What are you changing this year? Elements you are building or installing for 2023

[orlandoal]

Adding six additional 24" snow flakes this year, along with garage and gutter outlines, if time permits I am also thinking of adding some singing bulbs into the mix. I already have a singing tree, so not a whole lot of additional work incorporating those thankfully.

I will add the garage and gutter outlines into the Halloween show initially and then into the xmas shows with the new flakes. I really want to add a 8 or 10 foot mega tree, but might be pushing my luck getting that one built and tested. Luckily the sequences I already use have the mega trees programmed, I just do not currently use them.

 

[Kingfisher]

I've made some decent progress on new controllers. These ones are just missing a few things, some printed parts, vent holes and liquid nail. I use cheep kmart tubs as they do the trick, keep costs down and stack neatly.

2 * DMX2-24 + 31v power supply


He123 differential receiver (12v)


He123 with a BBB

 

[Skymaster]

He123 with a BBB
View attachment 23462

Looks like you've labelled the differential output ports wrong, they groups of four should be in increasing order left-right across the expansion board.
The silkscreen on the PCB shows the 1-16, so add either 16 for the right, or 32 for the left board.

 

[SmartAlecLights]

I felt like a challenging project this year.

 

[Indigogyre]

So, i started to work on some of my matrixes. Here is a sample while there is more to do. This is a snapshot pf a Ghostbusters effect.

 

[JordoLights]

My humble setup.

Main controller in black box on the right which powered my 2022 show. HE123 with BBB.

Adding 2x differential receivers this year to aid the expansion of the show.

 

[Kingfisher]

Looks like you've labelled the differential output ports wrong, they groups of four should be in increasing order left-right across the expansion board.
The silkscreen on the PCB shows the 1-16, so add either 16 for the right, or 32 for the left board.

Right right, now I know what I've done wrong... I'll fix it. Thinking about it might have been the same reason some things didn't work for me last year... Thanks mate!

 

[bmh255]

This week for me since I’m adding outlines to the house. Some remote boxes. Next week rebuild the main box.

 

[christmasdave]

I’ve been working on putting 2 arch’s together with a Rosa (my first ever HD prop!) in the middle.
still a few things to work out to stabilise the arch’s but I’m happy with progress.

 

[Domestos]

IKEA A$100 MiniTree.

Three years ago I built 4 of these trees, and apart from the odd pixel dying here and there, they have been going very strong. (Last year I added the Snowflakes on top) These mini-trees have withstand the harsh Brisbane Sun, and can be taken apart for easy storage.

The Parts:

• The base is an IKEA Gladom serving tray, made from steel, and already painted. $25.00
• The top is an IKEA Forenlig Plant Pot 9cm diameter. $2.50
• 15mm X 900mm Galvanised steep pipe. $12.35 (Bunnings)
• Two Galvanised 15mm Flanges. $9.60 (Bunnings)
• 4 6mm Short Bolts and nuts (I had plenty of these laying around on previous builds)
• Plastic Strip to mount the Pixels (850mm / length, I went with 6 legs) (I worked this out to be about $11.00 worth of mounting strip assuming you pay $110 for 50 meters - available here)
• Pixels (I went with 15 pixels per leg, = 90 in total) About $50 for the pixels.

All in all, abut $100 to $110 per tree, depending on your pixel costs.

The Build:

• I began by getting the centre point of the tray, and traced the flange's 4 holes.

• Next I drilled 8mm holes, and fastened the flange with 6mm short bolts and nuts (I had a ton of these, so didn't include them in the price)
• I fitted the pipe to the base flange, and added the top flange.

• I poped the top plant pot on the top flange (this is a nice snug fit, and gives the whole tree a good stable feel.

• I placed the mounting strip on the top Plant Pot, and eyebolled where the first leg would go, and drilled a hole, and fitted the strip with a cable tie. I repeated this 5 more times, and the end result was that 50% of the pot diameter was used for the 6 legs.
• The base diameter is 45cm, and that gives you a circumference of about 141cm. I rounded that down to 70cm (as I am only building a 180 minitree), and divided it by 6 giving me a total space of 11.66cm. In my original build, I worked with 11.5cm spacing, but for the 4 new trees, I am going to go down to 10cm. This will give the two side legs more of a front view.
• Once all the measurements was done, I drilled the 6 holes and fitted the mounting strip to the bottom with cable ties.
• Finally I fitted the pixels.

4 More "STRONG" mini trees.

 

[CassieK]

8 moving heads, and 10k extra pixels.

 

[Indigogyre]

I’ve been working on putting 2 arch’s together with a Rosa (my first ever HD prop!) in the middle.
still a few things to work out to stabilise the arch’s but I’m happy with progress.

That's very creative to configure them that way. How are you going to model it? I can think of many variations for models and sub-models.

 

[christmasdave]

That's very creative to configure them that way. How are you going to model it? I can think of many variations for models and sub-models.

I’ve actually probably been a bit lazy with the modelling just 2 arch’s with the bottom one flipped and treating as 2 seperate.
It started as more a ‘I wonder if this will work’. It looks good in xLights and even though I’m sequencing as seperate, they look like one model, which is nice. If I do get more time I’ll model them properly, which as you say will definitely allow for more customisation.

 

[Skymaster]

Today's work:

Built four mini spiral trees, 50 bullets wrapped on some tomato cages that my Mrs picked up from ALDI for 8 bucks each this week.

ALDI special buys™ new range every Wednesday and Saturday

www.aldi.com.au

An unexpected addition, no idea where I'll put them yet, probably ask the neighbour if I can put them on his side of the fence between our driveways. He has a about half a metre garden there which is just weeds



The other part of the morning was trying out two different mounts for my solar panel seed matrix. One uses a full 2m length of 100mm mesh, the other just uses a single square with the seeds supporting themselves.
The latter seems to be the best option so that there's no metal sitting on the panels directly. Looks better from the street too during the day.

The second and fifth panels here have the test matrixes on. 11x18 for a total of 198 pixels each.


This is the wire mesh mounting


And this is the pixel wire only method


In both cases, a square of mesh is wrapped around the panel to provide the attachment. Excuse the bird skeleton, let's just say that's my only Halloween decoration for the year

 

[someoneAUS]

Any noticable output drop on the panels doing that?