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Projects On Arduino LED

This document provides instructions for making a DIY Arduino Christmas tree lights project using LEDs. The project involves constructing a simple Christmas tree shape out of cardboard and attaching 27 LEDs that can be controlled by an Arduino board. The LEDs are wired in a 6x6 matrix and soldered to copper wires. The wires are connected to the Arduino to allow it to light up the LEDs in sequences, simulating Christmas tree lights. Basic materials needed include cardboard, LEDs, wire, an Arduino board, and decorations to embellish the tree.

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nagasaikiran ponnapalli
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51 views

Projects On Arduino LED

This document provides instructions for making a DIY Arduino Christmas tree lights project using LEDs. The project involves constructing a simple Christmas tree shape out of cardboard and attaching 27 LEDs that can be controlled by an Arduino board. The LEDs are wired in a 6x6 matrix and soldered to copper wires. The wires are connected to the Arduino to allow it to light up the LEDs in sequences, simulating Christmas tree lights. Basic materials needed include cardboard, LEDs, wire, an Arduino board, and decorations to embellish the tree.

Uploaded by

nagasaikiran ponnapalli
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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DIY Arduino Christmas Tree Lights

using LEDs
It is holiday season and with Christmas around the corner, we have made a
Christmas themed project. In this article, I’ll demonstrate a DIY Arduino
Christmas Tree Lights project using LEDs.

There are a few Christmas tree LEDs already available in the market but
with circuit board. We thought, where is the fun in lighting up a Christmas
Tree without decorations. So, in this DIY project, we have combined
Electronics and Holiday Season and made a simple Arduino Christmas
Tree Lights using LEDs.

An important point to note is that we will not be using an actual Christmas


Tree. It is just a fun little DIY project for anyone who wants to mix Arduino
and Christmas. So, let’s get started.

Table of Contents
 Construction and Output Video 
 Circuit Diagram of DIY Arduino Christmas Tree Lights
 Components Required
 Construction of the Christmas Tree
 Working of the Project
 Applications
Construction and Output Video 
Circuit Diagram of DIY Arduino Christmas Tree
Lights
There is nothing interesting in the circuit diagram part of the Arduino
Christmas Tree Lights Project as all you need to do connect a bunch of
LEDs to Arduino. The number of LEDs depends on the size of your tree
and in our case, we ended up using 27 LEDs.

Also note that we have directly connected all the LEDs to Arduino and
made sure that only one LED will be turned on at any moment.

The arrangement of LEDs or rather the wiring of the LEDs is interesting


because we went with a 6×6 matrix with 6 Cathode or GND pins and 6
Anode or VCC Pins.
NOTE: Due to problem with real estate on the Christmas tree, we used only
27 LEDs.

Components Required
 Sunboard Sheet (or any thick cardboard)
 Cutter
 Glue
 LEDs (# – depending on the size of the tree)
 Glitter and other decorating stuff
 Insulated Copper Wire
 Arduino Nano (UNO or Mega, anything is fine)
 Power Supply

Construction of the Christmas Tree


As mentioned earlier, the circuit part is easy but the construction part is the
tricky one. I’ll show you how to make a simple Christmas Tree for the
purpose of this project.

Take two Sunboard sheets, roughly about the size of an A4 Sheet and
draw a layout of the Christmas tree on one sheet. You can take any
reference from the internet.

Using a cutter, cut out the Sunboard along the shape of the tree. Be careful
when using the cutter as it is a very sharp tool.
Take the other Sunboard and draw a trace of the outline of the tree on it.
Then cut this board as well. Also, make a branch like structure to support
the tree.
Draw lines in the center of the tree on both pieces. Mark points for LEDs:
one either side of the line in one tree and on one side of the line in the
other tree. Use a drill or a sharp tool to make holes in the tree. You will be
inserting LEDs in these holes. So, make sure that the holes are of enough
size.
Take the tree on which we marked holes for LEDs on one side and cut it
into half along the line. Using quick glue, attach the pieces on the either
side of the other tree as shown. The resulting structure will something
similar to the one shown in bottom right.
Also, fix the branch to the tree and glue a temporary supporting base at the
end of the branch, so that the tree can have a stable position.
Now, insert LEDs into the holes and you can use glue around the LEDs so
that they won’t wobble in the holes. Arrange the LEDs in an alternating way
i.e. few facing one way and few facing the other.
We have arranged the LEDs in such a way that all the cathodes align to a
single side. This will make our job easier while wiring the LEDs.

Coming to wiring the LEDs, we have used an insulated copper wire from an
old motor. The reason for using this wire is that they can be twisted without
any short circuit.
Skim the insulation of the wire on the parts where you want to solder and
start soldering the wire to the LEDs. Since it is a 6×6 matrix, you will end up
with 6 GND wires and 6 VCC wires.

Arrange all the wires and glue then to the surface. The final build will look
something like this.
Make sure that there are no wires left loose or hanging. Twist all the wires
and position them at the bottom. We have to connect all these 12 wires to
Arduino.
Before connecting the wires to Arduino, let us make the base. Take a small
piece of Sunboard sheet and attach two supporting sheets to form a base
like structure. Remove the previously fixed temporary supporting base and
fix the tree to the new base.
Make a hole adjacent to the tree’s stem to push all the wires down.

Now comes more soldering. Solder the wires (6 GND and 6 VCC) to male
headers and these headers can be connected to any Arduino board like
Arduino UNO, Nano or Mega.
We are coming to an end. Take some glue on a painting brush and apply it
on the surface. Be careful and apply gentle pressure. When the entire side
is applied with glue, sprinkle some green sparkles. Give it some time to dry
and do the similar thing to all the side.
After the sparkles are completely attached to the surface, make additional
decorations like gluing some colorful balls, adding a star on top, Rudolph,
the reindeer and a Merry Christmas sticker. The Christmas Tree after all
the decorations will look like this.

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