I have the germ of an idea for a house sign (our place has a name not a
number).

I reckon if I get some perspex sheet and polish the edges, any light
that gets inside the sheet, should bounce around inside of the polished
surface. If I then roughen the surface on one face side, the light
should 'escape' and give an illuminated surface on which I can put
opaque letters to be visible day and night.
The question is how to get the light into the perspex. I'm thinking of a
series of drilled holes into the top edge with white LEDs stuck in.
The drilled holes will have a rougher finish and so the light should
enter reasonably efficiently.

Does this sound viable??

Bob

On Mon, 22 Dec 2008 22:01:02 +0000, Bob Minchin
wrote:

I have the germ of an idea for a house sign (our place has a name not a
number).

I reckon if I get some perspex sheet and polish the edges, any light
that gets inside the sheet, should bounce around inside of the polished
surface. If I then roughen the surface on one face side, the light
should 'escape' and give an illuminated surface on which I can put
opaque letters to be visible day and night.
The question is how to get the light into the perspex. I'm thinking of a
series of drilled holes into the top edge with white LEDs stuck in.
The drilled holes will have a rougher finish and so the light should
enter reasonably efficiently.

Does this sound viable??

Bob
Sounds poncy never mind viable

Bob Minchin wrote on 22/12/2008 :
I have the germ of an idea for a house sign (our place has a name not a
number).

I reckon if I get some perspex sheet and polish the edges, any light that
gets inside the sheet, should bounce around inside of the polished surface.
If I then roughen the surface on one face side, the light should 'escape' and
give an illuminated surface on which I can put opaque letters to be visible
day and night.
The question is how to get the light into the perspex. I'm thinking of a
series of drilled holes into the top edge with white LEDs stuck in.
The drilled holes will have a rougher finish and so the light should enter
reasonably efficiently.

Does this sound viable??

Bob

Lidl had such an item and solar powered on sale mid summer. 3x3 solar
panel on top, with a couple of white LED's back lighting a perspex
panel, with numbers/lettering, all powered by a NiMh single cell. Even
with the short days, long nights they run until around midnight.

--
Regards,
Harry (M1BYT) (L)
http://www.ukradioamateur.co.uk

"Bob Minchin" wrote in message
...
I have the germ of an idea for a house sign (our place has a name not a
number).

I reckon if I get some perspex sheet and polish the edges, any light that
gets inside the sheet, should bounce around inside of the polished
surface. If I then roughen the surface on one face side, the light should
'escape' and give an illuminated surface on which I can put opaque letters
to be visible day and night.
The question is how to get the light into the perspex. I'm thinking of a
series of drilled holes into the top edge with white LEDs stuck in.
The drilled holes will have a rougher finish and so the light should enter
reasonably efficiently.

Does this sound viable??

I've seem similar where, rather than roughening the surface, they use wax
crayons that draw the light out of the surface and project it.

Bob Minchin wrote:

I have the germ of an idea for a house sign (our place has a name not a
number).

I reckon if I get some perspex sheet and polish the edges, any light
that gets inside the sheet, should bounce around inside of the polished
surface. If I then roughen the surface on one face side, the light
should 'escape' and give an illuminated surface on which I can put
opaque letters to be visible day and night.
The question is how to get the light into the perspex. I'm thinking of a
series of drilled holes into the top edge with white LEDs stuck in.
The drilled holes will have a rougher finish and so the light should
enter reasonably efficiently.

Does this sound viable??

Bob


yes, with a couple of tweaks.

Normally LEDs are pointed at one (or 2) edge(s) of the perspex to get
the light in.

Secondly, if the perspex is evenly sanded, the light escape will be
very uneven. Solution is to grade the amount of sanding across the
sheet. Then you need to evenly distribute the light that does escape,
a sheet of white paper would be a simple way, preferably acid free
paper so it wont yellow.

Finally painting the far edge white will improve light level and
evenness of illumination. Do the sanding with the LEDs lit so you can
see where to sand a bit more to get reasonably even output. And dont
overdo it. Oh - adding a reflective filme behind the perspex will
boost light output and evenness further.


NT

On 22 Dec, 22:01, Bob Minchin wrote:
I have the germ of an idea for a house sign (our place has a name not a
number).

I reckon if I get some perspex sheet and polish the edges, any light
that gets inside the sheet, should bounce around inside of the polished
surface. If I then roughen the surface on one face side, the light
should 'escape' and give an illuminated surface on which I can put
opaque letters to be visible day and night.
The question is how to get the light into the perspex. I'm thinking of a
series of drilled holes into the top edge with white LEDs stuck in.
The drilled holes will have a rougher finish and so the light should
enter reasonably efficiently.

Does this sound viable??

Bob

If you want to outdo the neighbours, get one of these:

http://www.maplin.co.uk/Module.aspx?ModuleNo=224480

stick it in a perspex box (with hidden cabling), and wall-mount it!

On Tue, 23 Dec 2008 00:00:03 -0000, OG wrote:

-------------------8
I've seem similar where, rather than roughening the surface, they use wax
crayons that draw the light out of the surface and project it.

Interesting concept - does it depend on a vacuum? ;-)

On Mon, 22 Dec 2008 22:01:02 +0000, Bob Minchin wrote:

I have the germ of an idea for a house sign (our place has a name not a
number).

I reckon if I get some perspex sheet and polish the edges, any light
that gets inside the sheet, should bounce around inside of the polished
surface. If I then roughen the surface on one face side, the light
should 'escape' and give an illuminated surface on which I can put
opaque letters to be visible day and night.
The question is how to get the light into the perspex. I'm thinking of a
series of drilled holes into the top edge with white LEDs stuck in.
The drilled holes will have a rougher finish and so the light should
enter reasonably efficiently.

Does this sound viable??

Bob

A good light source would be a CCFL tube - available cheap as a PC modding accessory.

It is hard to get the illumination even - the backlight assembly from a scrap laptop/TFT monitor
would be a good start - there are all sorts of funky optical materials in there to get even
illumination.

"Bob Minchin" wrote in message
...
I have the germ of an idea for a house sign (our place has a name not a
number).

I reckon if I get some perspex sheet and polish the edges, any light that
gets inside the sheet, should bounce around inside of the polished
surface. If I then roughen the surface on one face side, the light should
'escape' and give an illuminated surface on which I can put opaque letters
to be visible day and night.
The question is how to get the light into the perspex. I'm thinking of a
series of drilled holes into the top edge with white LEDs stuck in.
The drilled holes will have a rougher finish and so the light should enter
reasonably efficiently.

Does this sound viable??

Lots of aircraft use an idea a bit like that. The only difference is they
paint the panel black and just the writing shows through.
It's done by using opaque white or clear Perspex, painting it white, then a
top coat of matt black. They then groove the lettering in about 20% of the
depth of the sheet.
Painting an undercoat of white makes the illumination more even.
It is illuminated by just putting lamps into holes drilled in the sheet
every 6" to 9", mostly red ones. (they use a sort of backwards socket so you
can't see the lamp)
It looks really cool when done properly.
I recon you would be better grooving the writing rather than roughening it.
As for illumination the light source only has to be at the edge - you could
put it in a frame - it doesn't have to be inset into the sheet.

Slatts

Bob Minchin wrote:

I have the germ of an idea for a house sign (our place has a name not a
number).

I reckon if I get some perspex sheet and polish the edges, any light
that gets inside the sheet, should bounce around inside of the polished
surface. If I then roughen the surface on one face side, the light
should 'escape' and give an illuminated surface on which I can put
opaque letters to be visible day and night.
The question is how to get the light into the perspex. I'm thinking of a
series of drilled holes into the top edge with white LEDs stuck in.
The drilled holes will have a rougher finish and so the light should
enter reasonably efficiently.

Does this sound viable??

Bob

You might like to google the term "Total Internal Reflection" or
"TIR". The technique is used quite a lot in industrial design, many
cars use it for instrument illunination - as far as I can tell it's
done because it is a relatively cheap way to make a good looking
overall illumination.

wrote in message
...
wrote:
On 22 Dec, 22:01, Bob Minchin wrote:

I have the germ of an idea for a house sign (our place has a name not a
number).

I reckon if I get some perspex sheet and polish the edges, any light
that gets inside the sheet, should bounce around inside of the polished
surface. If I then roughen the surface on one face side, the light
should 'escape' and give an illuminated surface on which I can put
opaque letters to be visible day and night.
The question is how to get the light into the perspex. I'm thinking of
a
series of drilled holes into the top edge with white LEDs stuck in.
The drilled holes will have a rougher finish and so the light should
enter reasonably efficiently.

Does this sound viable??

Bob

If you want to outdo the neighbours, get one of these:

http://www.maplin.co.uk/Module.aspx?ModuleNo=224480

stick it in a perspex box (with hidden cabling), and wall-mount it!

or go even wackier, use an old laptop with the screen behind thick
toughened glass, then you can use music player type visualisations to
present the house name in every conceivable funky but pointless way.
And you can leave all the work to your teenage kid.

Its a lot easier to use a cheap photoframe.

dennis@home wrote:
wrote in message
...
wrote:
On 22 Dec, 22:01, Bob Minchin wrote:

I have the germ of an idea for a house sign (our place has a name not a
number).

I reckon if I get some perspex sheet and polish the edges, any light
that gets inside the sheet, should bounce around inside of the polished
surface. If I then roughen the surface on one face side, the light
should 'escape' and give an illuminated surface on which I can put
opaque letters to be visible day and night.
The question is how to get the light into the perspex. I'm thinking of
a
series of drilled holes into the top edge with white LEDs stuck in.
The drilled holes will have a rougher finish and so the light should
enter reasonably efficiently.

Does this sound viable??

Bob

If you want to outdo the neighbours, get one of these:

http://www.maplin.co.uk/Module.aspx?ModuleNo=224480

stick it in a perspex box (with hidden cabling), and wall-mount it!

or go even wackier, use an old laptop with the screen behind thick
toughened glass, then you can use music player type visualisations to
present the house name in every conceivable funky but pointless way.
And you can leave all the work to your teenage kid.

Its a lot easier to use a cheap photoframe.

can they run live video generated by visualisation software? I think
you'd need at least win95 for that.


NT

wrote in message
...

8

Its a lot easier to use a cheap photoframe.

can they run live video generated by visualisation software? I think
you'd need at least win95 for that.

Mine will play video that has been pre-generated so its probably good
enough.

On Mon, 22 Dec 2008 22:01:02 +0000, Bob Minchin
wrote:

I have the germ of an idea for a house sign (our place has a name not a
number).

http://www.theglowcompany.co.uk/acat...OUSE-SIGN.html
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