Shitty Amateur Electronics - Part 4: The Random Light Game

In the last blog I posted a picture of the first real “thing” I made by myself, a simple row of LEDs and a button, all controlled by a Raspberry Pi. It was all put together on a breadboard and I was quite sad when the time came to taking it all apart to make something else.

So, in what was an uncharacteristically emotional thing to do for me, I decided to build the circuit in a more permanent fashion. I ended up buying some stripboard from Amazon, allowing me to transfer the whole thing in an easy way with no need for me to use little bits of wire. All of those strips are one continuous line, allowing me to practice making some logically clean and efficient layouts.

Unfortunately, the whole thing turned into a bit of a mess. I have now, finally, got a working board that I intend to cut to size and hopefully put inside a nice plastic enclosure so I can preserve it for posterity, maybe decorate it. But the journey to get there was a story of failed solder joints, accidental bridging of adjacent strips, and idiocy on my part where I joined a single line of components together that were already on the same row. It was very messy and the solder wick got a lot of work that day.

I was chided by a friend for wasting my breadboard jumper wires on this, but the simple truth is that these were the only things I had at the time with female jumpers on the other end. I am lazy and impatient. I regretted the decision immensely when the plastic on the top side of the wires melted thanks to the heat from below.

But, several hours with a multimeter and lots of repaired joints later, I had my board tested and working and now it’s time to think about what kind of box to put it in. I have to consider the size and clearance, and also how to make the LEDs come through while offering adequate protection to the delicate cargo inside. There’s also the switch to consider, and this gets a little tough. Do I put the switch on the end of two wires, so I can have a bit more freedom, while having a potentially more fiddly build? Or do I have a long switch directly attached to the board, which has a risk of snapping off if pushed or knocked in the right - or, indeed, wrong - way? I haven’t decided yet.

In terms of actual boxes there’s not much good news here. Pretty much everything I can find is either pre-cut with holes for other boards like RPis or Arduino, and if it isn’t those it’s outdoor electric junction box kits with full waterproofing and really thick plastic. Hardly appropriate.

The other option is to befriend the right people at work and see if I can get some help designing and 3D printing a case for it with holes cut where I want them. I’m sure I can do this, I’d even be happy to pay for the materials, and it gives me the freedom I need and also a bit of achievement-cred if I can pull it off.

Whatever route I take I’ll be sure to post here and see what pitfalls I come across. There will be many and I get stressed and frustrated. Probably shouldn’t build that DIY LED matrix I’ve been thinking about... that’s about 160 individual solder joints. Eep...