Making Aches from Strips

[ShellNZ]

These are my arches.

http://s126.photobucket.com/albums/p112/Toby3_photo/?action=view¤t=IMG_1123.mp4

They are ventilation tubing (cheap) with 2811 strip inside them. I have a pathway that they go either side, 9 arches long, around 45cm high. I just bent the bottom of them and ziptied then when putting them in the ground I put rebar beside each curve and ziptied the tubing to the rebar.

There are 2 x 5m 2811 strips joined together to make the 9-arches. So each archway line is 300 RGB chans.

I just created the chans in LOR S3 and made them do allsorts. My videos can be found in forums, unfort I didnt get any real closeups of my elements.

 

[DeeJai]

here are my arches, using 4m worth of conduit, held inplace using re-bars in the ground.

Im using 2801 pixel strip 12V, the strip is held in place using firstly a small loop of electrical tape, with a zip tie over the top.

The electrical tape just helps hold the strip inplace whilst you get your zip ties on, and offers a little bit of protection to the joins (solder pad area) of the strip. as this is where i attached the zip ties.

http://youtu.be/O2H5HuiCr44

 

[Binkles]

I forgot about your arches, they rock, sigh, would everyone stop posting their awesome stuff, I keep changing my mind on designs.

 

[bob_moody]

The way I do my arches is with PEX pipe. you just slip the strips into 1/2 inch pipe. This defuses the light, and also helps protect the strip.

Any pics or videos of the pex pipe arches ?

Bob

 

[bob_moody]

Thank you to everyone that replied.

I thought I had read before about splitting a single string..

I apprecaite it .. keep the comments, vids and ideas coming ..

Bob

 

[Bridgette]

Here are the arches I made this year out of flex string:
ringArches
It takes a bit less than 10 minutes to build one. The bigger one are 75 LEDs, the smallest 15, but they do all end up 15 sections. Radial or circumferential effects are pretty straightforward. For the circumferential ones, just light the arch you want to light. For the radial ones, treat the whole thing as a 5x15 matrix, or if using LSP, generate 15 virtual controllers. The building steps are described on another forum. If interested, I'll post here too.

ccan u tell what versiin of little drummer boy it is please

 

[fyb2000]

Bridgette,
you quoting my message but the video i linked to doesn't have any music. It was an animation only test that I put together to try out my multi size arches.

 

[sebjsan]

I missed those this year but they look great Francois.

 

[Gilrock]

Bridgette...the video I posted had Little Drummer Boy so if you meant mine it's by Sean Quigley and available on iTunes and other places. If you jump to the video on youtube instead of watching it embedded the description names the artist and there are links to the side that youtube put there automatically to allow you to buy the song.
Thanks,
Gil

 

[bob_moody]

Bump...

I will add that I have some testing on using PEX tubing for arches. PEX is somewhat transparent piping usually found in mobile homes and travel trailers.

What I did was to use a CPVC 45 elbows and a CPVC "T". This created a holder that I could slip over a piece of rebar in the ground and leave the inside of the tubing open. I can then slide strips inside the tubing and light them up.

I have some pictures on the blog page of my website if you want to see some static examlpes. I will say that for testing i used a dumb strip and a battery to light it up..

Check out http://moodychristmas.weebly.com/blog.html

I have this set up in my shop, so I just clamp the "T"s to a dumbbell to hold them in place (1st pic)

Bob

 

[z_special]

I am trying to put the finishing touches on planning for some new arches.
We want to use the WS2811 5m strips from Ray Wu ($32.00ea) that as I understand are similar to CCR's.

Question is can you build two arches from a single strip?
It seems that LOR SuperStar seems to think so, but at this point i'm more concerned with the mechanics than the programming.

I was thinking of inserting the strip into something like PEX tubing.
7' somthing piece, a 45 deg coupler, short straight, 45 deg coupler and the final piece of PEX to make the second arch.

Is this doable? can a single 5m strip been see as two?

Thanks for the help..

Bob

check out my arch from 2012, I used 3/4 pvc electrical conduit at a length of just over 5 metres/ 18 feet. Made for a nice high arch. Easy to assemble and break down because I did not glue the pipes together I used duct tape since the couplings are molded on each piece of pipe. Tie wrapped them gently on the pipe

http://sharing.theflip.com/session/7880e893e719bda5481d8d1d5654dd74/video/157005461
http://sharing.theflip.com/session/623fdca2f87e2b489cb5277984ea4f6d/video/157004781
Zane

This is the pixel I ordered http://www.aliexpress.com/store/product/5m-led-digital-strip-DC12V-input-WS2811IC-256-scale-10pcs-IC-and-30pcs-5050-SMD-RGB/701799_568458133.html