eBay meteor / icicle lights 2019. New circuitry. (With schematic)
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- Опубліковано 20 жов 2019
- A completely different (simpler) approach to the traditional meteor or icicle lighting effect.
These sets are very common on ebay at a fairly low price, and sometimes the quality and safety is debatable. This set doesn't use a capacitive dropper, which makes it a bit safer, but the typical imported power supplies should never be regarded as being properly isolated.
If you enjoy these videos you can help support the channel with a dollar for coffee, cookies and random gadgets for disassembly at:-
www.bigclive.com/coffee.htm
This also keeps the channel independent of UA-cam's advertising algorithms allowing it to be a bit more dangerous and naughty. - Наука та технологія
"Is it fully charged? Let's stick a finger across it..."
And that's how we found him...
Almost an ElectroBOOM moment.
@@ChrisGrahamUK Having been on the receiving end of an ElectroBOOM moment, I can attest that they are quite shocking.
@@ChrisGrahamUK I'm actually waiting for that moment to happen I bet you she'll say something about electroboom or something I'm just curious why don't say in the first place.
@@ramixnudles7958 oh I get what you said there quite shocking hint hint
BC: "I wonder what the maximum voltage these chips can handle is?" - You have a bench power supply right there!
Always good to see the Vice of Knowledge make an appearance.
With its trusty sidekick, the pliers of education.
You know the phrase if it doesn't work get a bigger hammer.
it's Vise not Vice. or I have heard it both ways, but AFAIK Vise is the accepted form.
Double sided SM assembly - needs very accurate control of the upper & lower temperatures. The board goes through the oven twice, without the use of glue. We do this every day, being contract electronic assemblers.
Doesn’t the super thin pcb make that very hard?
"A pair of pliers for extra enlightenment". Priceless! Cheers, Clive!
:"Is this fully charged? lets just put our thumb across this" absolute madman :-)
The Pliers of Inquisition, nobody expects them either... :P
Clive proving he's human by making mistakes.
I'm glad you showed BC coming before AD, and DC coming before AC.
My understanding is that Surface Mount on both sides is done with two different solder pastes, one for each side. One paste has a solder alloy that melts at a lower temperature than the other. So the first side is flowed with the higher temp solder paste , with the oven set at the higher temperature, and the second side is flowed with lower temp paste at the corresponding lower temperature.
That generally isn't necessary. The surface tension of the solder paste is usually quite sufficient to hold most components in place during reflow of the second side. Inductors or similar heavy components can be a problem, but this can be mitigated by using glue. More commonly you just design the PCB to have all the heavier SMD parts placed on the "second" side of the PCB. The (red) component glue is mostly used in wave soldering processes, otherwise the components can be washed away by the wave. Wave soldering isn't as common as reflow these days. The slightly higher melting point solder you mention is commonly used in modules that are reflowed onto another PCB, so that they are less likely to have any failures during the extra reflow cycle. That said, there are certain end use applications (hi rel) or other reasons to use odd manufacturing processes :)
Just watched this where 2 temp solder paste us used: ua-cam.com/video/W-B32C_jKbA/v-deo.html
With heavier components you can also use a thermosetting glue dot, placed beneath the components and then use wave soldering.
@@alankingvideo Thanks, though I got bored so here's your link with the (7 min) offset added: ua-cam.com/video/W-B32C_jKbA/v-deo.html -- though the guy doesn't seem very happy with the process.
@@alankingvideo That's prototype assembly, where things are very different to production. Using one paste type for both sides with two reflow passes is usually fine in mass production as long as the heaviest of parts are on the second pass. Even large parts like those chips are quite light vs the solder surface tension on all the pads. If I am doing double sided protos then I often reflow the first side (with the most parts) and hand solder the rest.
You must have an absolutely ridiculous amount of holiday lighting.
Once a child with ONE led, now a man with more than he'll ever need. Such is life.
Rumor has it, his house can be seen from space.
If you poke around, he talks about his time putting up a city's holiday lights. And the inevitable "Get all of that out of here, we're doing something else!" So... probably *astounding* levels.
I knew a guy....used to fit lights up for a small-ish town....once, as they weren't in use at the time,for his anniversary, he fitted as many as he could to his own house...
It was spectacular .....you needed a welders mask to view safely....it was like an inland lighthouse.....
@@j.cheeverloophole9029 Light pollution on a whole 'nother level.
When I fix things for my kids I occasionally tell them: "Time for the 10lb Swiss watchmaker's hammer." You can use it, too, Clive - no copyright! Best wishes from London.
Then there is in the army "Tool, fine adjustment, 14 pounds" IE sledge hammer.
In the IT world, we have the "Percussive Maintenance Assistance Device"
The proper name is multi adjusting tool
Hammer; AKA = XRay machine
Tis the season for Clive making me rethink all my lighting plans
Thank E.E. for the vice of knowledge and pliers of enlightenment!
To reset the microcontroller "reliably" when it would possibly hang due to undervoltage, you need to activate its brownout detection reset circuit via fusebits or some similar mechanism. Unfortunately depending on the chip, reliability of the circuit can be... debatable. The second line of defense is watchdog circuit, which you restart programmatically once in a while to signal that the program execution is proceeding normally.
I've been subbed for quite awhile. I have absolutely no electrical knowledge 99% of the time big live could be talking in Chinese but for some strange reason I have yet to identify I just love watching a clearly very clever man who has probably been responsible for installing millions of pounds worth of electronics just tinkering with pound land tat for no reason than why not!
Got a set of these from CPC a few years ago. Trouble is the Christmas lights are all in the loft and I can just imagine what the missus might say when I take them to bits. "Oh don't worry love I'm just checking the DC voltage on these to see if they match the Big Clive ones and whether I can run them off a power bank or not" I'm obviously a) Hooked on Big Clive vids and b) Need to get out more!
0:08 and you already said ‘sick squid’ - cool and slippery...!
I kinda dig those. Somewhat like the icicle lights they sell at Christmas time except those are rope and they don't exactly hang straight down these ones hang down straight .
@ 9:20 how do they mount SMD components on both sides? At least 2 possibilities:
1. They may apply solder paste, apply glue, place the parts on side A , then flip the board and repeat for side B
2. They may use solder paste with two different melting temperatures, one for each side of the board.
Fisrt side uses higher temp reflow solder paste, seconds side uses lower temp paste
Very glad you revisit these things as sometimes they actually *do* get better. I love how you share the joy of discovery and thought processes, rather than editing them out to appear more competent. Your works are a complete joy to watch and learn from.
Also, I'd bet you could ""go USB" if you bridge the resistor in the pigtails, but that requires opening them.
The issue is driving the two LEDs in series, not the voltage drop to the microcontroller. Bridging the resistor will not help.
You can explain that stuff very very good !
You can apply a thermosetting adhesive to one side of the board to prevent the LEDs from falling off when soldering the other side. The LEDs that are glued to the board are then wave soldered.
You apply the solder paste to the one side, then use the automated syringe glue drop dispenser to give the drops of glue, place the components that side, then put the board in a carrier ( simple wooden jig with slots for the boards, so they are gripped by the edge of the cut outs and not touching the components, though the glue by then should have cured) and apply solder paste again, then send through your PNP, or use manual labour and a reel of dies, as there is only one orientation. then whole panel through IR oven for reflow, and snap panels apart after testing them post toasting.
@@SeanBZA that's how I would have done it.
SeanBZA Why the wooden jig? Just run the unbroken panel down the usual assembly line rails like any other panel being assembled.
You need Andreas' plastic pointing finger of knowledge
@Josh Wolf here on UA-cam uses a little doll hand as a spliff holder... fits over the tip of a finger...
Off on a tangent me but watching the pattern of the iceicles reminds me of an old disco matrix controller.I believe fairground rides used these controllers for their lighting patterns....Memories.Great teardown
Clive used to make those controllers, back in his carny days.
love how you test the capacitor with fingers to see if it has a charge, would love to see some of your unedited videos "bigclive'smishaps"
Christopher J pretty much all his videos are unedited. He occasionally pauses recording to save us from watching something repetitive or overly time-consuming but I think that’s about it.
To flow 2 sides one will be glued before re flow or just surface tension could hold them. I suspect glue
The circuitry changed because you highlighted the flaws... Keep it up!!!
Would covering the lights in a clear coat be a good way to protect the lights from corrosion? with the power fluctuating I wouldn't think those lights would get very hot, USB powered or otherwise.
Remember folks, UK sockets are typically protected by a 32A breaker in the distribution board.
UK plugs have a user replaceable fuse, of up to 13A, but with wall-warts such as these you just have to trust that the manufacturer has put in appropriate protection. Clearly this one has not. If the bridge rectifier or HV electrolytic goes short-circuit, those thin wires connecting the plug pins are the only things that will blow, and blow violently.
I hope that's what Clive meant when he said it was very suspicious that he got these from a UK supplier, because they shouldn't be selling non compliment stuff like this.
Ahh, the Lineman's Pliers of Extra Motivation!!
There must be a Zener built into the chip that regulates the votage down. That's why there is that 3k on the supply. The missing component would have been an external Zener in earlier versions. The Zener also implies the reverse voltage protection.
More variations in "English", such as "boot" & "trunk". In "Merica", we call "tristate multiplexing", "charlieplexing", after Charles Allen of Microchip, who came up with the scheme in 1995.
Charlieplex is not restricted to just LEDs, but can be used for any PN junction, such as the base-emitter junctions of bipolar transistors. I use it for my nixie clocks:
threeneurons.wordpress.com/nixie-power-supply/nixie-clock-kit-microcontroller/
This circuit seems very similar to that used in some of Hasbro's toy lightsabers that have a blade that's a string of LEDs that light up or power down in series.
I found a set on Amazon using a similar design to these that DOES work off a USB power supply, or off an included lithium cell solar charger module.
My guess is that they use a smaller input resistance, and each channel is all four LEDs in parallel to bring their bias voltage down, so they can work off the lithium cell.
Because, yes, it outputs the lithium voltage directly to the light string.
I tested them off a USB battery bank, and they lit up rather brightly without exploding.
I think how they flow both sides is by using a solder paste that flows at a higher temperature, and the other side flows at a lower temperature. You do the 'hot' side first, let that settle down, flip the board, then do the other 'cool' side afterwards. I've found pastes that are at least 30F of delta between them. It would be interesting (if not a bit destructive) to set a soldering iron to a very low temp, and then slowly ramp up the temp to see when the solder flows again.
That or they just used glue to keep everything held down... But that isn't as fun, now is it?
Those solder joints look pretty dry and crystalline.
As for flowing the components on without melting the ones on the other side off, well, they may be doing it the old-fashioned way which is gluing the components down and wave soldering the whole thing on at least the bottom side. However, these tiny SMD LEDs on the backside may be lightweight enough that the surface tension of the molten solder is enough to hold them during reflowing, removing the need for adhesive entirely.
Last year Class Ohlson had these light-changing fairly lights that get completely de-synchronized over time. I really hope they will have them again, I like the effect a lot. Didn't manage to get them last year.
They sound like standard colour changing LEDs. Each runs at its own speed. You can find them on eBay if you search for 100pcs 5mm diffused slow RGB LED
www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_from=R40&_nkw=100pcs+5mm+diffused+slow+rgb&_sacat=0&_sop=15&rt=nc&LH_BIN=1
Either they do 2 passes through the re flow oven with 2 different melting point solders, or it could be 2 boards glued back to back. They could even be doing the original surface mount thing where each chip has a small dot of glue on the back to stick it to the board. I wonder how much current that psu can dish out as there is a daisy chain connector on the end ?
First side the solder paste is applied through a screen printer, components are placed and passed through a reflow oven. The other side, components are glued in place, the board is sprayed with flux and passed through a solder wave.
i'd love to know where you got this particular set from, it seems a lot safer than one i bought a few month ago that was wildly dangerous built and had a floating earth connection in the provided adapter.
7.5V open circuit implies to me, this was designed to also run off of two Lithium-Ion cells (in series, packaged with a Solar Panel).
You are right, these lights are available with a panel as well. I doubt they're as bright as the mains powered ones, especially in the winter months
Yes...shame about the 5volt....i was thinking of sticking some on the front of the house shortly as i have scaffolding arriving soon...& i was going to run a few sets from a 5v power bank...
I might order a few sets from different sellers and see which type arrives....
I showed a friend of mine your code, and he said that it was "extremely clever" coding.
I think it would be simple enough to use a USB power bank and or supply with a boost converter. I'm sure that string doesn't draw that much current and a 1A booster is cheap..
you say zeener I say zenner...zeener,zenner..zenner,zeener...let's take the whole thing apart👉💎👈⚠️😁
nope, Zener diode
@@jyvben1520 Diode!, d.i.o.d.e...... diode come and I wanna go home........
It's named after Clarence Zener, and he pronounced his own name "Zeener", so I guess that's the "correct" way to say it (even though the name comes from German Zener / Zeiner, which are pronounced Dzennerr / Dzeynnerr)
@@RFC3514 Hey thanks for getting back...that's properly interesting 👉👍👉⚡👈
@Dave Micolichek thats just the way it is written, how you say it is up to you
Was that brief hesitation in your voice at 6:33 because you noticed the shape of the track?
are them green wires rated for mains voltage? they look a bit thin.. 🤔🙈🔥
Hey Clive, I've got several LED bulbs in my house that were bought and installed at roughly the same time, and three of them have just failed suddenly within the last week. Two are totally dead and one is flickering. Would you be interested in doing an autopsy on one of them? They might require the vice of knowledge or a heavy duty "x-ray machine" to open.
I like your finger-voltage-sensor.
I have a older style that is in color and runs backwards the effect go up it really stands out
"The vice of knowledge knows all" LMAO. Brilliant.
How do they reflow on both sides? Simple - they have little spots of glue to hold the components as it goes thru the reflow oven. :)
Neet video Big Clive
Could both sides be applied simultaneously?
I’m going to buy those lights!
Hi Clive. I have a set similar to this. When I connect 3 of them in series the last set are duller than the rest and the middle slightly more dull than the first. Can I run with a power supply either end of the 3? So 2 power supplies powering 3 sets? Xx
Be careful with the power supplies if they are grey imports. If they are around 5V it might be worth experimenting with using a USB charger to power them.
a weenie is the first thing I see when Clive starts with the photograph of the circuit board
Uncle Clive
Not really my thing but, If the mystery component was a 4.2k resistor, would it not run on 12v?
Is there a simple way to get these to instantaneously turn on? IE eliminate the PIC12 boot time?
Up until the last two years or so almost all of American Christmas lights where a string of filament or LED in series across 120v some times you would see 3 wires to split a long string in half.
I wonder if the IC includes a zener on it's power input, which is why a series resistor is fitted.
Probably only a 5V process, and the absolute max voltage is 7V, but in reality they might still work up to 10V with only a few failing short term. The absolute max ratings are in general conservative, and IC from any batch must meet those, but you can be a lot better. Thus a 1N4001 is rated to 100V, but in reality most of them probably will work up to 1000V, simply because making them all to 1000V is cheaper, and those that fail at 1500V ( the test voltage for the 1N4007) but which are otherwise fine are simply marked as lower spec 1N4001 to 1N4004 units depending on the actual test result. Often if the order calls for a 1N4004 part they will simply mark the 1N4007 part with the lower mark, as they do exceed the spec, and the yield on the 1N4007 part is in general pretty good.
For mounting on the both sides there are two methods :
1- using glew for one side that isn't loosened when heating up
2- using two kind of solder paste one with lower melting temperature and the other one with higher melting temperature so first they mount the side with lower melting temp and then the other side
Easy :)
The PSU looks like those 5V SMPS modules from neatblay, aie distress , mecazon. Put two CR2025 in series for testing :P
They must use a jig to hold those SMT LEDs in place whilst flowing solder.
I'm sure you mentioned it in one of you other videos Clive, but what is that little screwdriver you were pointing with? I'm kinda curious to find one
Common style called an 8 in 1 precision driver.
@@bigclivedotcom Thanks Clive!
Yo, Clive! To remind you: you tried a lithium "coin cell" to power the circuit-- didn't have enough voltage. You might try two cells next time!
Doesn't it need 6v+ because of the two LEDs in series ? Most white LEDs are 3v ?
Someone please answer this question I think I know the answer but I'm plead the fifth in case I don't.
BigJonYT Experimentally confirmed in video. Perfect for 4 "heavy duty" batteries (heavy duty compared to even more ancient types).
i got a set of these delivered today from (blue LEDS) has a mains 3 pin plug normal with a small power supply box in the cable instead. does your come with blanking cap for the end connection plug? mine didnt...
No end cap with mine.
@@bigclivedotcom i took a short video with it, although it was split into three parts... apologies as your sweet dulcet tones are in the background (of this video) whilst i recorded it, oops.
They use SMD glue to reflow them without the other side falling off.
Are they even done separately? Seems like it would be more efficient to solder both sides at the same time.
Here's my theory on the Missing component: it was a zener diode with the resistor to limit the current through it. But they realized that it will work well enough with the resistor dropping a (relatively) fixed voltage as the uC draws a (relatively) fixed current, so cheapened their design. The the uC might only be rated to 5V, or even lower.
roflchopter11 A decoupling cap seems more likely. Only when testing a full batch of 1000 strip will they know if they need the caps to get the failure rate low enough to be worth the omission.
A few vids back you was talking about the "Neons" well I got some (very nice too) I was wondering if there's anything I can do to make them to turn on and off remotely? turning them on and off from the plug isn't "cool"
Use one of them eBay 12v remote control units,I use them for my Halloween props rover.ebay.com/rover/0/0/0?mpre=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.ebay.co.uk%2Fulk%2Fitm%2F113856044951
Depends on how you wanna do it remotely. If you want to make them internet controllable, you can use an ESP8266, transistor, and resistor. Then you can control the brightness with PWM as well!
Well you can use the scissors of unplugging to turn them off permanently.
Thanks all found this with your help www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Wireless-Remote-Control-Sockets-Programmable-Electrical-UK-Plug-Outlet-Switch/143357427994?hash=item2160c4c11a:m:mLHsQefvT79vPh6iZ85xKWw
Type "arduino" and "remote control" into any search engine and you will have months and months of reading.
na..na.. what was the voltage after the 3k resistor ? . Thats where you see the Vcc of the chip. it may still be 5 volt.
Who was the supper of your lights?
I need to learn to program those little controllers. Start with PIC I guess?
The company "Microchip" bought out Atmel, you can get Atmel "arduino" parts and PIC parts both.
There are a lot of projects for PIC, there are many, many projects for Arduino and growing.
One small popular part is the ATTINY85, Adafruit produces a development board called the "Trinket" (choice of 5V or 3.3V)
When you get a project going with the Trinket, there are projects showing how to use Arduino Uno to
reprogram an ATTINY85 (device only) with your code. So your final project can be smaller than dev board.
When you need more memory or I/O the "arduino" software has been ported to many other chips.
Adafruit Trinket M0 is another dev board.
@@leef_me8112 ATTINY85 is a lot of fun. I suggest getting an arduino uno or something of the sort to start with. You can also use an arduino as a programmer for the ATTINY. The good thing with the tinies (other than the low cost) is that you only need a decoupling capacitor to run it. No need to futz around with crystals or pull ups/downs on various pins just to get it to run.
How do yo take those pics of the circuit board and how do you print them out?
Phone camera, good illumination and an inkjet printer.
"Tri-State-Multiplexing" - also known as Charlieplexing. It's good stuff.
A crappy unregulated power supply. It's possible the controller IC has a built-in shunt regulator. Try measuring the voltage across the power supply pins. You'll probably find it's around 5V and is why there's a 3k resistor in series with it.
👑
Could you measure the chip voltage on the other side of the 3K resistor. There could be a built in Zener and/or shut regulator on the chip.
Also, you should be able re-resistor the circuit for 5V USB operation.
Thanks for another great teardown/review/reverse-engineering video!
"Re-resistoring" probably won't help ya, because there are (multiple) pairs of LEDs in series; 2 x Vf > 5V, hence the power supply providing 6+V
Clive, are you going to show us some Halloween lights this year?
Tristate multiplexing, well that's obvious 😁, never heard of it lol.
There awesome x
Surely, the need for a class Y capacitor and general safety concerns would be obviated by putting an earth pin on tye plug and connecting it to the secondary side of the power supply.
It has to allow for the fact that many buildings have no earthing system.
Does anyone know where I can find a mailing address to send Clive some goodies?
I think he has it listed on his website.
Aadil Shah I poked around I couldn’t find it maybe I will try it on PC
I think you need to email him and prove that you're not a stalker, and maybe it'd help to send him a few bucks for coffee.
Nicely
Could you bridge the 302 then run off usb.
No. It's the LEDs that need the extra voltage. The 3k supplies the chip.
@ 3:19 The current popular term is charlieplexing en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charlieplexing
Got some of these end of last year..US transformer has 7 volts printed on it...don't play well with old lights!
What is the purpose of those tiny holes on the board?
Plated through holes. They connect one side of the PCB to the other.
Photonicinduction would soon see what voltage they work on!
Anything will work with 440 volts..... for a second or two
@@BillyNoMates1974 Any device can be a smoke machine depending on how you use it.
@@BillyNoMates1974 or a millisecond or to.
How in theory to go faster than the speed of light.
Take an LED which horse will it meant light at the speed of light.
Connect said LED 2 440 volts DC depending on the color of the LED the light should be traveling at X number of times the speed of light in terms of the number of times the voltage is increased past rated forward voltage.
No there's no going back because in the process the device is destroyed.
A k a one-way trip.
LOL LOL LOL.
@@Okabim case in point seen videos on this an inappropriately rated capacitor hook to crossed AC power directly.
Aaron Brandenburg I’ve done electrolytic capacitors on the mains. They sound like gun going off. 12 volt relays wired like a buzzer on mains is good fun. Nice green arcs across the relay contacts. The joys of electronics in my childhood. Lol
I thought it's some kind of landing lights to guide Meteors to hit your home hence the name.
Aye, put some on your roof so the mind bending aliens know where to land...
Lol.
😇😇😇😇😇 great work
Maybe you could use USB power with an inductor?
Tristate multiplexing AKA Charlieplexing after Charlie Allen at Maxim Integrated.
How about powering them with a couple of 18650s in series? 🤔
these run on 6.5v a 18650 is 4.2 volts at full charge
@@God-CDXX That's why they said in series 😉
@@BRUXXUS flat 18650 would work, fully charged which is 8.4v might blow up the thing, just use a generic voltage booster and use a single 18650 would work better
@@pierreuntel1970 Yeah, that's what I would do, personally. I'm actually using some of those little boosters and charger boards for an LED project now! :)
@@pierreuntel1970 i agree you can set the voltage booster to 6.5 volts
cool
@3:00 This is known as Charlieplexing. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charlieplexing
Could it possibly be this www.dianyuan.com/upload/community/2017/07/03/1499049217-55058.pdf ? It says it is a proprietary control current regulator and does so by sensing the peak current, off time and based on the turns ratio knows the secondary current.