Tutorials
Building the Opencockpits COMM
Building the Opencockpits NAV
Building the Opencockpits ADF
Building the Opencockpits XPDR
Radio Pedestal Circuit Diagram
Backlighting the Opencockpits MCP
Simple and Cheap Home-Made Panels
December 2008 Builder of the Month
MCP backlighting
Backlighting is one of those asthetics that in the beginning you may be tempted to do without, however if you get to fly just once in a sim with backlit panels you will soon hanker for the same in yours. There's just no substitute to add that little extra bit of realism.
The Opencockpits Mode Control Panel doesn't come backlit and this is a big drawback for some however there is a simple solution which I will detail here. Of course the principle can be used to backlight any project. If you prefer you can get the pdf tutorial HERE.
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Begin by deciding how many LED's you will need. Click on the image below to see my layout
Your's will be governed by the brightness of your chosen LED's and the amount of soldering and gluing you wish to do. I found 33 was perfect!
Here is the list of parts I used:
- 33 x 3mm 15000mcd LED’s
- 11 x 68 ohm ¼ watt resistors
- 33 x 300mm (12”) thin twin flex cable
- 1m Red heatshrink
- Suitable circuit board
- 12v DC power supply
Tools:
- Soldering Iron
- Heat gun
- Screw drivers
- Wire stripping knife
- Hot glue gun
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Bend each LED to a right angle. |
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Solder each LED onto a 300mm length of twin flex using heatshrink on each leg for insultation. Check the polarity and mark one leg in some fashion. I used a piece of heatshrink on the positive leg. If you can't be bothered with this process you can buy pre-wired LED's on ebay very cheaply. |
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I purchased a project circuit board from a local electronics store which roughly had the solder tracks I required. A little cutting of tracks gave me the combination I needed to connect 3 LED's and a resistor in series as per the following circuit diagram. |
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This circuit was sourced from http://led.linear1.org/led.wiz/ . If you use LED's of a different variety or number use this handy website to determine the correct configuration. |
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Then solder to your hearts content or at least till all LED's are attached. I suggest testing each group of 3 as you go so you don't have any nasty surprises at the end. |
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And test the whole shebang with real power prior to assembly. |
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Carefully remove the faceplate from the MCP to expose the circuit board behind. This is going to be the base for all your LED's. Keep the faceplate near you for reference when aligning the LED's. |
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Using a hot glue gun carefully locate and glue each LED in place. |
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Continue until all backlighting is complete. Due to the number of cables you will end up with a mess of spaghetti coming out from your unit but there's really no avoiding this. Just tidy them up as best you can. I glued some cables onto the circuit board so they wouldn't flop around loosely. |
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Although difficult to see clearly, here is the result once completed. |
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Re-attach the faceplate (being very careful not to damage the paintwork!) and power it up. |
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And there's plenty of brightness down there! |
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Using 3mm LED's is necessary in such a confined space and in order for them to disperse the light enough. |
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A closer view of the innards. |
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An excellent result you'd have to agree. |
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DISCLAIMER: Please use the instructions in this tutorial at your own risk. The author claims no responsibility for hardware or electrical damage as a result. This tutorial is made available as a guide only and represents the process, views and opinions of the author and not of Opencockpits or any affiliates.