I need a hundred bright morse code emitters - must be light, bright and small.

I need a hundred bright programmable LED emitters that display morse code that i want.

I might be able to pay if this works out.

They must be small, light and bright.

They will be attached to $5 foam gliders and not hinder their flight.

They must be bright in the night sky - as bright as police dashboard lights or a flashing aviation light on a skyscraper rooftop.

A single LED is not bright enough.

Some cheap plastic LED badge (20 LEDs) would be bright enough - I would write 'llllllllll' for a dot, leave ten spaces and then write 'llllllllllllllllllll' for a dash using the colours and scrolling speed I want. Unfortunately, this single dot and dash equates to 40 characters and most badges don't allow more than 250 characters. Although this one might: wholesale LED Belt Buckle Badge-buy discount LED Belt Buckle Badge made in China-CTO3006

It would be better if the badge emitted morse code as i wanted it to.

I also don't want to program each badge manually because we are not living in medieval times. One computer should be able to wirelessly program the LEDs to do what I want, and worst case scenario - 100 independent USB connections.

Please contact me at zxen@hotmail.com if you can get this done.
Thanks.

You would program them on the ground before launching? Not trying to send messages to them as they fly?
'328P has 2K EEPROM, can develop a protocol that inteprets each byte for a symbol.
Use 7 bits for 128 characters, 8th bit to indicate if there is a letter pause or a word pause between letters.
So 0x00 for letter to letter pause, 0x80 for word to word pause.

A stripped arduino board with FTFI header and 20 LEDs all driven at the same time would be easy to implement.
Add an inexpensive 315/434 MHz receiver to download a message wirelessly.
Couple of pins used for dip switch jumper so each can be assigned an address.
3.7V LiPo battery, power the 328P directly, run at 8 MHz.
You need to define board size, thru hole or SMD, LED size, and add a transistor to drive 20 LEDs in parallel. Or boost the voltage and drive LEDs in series to cut down on current needs - 20 LEDs in parallel at 20mA each, or 4 strings of 5 LEDs powered at 12V and 20mA?

Your requirements taken in whole means it can't and won't be realized. But then again motived people can sometimes accomplish amazing things just because they don't know it can't be done. :wink:

Still I think you have too many requirements that conflict with each other.

Lefty

I don't think that's the case Lefty.
Having an arduino clone drive LEDs, that's easy.
Writing a sketch to read from progmem and output morse code, that's pretty straightforward. There's been examples of character to morse code creation sketches posted. Having a sketch that can accept serial data and store to EEPROM for reading out, also not too hard, that's what I was doing with my scrolling message board.

Downloading a new sketch which contains a morse code message to be flashed, can be done via simple TTL serial interface from a master board, an FTDI type interface that is plugged in as needed (low card cost), or RF module can be added for Fio type downloading with a higher card cost.

I'd opt for plug in & download serially to EEPROM personally,with wireless as an option, and maybe a switch to ensure RF is turned off when not being programmed.
315/434 MHz receiver/virtualwire, or a nrfl2401+ transceiver (SPI interface), both add about $5 in extra hardware modules.

Zxen:
A single LED is not bright enough.

There are some pretty bright individual LEDs out there.

CrossRoads:
I don't think that's the case Lefty.

There is certainly room for discussion on the possibilities.

Having an arduino clone drive LEDs, that's easy.

Leds as bright as "as bright as police dashboard lights or a flashing aviation light on a skyscraper rooftop." ?
Have you ever seen the aviation strobe lights on tall buildings used for FCC compliance, how big and heavy they are and the power they consume? And to be placed on a $5 foam glider such that it's flight characteristics are not negatively effected. Cough, choke, give me a break. The OP's specifications are fantasies.

Writing a sketch to read from progmem and output morse code, that's pretty straightforward. There's been examples of character to morse code creation sketches posted. Having a sketch that can accept serial data and store to EEPROM for reading out, also not too hard, that's what I was doing with my scrolling message board.

Downloading a new sketch which contains a morse code message to be flashed, can be done via simple TTL serial interface from a master board, an FTDI type interface that is plugged in as needed (low card cost), or RF module can be added for Fio type downloading with a higher card cost.

I'd opt for plug in & download serially to EEPROM personally,with wireless as an option, and maybe a switch to ensure RF is turned off when not being programmed.
315/434 MHz receiver/virtualwire, or a nrfl2401+ transceiver (SPI interface), both add about $5 in extra hardware modules.

Yes they are, but:
"as bright as police dashboard lights or a flashing aviation light on a skyscraper rooftop." ?

And to be mounted and be powered on a $5 foam glider no less. :smiley:
LOL

Lefty

You get 20 20,000mCD LEDs, that's gonna be pretty damn bright.
I couldn't take 3 of them at 20mA, had to tone way down to like 2-3mA.

CrossRoads:
You get 20 20,000mCD LEDs, that's gonna be pretty damn bright.
I couldn't take 3 of them at 20mA, had to tone way down to like 2-3mA.

White ø 5mm Clear LED Extra Bright 20,000mcd - dipmicro electronics

If too bright might it not start to melt the $5 foam glider? :wink:

Lefty

Heh heh, it's visible light, not a laser 8)