Wireless On-Air summary

So, I’ve finally got a chance to share a bit more about my wireless on-air light setup.

It is up and function, if somewhat jenky looking. Here’s a short clip of it in action. The yellow wire is an antenna, which probably doesn’t need to be external – but hey, I already drilled the hole.

Follow the jump for some more info on how it works.

Here’s a crummy camera phone shot of the inside of the box. Unfortunately I don’t have a better digicam available at the moment.

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What you see is the wireless receiver/relay board, along with the LED flasher board. I think total assembly time to solder all the stuff on to the PCBs was about two hours. Followed by another hour or so to figure out which things I mounted backwards. Heh.

Range is pretty good – about 30 meters with line of sight, and at least 10 meters even through a couple walls. Since my intended use is to have the box just on the other side of a door from where a production is taking place, I think it’s acceptable.

If it were a commercial product, it wouldn’t be so crummy looking, but at least this is a suitable proof-of-concept. What makes it pretty interesting is that I could build more boxes all tuned to the same key fob, so that one remote could trigger boxes all throughout a location. I also think the boxes could be built extremely inexpensively in mass production. Anyone want to take on the task?

One important lesson learned is that even though all the components specify that they’ll run off 9volt, the wireless receiver/relay board is EXTREMELY sensitive to voltage fluctuation. It stopped working as soon as the 9volt I was using dropped to 8.98volts. I “solved” this by chaining in a couple AAs, so that it’s getting more like 12 volts now. Everything works ok and battery life is much more acceptable.

Here’s the order list from Q-Kits, if anyone wants to replicate it.

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SET OF 80 ASSORTED LEDs (#K/LED1): 1

Item Total: $6.59

2 Channel RF Code-Lock Remote Transmitter Kit (#K8059): 1

Item Total: $18.95

ALKALINE MN21 12V-38mAh 4223.101.401 (1pc/bl) (#V23GA): 1

Item Total: $3.95

2 Channel RF Remote Receiver with Random Code (#K8057): 1

Item Total: $24.95

ABS Plastic Box (#WCAH2853): 1

Item Total: $4.95

9 Volt Battery Snap (#BS-TR): 2

Item Total: $1.90

LED Flasher Kit 5 Dot (Straight Pattern) (#fk111): 1

Item Total: $4.95

Mounting wire kit (#KMOW): 1

Item Total: $6.95

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