LED Block Game
Mouser Electronics Technical Support Team
Licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0
Assembly
Wireless Controller Assembly
Before assembling your controller, plan your board organization and layout. Pay attention to where you place components and how you will create traces and run wire. In this and later examples, we use a combination of solder bridges and wires to make connections between devices. For ease of programming and replacement, consider using a DIP socket adapter instead of soldering the PIC16 directly to the StripBoard. On the board, the switch allows users to turn the controller on and off, while the pushbutton acts as a start/reset for the display driver.
Sample layout of the wireless controller.Display Assembly
Now that you've programmed the chipKIT, you need to create a second RF module to act as a receiver for the wireless controller. These connections, included in the schematic image and as displayed in the following images, will allow you to seat the receiver module like a shield into the chipKIT.
When laying out the LEDs, note the direction of the signal. The LED strips used in this project have arrows indicating the data line direction and need to be kept in series and zig zag from top to bottom. Be sure to maintain uniform spacing between the strips and keep the LEDs even from one strip to the next. If the display will be stationary, you can adhere the strips to acrylic or plywood to ensure proper spacing. In the following image, we've mounted the strips by suspend them between furniture-grade PVC pipes so we can easily assemble and disassemble the display.
LED strips mounted to a PVC frame for easy transportation.
Power supply for the LED Block Game.We would love to hear what you think about this project; please tell us in the comments section below.
