Weatherproofing ACL strobes

kool-lites said:
what sort of housing are you guys using?
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I'm using the covers that i got from FatHead, who i haven't seen around for a while, but is no surprise after he and his wife had their first child, kinda expected him to start having new priorities
 
My plan is to take the completed PCB/LED assembly and first seal the LED into the cover so that the opening is sealed off. This is because the covers have weap holes in them (which I didn't notice right off...). I'll use true silicone caulking and let them dry. Then I'll wire up the strobes and put a 1/2" (13mm) shrink tubing (about 1-1/2" long) which just happens to fit right over the opening of the cover. I'll partially shrink this tight to the cover then squirt in a dab of silicone into the open end and continue shrinking it until that end is completely sealed.

I've built a set of four of these and it seems to work pretty good. I did use the wrong caulking (latex) at first which caused issues with the board itself (plus I used too much caulk...). I just ordered a bunch of white shrink wrap so just waiting for that to come in before finishing these things up - finally!
 
Thanks, Brian!!! I was thinking the shrink wrap route myself, but figured I'd ask before I did anything. Any pics of yours available??
 
DanoNJ said:
Thanks, Brian!!! I was thinking the shrink wrap route myself, but figured I'd ask before I did anything. Any pics of yours available??
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Nope but I can do that once I get some of the new batch made up. I hate to admit it but I didn't get that far for my 2010 show so I used doubled-over packing tape with a touch of silicon along the wires to seal the entry. It looked completely horrendous close up but I must say it worked reasonably well! Of course they won't last in any kind of weather that way but at night they looked pretty good! I don't have pictures of those - they would go on my wall of shame... ::)
 
I made a few with electical tape for the NJ mini. Tape has held up so far, but I'm sure sitting outside for 60 days some will fail. Wonder if these need to be completly waterproof / resistant.

I'm actually surprised with all the boards sold, more people haven't built more - or just not posting their findings....
 
DanoNJ said:
I made a few with electical tape for the NJ mini. Tape has held up so far, but I'm sure sitting outside for 60 days some will fail. Wonder if these need to be completly waterproof / resistant.

I'm actually surprised with all the boards sold, more people haven't built more - or just not posting their findings....
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I wonder how many strobes there are that are sitting in peoples draws and put in the too hard basket due to being SMD
 
Fasteddy said:
I wonder how many strobes there are that are sitting in peoples draws and put in the too hard basket due to being SMD
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Mmm, would be a sad thing, how much stuff is'nt even avaialble in non smd?
 
SMD part was easy, i've made up 150 with only 3 failures. Trying to sort out wiring is the hard part for me.
 
Dave said:
Trying to sort out wiring is the hard part for me.
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This is a task! Mine will not have a trigger so I only need 2 wires. Origianlly I used CAT5 - solid for almost half of the 80 I have. Then got to thinking the sold core will eventually fail and break, so I may turn to extra mini light wire which is stranded and just about fits the wholes.
 
I finally got around to finishing up a batch of strobes and did a quick write-up on it. There's a multitude of ways to do things so this is how I did mine - http://christmasinsj.com/Strobe-How-To.pdf.

Hope it's useful to some - don't let those little guys sit in a box somewhere - get them built!
 
Ive just about finished my strobes,
still need to order the Leds ,
an install 19more chips on the last batch i have just about finished soldering.
I hand soldered every part on every board, the worse part is dropping parts on the floor
 
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