LED upgrade for Construction Lights
Over the summer I grabbed every orange flashing construction light that I could find at yard sales and junk bins. I ended up with about 7 that were all the same. Instead of using a bunch of batteries and having to switch them on and off every time i want to use them I wanted a simple solution that would allow me to power them all from one power supply while still having them flash and be very easy to connect them all together. This system will use one light as the master and the rest are just Dummy lights connected to the master. The master light contains a 12 volt power supply, the flasher circuits and a set of spring terminals to connect additional lights.
This project will be using the small flash boards that were salvaged from the lights before upgrading them to LED’s, a 12volt power supply, and small custom LED boards to replace the old bulbs in the lights.
The high voltage wiring is pretty simple on this project. It is just a 120 wall plug wired to a 12 volt Power supply. Taped well to cover any exposed metal and to hold the wires firmly in place. This will be installed in the master light. This provides the 12 volts needed to run all the lights.
Since this uses the old salvaged flash boards it makes the wiring really easy. the negative side of the power supply will tie to the negative side of the spring terminals and also to the led board that will be in the master light. The polarity of the flasher boards does matter, the red wires will all be connected together and will go to the positive lead of your power supply. the black wire will connect to the individual positive sides of the spring terminals and to the positive side of the led boards. Since the led are low current you can power more them one board from each of the flasher board. This will allow you to add as many as you want to the master light.
What you will need:
1. Orange flashing construction lights
2. LEDs, matched resistors, and a piece of perf board (These are grouped to make them 12volts)
3. 120 volt Power cord
4. 12 volt wall wart power supply
5. Spring terminal(salvaged from surround sound)
6. Nuts and bolts
7. Tools, Soldering iron, wire cutters, screw drivers, zip ties, drill, dremel
8. Wire Cat 5 works well
LED boards:
LED test:
The Flasher Boards:
Master Light Parts and Construction:
Testing the Finished master light:
Testing:
I Checked all my connections to make sure they were correct, and checked for any possible shorts with a multi meter, finding none, I connected the light up to power and tested all of the LEDs, each of them worked perfectly, And are ready to be installed in the remaining construction lights and be used in the haunted house.
Any questions or comments email: Haunthacker@outlook.com