Flexible and rigid square LED circuit boards for personal lighting projects
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The APA102(C) RGB LED and driver combination is SPI compatible and driven by 5V VDD. Open source libraries are available.
The flexible Light Squares are cuttable and can make smaller functional squares or L-shaped patterns.
Any software related will be released under BSD or MIT license. SAAS or cloud based software will be AGPL.
Well we learned some things. Mostly that we need a more engaged network of people that cares about LEDs :). We will try to launch a better campaign with better example usages of the panels in the future.
We have a campaign up on Indiegogo - https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/fyber-labs-light-square-flexible-rgb-led-panel/
This is to submit an order of about 100 panels. We plan to get around 80 orders and order the rest to use ourselves and to sell on Tindie. This is for the 5" 64x APA102C 16mm spaced flexible PCB design.
Here is the hand etched version running a rainbow pattern:
Chasing color pattern at full brightness:
Rigid version works quite well with a much lower 220'C reflow. I am using leaded solder, but I'll be trying some experiments to bring the SAC solder reflow to lower temp with a longer soak too.
We originally planned to make a low cost microcontroller version to just make pretty jewelry that integrates LEDs. Since the rigid is somewhere between this and a garment insertable panel, I figure it will most likely be used in DIY projects. I grabbed Adafruit's 5V Trinket board file and made a rough pattern for it as an optional controller. The result is available on Dirty PCB http://dirtypcbs.com/view.php?share=8802&accesskey=886f9b5b20749e82de0fed6f0aea530a . We made an order of them (obviously) and we hope to start using and selling them in a couple weeks when we get them.
I'll still be working on a smaller footprint controller with battery power. Probably based on Cortex-M0 with Tag Connect SWD pads. It will be used for jewelry and small accents. I'll post the design in a new project.
Just wanted to note, we did a rigid PCB demo board with 64 APA102Cs and it is clear the APA102Cs are very delicate compared to even other LEDs. I believe we will need to utilize a lower temperature solder or improve our reflow oven's timing. We ended up needing to rework many APA102Cs and re-reworking some. The demo proved our concept though, so we will next be producing hand etched flexible PCB prototypes.
Chris Hamilton