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cjsiege88
01-27-2018, 11:42 PM
Hello all, I have a question about neopixel blades using a Prizm 5.1 board, I hope I'm doing this the right way posting this here...

I'm working on a neopixel build using a Prizm 5.1 (when I can actually get my hands on a board, that is) and I've been reading up and planning it out as much as I can before hand. I would like, if possible, to use 3 neopixel strips wired up together and I'm trying to figure out the power/battery needs for such a build. From what I understand, the Prizm 5.1 can use a single 3.7v 18650 battery, and I'm trying to find one with as much mAh as possible to do this. My question would be can I take two of such batteries and create a dual pack between both of them, wired in parallel to keep the same voltage level, but increased capacity? Or will the board not support this sort of mash-up?

Would the power consumption for 3 neopixel strips be far too demanding as well? I'm hoping to make it as bright as possible, rigged up in a triangle sort of shape to produce as much light all around and avoid any black lined areas, is this a feasible approach? This will be my first neopixel/strip blade attempt, I've made several in-hilt tri-cree sabers in the past using NB 3 and 4 boards and CF 8's, so I'm just trying to figure out as much as possible as I can for this new approach.

Thanks for taking the time to read this, hopefully someone with a bit more insight into all this can clear these up for me! :)

PCModulus
01-28-2018, 12:13 AM
Im basing this totally off of guess work for the moment... You could in theory wire one battery to the Prizm and one to the pos side of the NP's and place a diode in between so the Prizm never see the second board (because you would have to couple the batteries for charging) since the negative side is what triggers the LED's, at least for 'normal' LED's.

At least its a basis for thought.

RarestSquirrel
01-28-2018, 01:36 AM
There are 18650's with 15a discharge(which is the important part for having a functional blade), though they do tend to have a lesser capacity than the 3500mah 10a cells.
Thar also be 26650's out there with upwards of 15a, though obviously they'll only work in a large enough hilt.

Your main issue with 3 strips is going to be amperage. If you're not hitting the necessary discharge you'll get the evil death sounds noted in a few threads below as the pixels will be trying to eat more than your battery is capable of outputting. mAh alternatively is just run time, which'll be pretty sucky with the 10+ amp 18650's.

TL;DR Get a nice 26650. Orbtronic and keeppower make good ones.

As to making a three strip triangle! Yep! Very possible, but use skinny strips, they'll fit better in the diffusion foam. Best practice seems to be to use something rigid to stick each strip to. Dowel would be my first guess. There's also the Intelliblade from Naigon, but he'll be out of stock for another 5 or so weeks apparently. His is a three strip system that's rigid and forms a triangle as an aspect of its design.

Squimboos
01-28-2018, 01:43 AM
So for a three strip build using the tcss connectors would you split the positive and negatives for a total of 6 so each pad on the connector has 2? Then again for the negatives on the board?

cjsiege88
01-28-2018, 06:07 AM
Ok, I actually hadn't considered amperage so far, so that's good to know lol. I looked around at some 26650's just to try and get a good understanding here... one of them had a "Discharge: 20A Max Continuous, Rated 40A Max Pulse by Aspire with a 67 deg F temperature limit" with 4300 mAh.
Would that or something similar to it be enough to power the strips, board and speaker sufficiently?

(Edit: I found the orbtronic and keeppower ones that you mentioned, higher capacity there, would definitely go with either of those)

As far as battery life goes, since I assume it'll be rather small with so much drain going on like you mentioned, could two of these cells be wired up into a pack to double their capacity? PCModulus mentioned his theory above, I was thinking something similar to the li-ion packs available here at TCSS with the cells joined and wrapped up together, though I admit my understanding of how exactly those work together now may be a bit off lol...

Reading up earlier on batteries, it sounded like taking two cells and wiring their positives to each other and negatives to each other would increase capacity without increasing overall voltage, though that may be an overly simplistic way that I'm looking at it... I also don't want them to blow up or something because I didn't figure it all beforehand lol....

(Edit 2: have read that this is possible and ok on some sites, others say this is possible but an extremely terrible idea to try on my own, lol)

That's good to hear that 3 strips is do-able, I'd kind of grown attached to the idea haha. I was planning on attaching them all to strip of foam in the center for impact absorption, I'm sure a dowel would work just fine though too.

adacey
01-28-2018, 07:54 AM
So for a three strip build using the tcss connectors would you split the positive and negatives for a total of 6 so each pad on the connector has 2? Then again for the negatives on the board?

There's 7 pins on the TCSS PCB, 3x POS, 3x Neg, 1x data so I assume you'd run each strip of a separate pad on the blade side, which would connect to separate pins (except for data being shared).

PCModulus
01-28-2018, 07:34 PM
There's 7 pins on the TCSS PCB, 3x POS, 3x Neg, 1x data so I assume you'd run each strip of a separate pad on the blade side, which would connect to separate pins (except for data being shared).

7 pins, but still only 3 circuit paths. Just makes wiring 3 strips a whole lot easier if you go 1:1 like you said.

Meatsweats
01-29-2018, 12:42 PM
I attempted to wire up an Intelliblade using the TCSS connector and I was having some problems with it, used a g16 instead and it worked. I don’t know why, but the TCSS connector was shorting out. Make sure you use heavy gauge ptfe wire like 20ga for the commons or you won’t get full amps.

Tom Tilmon
01-29-2018, 01:45 PM
Is that a recent development meatsweats? Very interesting indeed if so. I'm going to try hooking directly in. I am using heavy gauge PTFE wire already, but I get nada through the TCSS connector that works fine on adafruit strips.

Tom

Meatsweats
01-29-2018, 01:56 PM
when I first got the Intelliblade I first tried the TCSS connector and it was acting odd, like restarting and such. I didn’t have the same problem with the g16. I’ve been having all sorts of problems with the Intelliblade as we’ve talked about, so I’m not sure what is at fault. I’m waiting on some generic strips for a tri strip blade at which point I’ll try the TCSS connector again.

cjsiege88
01-29-2018, 03:34 PM
when I first got the Intelliblade I first tried the TCSS connector and it was acting odd, like restarting and such. I didn’t have the same problem with the g16. I’ve been having all sorts of problems with the Intelliblade as we’ve talked about, so I’m not sure what is at fault. I’m waiting on some generic strips for a tri strip blade at which point I’ll try the TCSS connector again.

Do you mind if I ask what strips you're planning on using? I've been looking at adafruits 144 LED strip in regular and thin versions, but found other 144 strips at a lower price from other brands.

Meatsweats
01-29-2018, 03:53 PM
I’ve used the adafruit skinny 144/m rgb white pcb and they work very well. They are pretty expensive though. I’m still waiting on some generics from China via ebay, they are the 144/m sk6812 5050s.

cjsiege88
01-29-2018, 06:32 PM
I’ve used the adafruit skinny 144/m rgb white pcb and they work very well. They are pretty expensive though. I’m still waiting on some generics from China via ebay, they are the 144/m sk6812 5050s.

Ah ok, I have also looked at those same ones. I would like to do 3 of the adafruit skinny's, but like you said they do have a bit of a price tag on them... I'm planning on doing two neopixel set up's actually, a graflex 2.0 and a Korbanth LS6 gullwing when it arrives (hopefully soon...)
I may try and get some of the sk6812's in the meantime and do a 2 strip set up for the graflex and see what I can learn from that. Are the regular width strips an easy enough size to work with in a 1" blade, packing diffusing material and the strips inside? It looks like they come pre-wired as well, can these wires be merged, or does each strip have to be wired into the others solder pads, if that makes sense?
Sorry if I'm hounding you with questions, like I mentioned this is a new sort of approach for me...

Meatsweats
01-29-2018, 07:58 PM
I would start with a dual strip to be honest. They are plenty bright. I’m just trying a three strip for fun. Three strips present more problems like needing a higher capacity battery and thicker wire. Run time is less as well with the 18650s. Lots of people have gotten generic strips and they have worked well, so I don’t really think the Adafruits are necessary. They do come prewired but, I cut it off and start clean. Each strip will need 3 wires from it going to a connector of some sort (g16, TCSS). On the blade side you’ll have 3 wires from the connector to the board. My preferred diffusion technique is a 1in thin clear tube, TCSS blade diffuser, a couple revolutions of cellophane for bulk, and a closed cell diffusion tube like TCSS or a Hasbro. The strips go back to back with double sided tape. There’s other ways to do it too. Make sure you get some good 22-24ga ptfe wire that can handle the current.

cjsiege88
01-31-2018, 01:14 PM
I would start with a dual strip to be honest. They are plenty bright. I’m just trying a three strip for fun. Three strips present more problems like needing a higher capacity battery and thicker wire. Run time is less as well with the 18650s. Lots of people have gotten generic strips and they have worked well, so I don’t really think the Adafruits are necessary. They do come prewired but, I cut it off and start clean. Each strip will need 3 wires from it going to a connector of some sort (g16, TCSS). On the blade side you’ll have 3 wires from the connector to the board. My preferred diffusion technique is a 1in thin clear tube, TCSS blade diffuser, a couple revolutions of cellophane for bulk, and a closed cell diffusion tube like TCSS or a Hasbro. The strips go back to back with double sided tape. There’s other ways to do it too. Make sure you get some good 22-24ga ptfe wire that can handle the current.

Seems like the best option right now, going with 2 strips. I've got all the parts coming my way now, so I'll be giving it all a shot assembling it soon, I'll have to post some results when I get it all figured out :)

cjsiege88
02-13-2018, 12:52 PM
Well I've got it wired up using a 26650 Orbtronic 5200mAh battery, Prizm 5.1, but I've run into a problem with the LED strips that I cant figure out, that I'm thinking is either a problem with the data line itself, or something in the configs.
When it ignites, it lights up, but only about the first... lets say, 25 LED's or so. When I switch profiles using the aux switch and main switch, it changes colors like it should and lights up all the rest of the strands, just like it should. When I deactivate it, the first 25 turn off and the rest stay on. This is very odd to me, has anyone else run into a problem like this before? I've been going over the manual but cant seem to pin it down....

Edit:
Also, using the aux switch while the board is activated will play a blaster sound, but following that the board will immediately reset. FoC works, and using the aux switch works to rotate through profiles.... anyone know what could cause this?

RarestSquirrel
02-13-2018, 02:51 PM
Well I've got it wired up using a 26650 Orbtronic 5200mAh battery, Prizm 5.1, but I've run into a problem with the LED strips that I cant figure out, that I'm thinking is either a problem with the data line itself, or something in the configs.
When it ignites, it lights up, but only about the first... lets say, 25 LED's or so. When I switch profiles using the aux switch and main switch, it changes colors like it should and lights up all the rest of the strands, just like it should. When I deactivate it, the first 25 turn off and the rest stay on. This is very odd to me, has anyone else run into a problem like this before? I've been going over the manual but cant seem to pin it down....

Edit:
Also, using the aux switch while the board is activated will play a blaster sound, but following that the board will immediately reset. FoC works, and using the aux switch works to rotate through profiles.... anyone know what could cause this?


Check the pads on the LED's themselves around where it stops doing what he should be doing. I had one lift off and cause the rest of the strip after it to bork out and stay on without it actually being switched on. You can just resolder the borked pads back down, but carefully.

cjsiege88
02-13-2018, 03:14 PM
Check the pads on the LED's themselves around where it stops doing what he should be doing. I had one lift off and cause the rest of the strip after it to bork out and stay on without it actually being switched on. You can just resolder the borked pads back down, but carefully.

I checked them, they seem to be all ok. I actually had the exact same problem with a set of RGBW strips that I replaced with RGB strips because I guess the Prizm 5.1 wasnt designed to work with RGBW. They would still ignite, but only a fraction of the way up. Well, attaching the RGB strips today and the same problem happened.

This is its state at ignition.
16328

After changing color profile, a full lit blade
16329

And this at deactivation.
16330

Edit:
It seems to be stopping at pixel #32 on both strips, I have them back to back on each other right now, and they both stop lighting up in the same spot.

cjsiege88
02-13-2018, 04:26 PM
Well I seem to have narrowed down the issue, I set the ledstrip= value to a much higher one than I had it at... 1160. Which seems like way more pixels than my two 144 LED strips actually have, but I'm new to this type of blade and if it works, it works lol...

Legume
04-14-2018, 09:00 PM
I've been thinking about using a 26650 in my latest build but am concerned about the size issue. How did you cram it in there? Are you using MHS hilt parts or something larger?

Tom Tilmon
04-15-2018, 04:53 AM
26650 will fit inside MHS Hilts; however there is no room for a board over the battery. There are no chassis disks for it, so if you went 26650 via MHS, you're going to have to be very creative with the engineering to keep it solid, safe, and enduring. I bought some 26650 holders (although they are very tight for protected circuit batteries). I did adapt them to a Hasbro Kylo Ren Chassis, and I believe I could probably adapt them to a MHS Disk Chassis, but it would be difficult. You would definitely have to plan the chassis carefully. There are other batteries out there between the 26650 and 18650. 18650s can run a single bladed saber for a decent amount of time. I have a neopixel saber that runs 18650s, and I get about 45 minutes out of it. If that isn't enough for your application, you could always plan for changeable battery system.

Tom

Emortis
04-17-2018, 08:51 PM
Is it okay to use high drain unprotected batteries? I have a bunch of 26650's I use for my vape but they are all high drain lithium.

Forgetful Jedi Knight
04-17-2018, 08:59 PM
I wouldn’t use unprotected cells. Today, a cheap one blew up on someone in one of the FB groups.

Emortis
04-17-2018, 09:35 PM
Ok, good to know!

Any recommendations for 18650 and 26650 batteries for neopixel builds? I'm looking at orbtronics right now.

Tom Tilmon
04-18-2018, 12:46 AM
Unprotected lithium ion cells in sealed metal pipe=pipe bomb.

You can't get battery brand recommendations from other sites, as this site is attached to a store. That being said, your most recent post seems to be well advised.

Tom

Forgetful Jedi Knight
04-18-2018, 04:25 AM
Unprotected cell on workbench + 3D printed chassis + soldering iron = loud boom + soiled underwear. Fortunately the guy in questions wasn’t otherwise hurt.

jbkuma
04-18-2018, 08:17 AM
It is way too easy to think of ways the battery can end up shorted in even the most carefully constructed hilt. Electronics fail, even good ones, given enough time or over large sample sizes. The cost difference between a cheap battery and the best batteries is insignificant to your total construction cost. It's worth the cost of a sandwich to not have a fire/explosion hazard.

Emortis
04-18-2018, 10:31 AM
OK, so without mentioning the cell brand names, I am using the the keystone 18650 holder inside a 3d printed chassis designed to hold it and I'm going to wire it up to a nano biscotte v4.

The cell I am looking at is a "3500mAh Protected 18650 Battery Li-ion 3.7V Rechargeable 10A Dual Protection", but it has a button top. Is this what I should be looking for?


I really appreciate the help guys. I have tons of batteries, but they are all made for vaping so I am trying to do my due diligence before I start wiring anything up....the last thing I want is to worry about accidentally creating a pipe bomb.