LED mods

[subatomic]

just to follow up with this thread, I went ahead and ground down the LEDs to make them flat, they look really cool and I'm glad I did it:



And here's another picture that's too big to display here.

[controlvoltage]

Hi,

How did you grind them down to the same level? Did you use a jig of some sort, or just eyeball each one?

Thanks

-Amos

[subatomic]

[click these to see closeup]

I just eyeballed it, was careful, and got into a 40 LED rhythmic human production cycle. I stopped grinding when the dome part was completely gone, just straight cylendar sides left. I preferred to leave part of the dome than remove too much, so sometimes there's a very slight curve on the LED sides, but it's not noticable.

So they're all unique, organic... like snowflakes.

So the only thing you can notice "wrong" is that a few of them seem a little lower or higher than others (I'm talking very small nitpicky amounts), but I think the tolerances for error in my results are near pro gear, looking around at some other synths.

The battle was to hold the LED straight so the flattop was level against the grinding wheel.
A jig piece of wood with a hold drilled into it might make this process easier. Please post if you do something like this.

[mome rath]

Did you need to change resistors to use different colors?

edit: I mean, were they bright enough for you?

[subatomic]

Did you need to change resistors to use different colors?

edit: I mean, were they bright enough for you?

I used 3.3kohm for the blues (5000mcd), which is just on the bright side when compared to all my other gear. For the orange (5000mcd) and white (5000mcd) I used 2.2kohm since they seems to not be as bright.
If I was doing it over, I'd try 5k for blue and 3.3k for orange & white.

Definately give it a try before soldering them in, since all LEDs have difference brightness ratings...
The best way to "get it right" is to test the brightnesses next to your other synth gear (or anything with an indicator LED light, laptop, PS2, xbox, etc...).

It's easy to fail without this simple comparison since it's really hard for the eye to gauge brightness (probably because of the iris and our sensory system's redundancy filtering getting in the way...).

[nilsomat]

I have another idea:

Just put 20 LEDs with a handful of sand or little stones in a can and tie it to something moving (record player put vertical would do).
Then just let it grind for a couple of hours and you get the diffused finish...
Good luck!

Nils