Betabrite Prism LED Message sign

[whizzr]

I took an indoor sign, and converted it to outdoor use. My sign has an extruded aluminum case, with no vent holes, mount holes, or other ingress, so the only points of entry are the front lens, and the two end caps.

What I did was take everything apart, and carefully seal the front lens with silicone. Then for the sides, I removed the factory-supplied caps, and a friend with a CNC milling machine cut me two aluminum plates to fit over the ends of the sign. These were also sealed with silicone. Rather than have power and serial plug in to the side of the sign, I plug them in inside the case, and run the wires out through a channel in the bottom of the aluminum block. Each wire gets a drip loop, then passes though a junction to connect to wires that emerge from a hole in the crossarm of my "Digital North Pole". The power connection is weatherproof, but the serial connection is not. The serial line is a 4-wire intercom station wire, attached together with RJ-11 ends. The junction is simply a female-to-female RJ-11 adapter.

This setup has been in use for three show seasons now, and has worked flawlessly. I've never even worried about moisture getting in to the serial junction -- it probably gets wet, but it has never stopped working, and we got absolutely drenched this past season.

[jeffl]

Year 4. I switched my BetaBrite power supply setup from a LOR channel to an DC/AC SSR and it lasted three days. I'm wondering if heat has more of a factor than anything because my sign is in a near fully sealed enclosure.

[Tim Fischer]

My old sign, made by the same company as the BetaBrite, died a similar death. I had it running in my office all year, then moved it up to the upstairs window, plugged it in, and it was completely dead. I've been using the BetaBrite Prism ever since. So far no problems -- I don't run it all year anymore and haven't yet pulled it out for this season, but I'm hoping it's still going strong...

As I noted above in the old posts, Mine is controlled by X-10 for the display, which is a simple mechanical relay.

Edited November 20, 2012 by Tim Fischer

[jeffl]

I pulled the device apart and it's a very simple constructed device. A winding, capacitor, 4 diodes and a fuse. I'll mess with it when the display starts. I think my problem is the box I have it in it fully enclosed and with no vent so it gets hot when the outside temp is higher which is was the day it died. Normaly the temp is below 30 so it probably stays failry cool.

The relay I was using was not mechanical so I'm not sure how good the power is coming from it. I switched back to powering it from an AC controller until I figure out another power supply backup idea.

[pdowns]

So this year I built the plastic enclosure and put the sign outside. No problems so far. I put the sign on my mailbox thinking it would finally be visible. The irony is that there's so much going on in the show, that people still don't see the sign. Sigh.

I actually made a 12 CCR SuperStar this year. I'm going to put "Tune to" info on that 15 foot tall tree in text. Maybe (only maybe) will people finally notice!