savage
New Member
Lo all,
Quite a devastating project, but hopefully it will be successfull (and hopefully I'll get lots of help!! ). I want to start building scale models of air ports. Model rail roads and the like are very common these days and allot of people do them, but it recently struck me what seriously complex electronics actually is involved in running and operating multiple runways at airports - hence, I want to attempt to build them.
My first big problem (hence the post) is the current requirements. As I'm sure you all know, air ports have MASSIVE amounts of lights. Based on scale, I am estimating that 1 runway will have approximately 4,000 LEDs (DING DING DING). Up to know, I've been connecting most LEDs in parrallel, but the shocking part, is that with a 5V supply, my SPICE program reports a over 50A current for +- 100 LEDs (2.2V @ 10mA).
How on earth can I possible manage a power supply, regulators, inverters, lots of timers and allot of other electronics to drive LARGE (and I mean LARGE) amounts of LEDs? Working on 4,000 LEDs per runway, installing 2 Runways on the airport - that's 8,000 LEDs. Add some taxiways, signal lights, and the like, I think I will be easily over the 12,000 mark as far as LEDs go....
The majority of the LEDs will be RED and WHITE (which I also think isn't the best thing as far as current goes), and all the LEDs will be 3.5mm. I think as far as the runways are concerned, approximately 25% of the LEDs will be bi-coloured.
Colours used on the runways range from green, red, yellow, and white. Taxiways and the like will be Blue and White....
The bottom line, I think I need to get my hands on a KILLER power supply. So far, I thought about perhaps getting a high Amp transformer, and running a bunch (couple of 100's) of 7805's. This will give me a regulated supply of 5V 1A. My idea is then to run say 60 LEDs of each regulator... But again, I'm not sure if this will work - more than likely not.
Hopefully, someone clever here can come up with some feasable ideas for me, because I'm fresh out of ideas as far as this power supply goes, based on the ideas I get back from my SPICE modeling.......
Cheers.
Quite a devastating project, but hopefully it will be successfull (and hopefully I'll get lots of help!! ). I want to start building scale models of air ports. Model rail roads and the like are very common these days and allot of people do them, but it recently struck me what seriously complex electronics actually is involved in running and operating multiple runways at airports - hence, I want to attempt to build them.
My first big problem (hence the post) is the current requirements. As I'm sure you all know, air ports have MASSIVE amounts of lights. Based on scale, I am estimating that 1 runway will have approximately 4,000 LEDs (DING DING DING). Up to know, I've been connecting most LEDs in parrallel, but the shocking part, is that with a 5V supply, my SPICE program reports a over 50A current for +- 100 LEDs (2.2V @ 10mA).
How on earth can I possible manage a power supply, regulators, inverters, lots of timers and allot of other electronics to drive LARGE (and I mean LARGE) amounts of LEDs? Working on 4,000 LEDs per runway, installing 2 Runways on the airport - that's 8,000 LEDs. Add some taxiways, signal lights, and the like, I think I will be easily over the 12,000 mark as far as LEDs go....
The majority of the LEDs will be RED and WHITE (which I also think isn't the best thing as far as current goes), and all the LEDs will be 3.5mm. I think as far as the runways are concerned, approximately 25% of the LEDs will be bi-coloured.
Colours used on the runways range from green, red, yellow, and white. Taxiways and the like will be Blue and White....
The bottom line, I think I need to get my hands on a KILLER power supply. So far, I thought about perhaps getting a high Amp transformer, and running a bunch (couple of 100's) of 7805's. This will give me a regulated supply of 5V 1A. My idea is then to run say 60 LEDs of each regulator... But again, I'm not sure if this will work - more than likely not.
Hopefully, someone clever here can come up with some feasable ideas for me, because I'm fresh out of ideas as far as this power supply goes, based on the ideas I get back from my SPICE modeling.......
Cheers.