newbie diy leds

i have a dji f550 with a taranis 9xdplus with a 8xd reicever

i have at the moment some led strips on all sides of my arms plugged directly straight to balance port on a 3s 11.1v lipo

i want to control these by a control switch on my tx i orded one of these from brc hobbies

RC Lander Receiver Controlled Electronic On/Off Switch
[421686]

but cant get lights to turn on/off i have set the +/- 100% etc in tx

i reckon theres about 12meters strip all together 2m amber 2m blue 4red 4m green

also i want to create new leds and have assigned to other switches via method i bout 4 green at 3.3 and 4 white at 3.3 and 4 red 2.0 volts

and bought a resistor i put supply volage as 11.1 and it gave me a 300 resistor am i right in thinking the supply voltage should have been 5v from reicever also whats the best way to wire these or so on as i am looking at a few different sets to enable on switches am a novice to making led sets

at the moment wired them up to a switch as above and can switch these on/off via tx but they dont seem that bright for what i want as these are to simulate nav lights at switch of button theres only one resistor to all the leds but i belive this is the wrong one

any help or suggestions would be great

will try post pictures tommorow

Here is just a quickie answer.

Most Leds have a forward volt drop of about 1V - 1.2V, so the max leds in series you could power is about 4 (using a 4.8V rx battery). If we was to say that a current of about 20mA is required then the resistor required would be approx 250ohms (check what the max current from the manufactures data).

I switch my nav lights on with a dedicated RC switch connected to an RC channel Which by the way has some electronics to give me constant on LED for nav and bright flashing white lights as full size aircraft, that way I can use a Lipo with higher voltage so as to run many more leds in series.

Some Led strips that can be bought have the Leds in parallel (a resistor for each LED) but these tend to be 12V rated so a 11.1 lipo would be required, you could change each led resistor value to suit your receiver battery but would it be worth the extra hassle.

I would be a bit reluctant to drive my Leds direct from the receiver channel (an RC switch would be required for each channel otherwise), if only from a safety point of view. I know the channels are designed to power servos which sometimes have a high current draw in operation but I want the receiver to have an easy life If not from a reliability point of view.

I would not want my pride n joy doing anything drastic due to loss of RX in flight because of connected LEDs but thats me.

I have checked your switch which is limited to the RX battery which is about 4.8V, if you have bought the 12V led strips then you dont have enough forward volts to power them correctly (which you have already found out).

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Owen Grey January 10, 2015 at 10:32am

Here is just a quickie answer.

Most Leds have a forward volt drop of about 1V - 1.2V, so the max leds in series you could power is about 4 (using a 4.8V rx battery). If we was to say that a current of about 20mA is required then the resistor required would be approx 250ohms (check what the max current from the manufactures data).

I switch my nav lights on with a dedicated RC switch connected to an RC channel Which by the way has some electronics to give me constant on LED for nav and bright flashing white lights as full size aircraft, that way I can use a Lipo with higher voltage so as to run many more leds in series.

Some Led strips that can be bought have the Leds in parallel (a resistor for each LED) but these tend to be 12V rated so a 11.1 lipo would be required, you could change each led resistor value to suit your receiver battery but would it be worth the extra hassle.

I would be a bit reluctant to drive my Leds direct from the receiver channel (an RC switch would be required for each channel otherwise), if only from a safety point of view. I know the channels are designed to power servos which sometimes have a high current draw in operation but I want the receiver to have an easy life If not from a reliability point of view.

I would not want my pride n joy doing anything drastic due to loss of RX in flight because of connected LEDs but thats me.

I have checked your switch which is limited to the RX battery which is about 4.8V, if you have bought the 12V led strips then you dont have enough forward volts to power them correctly (which you have already found out).

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newbie diy leds

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