Fa-la-la display

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I thought it would be fun to animate the refrain from "Deck the Halls" and my vision was something like this where each syllable stood on its own so it could be placed anywhere in the yard, could be any color and yet would not require a lot of wiring or take a million channels to control.

Falalalala.png

As each sign would have RGB capability, I decided it would be efficient to use "dumb RGB bullet" light strings instead of smart pixels (externally they appear to be virtually identical in shape and size) yet "dumb" RGB strings need only 3 control channels for the entire string whereas smart pixels require 3 channels for each light in the string. But I thought it would be efficient to use pixel technology because of the convenience of the wiring and structure of the WS2811 smart pixel control mechanism.

IMG 1297.JPG

As each sign would use about 20 lights I devised a "Pixel-SSR" which used a single WS2811 chip that controlled a three-channel DC SSR because there would be many more LEDs to control than just a single LED, which is what the WS2811 chip is designed to do. So the DIGWDF Pixel-SSR was born and a set of 9 assembled, one for each of the 9 syllables:

Pixel ssr.png IMG 1277.JPG

9 pieces of coroplast measuring 16" x 16" where cut from a single 8'x 4' sheet and 7/32" holes drilled through them to hold the