the frequency of voltage applied.

I also plan to take a couple strands and secure them to a spinning disk. with some flashing patterns, it could look really neat. - so much I want to do... so little free time.

Anyone wana come do my REAL job for the next 2 months so Ican get my hobby work done ?

Its hard to see in the photo - this stuff is SO TINY, but the strands hanging down are about the size of a single STRAND of 22AWG wire - Its fair to say they are just a bit thicker than a strand of hair. There are 2 strands spiral wrapped around the core. Its recomended you slice the jacket off with a razor blade, but one nick on those tiny wires, and you have to start over.





Attached files

[Max-Paul]

My only concern would be if you try to move the EL wires to make it look like grass swaying in the breeze. Is this, that most materials do not like to be reshaped a whole lot of times. I can see, esp when it is super cold out that the bending back and forth of the wire is going to cause it to snap off.

So, I would either move the whole bottom part or go static. here is an idea. Make two bases. Have the grass leaning to the left on one and right on the other. Make one base stationairy and one moving back and forth. Or both moving. Your display, just some suggestions?

[Steven]

How about this? Take a length of fishing line and stretch it horizontally a few inches above the PVC pipe. Tie the left end to a weak spring that is attached to a stake to the left of the "grass". Have another stake to the right of the grass, where you will mount a servo that will be connected to the fishing line.

Once that's in place, put the servo in the center position, and attach the fishing line to the back of each EL wire with a dab of hot glue. You could also use transparent tape.

Now the servo can pull the "grass" to the right, or let the spring pull it to the left. Since you're using glue and fishing line, it can't cause much damage if it gets yanked because the fishing line will slip through the glue. It's not visible (except for the stakes, spring, and servo, which can be placed as far from the grass as you wish). To make it sway properly with the music, you'll need a servo and a ServoDog (cheap!) Setup should take a lot less time than you've already spent building it.

You could do other effects by using multiple servos and fishing line, using the same stakes.

[Dave H1]

Dan C wrote:

Am I the only one that thought of something else when I read the Title to this thread?

I mean, come on. Lighting up grass????

Dan



Just vouch that you never inhaled

Oh yea, Oh yea sure!!!