Question for the dio crowd

not me personally but look for modelchasm for help...that guy was working with all kinds of lights and stuff for a build a short time ago! though im sure other's will help!

What little I know about lighting would be to stay away from the grain of wheat bulb. They don't have that great of lifetime and unless you build it so you can get in and replace the bulb, your toast. An LED gives much more life and usually is brighter. As to the effect, build it like the real thing. Have the light reflect off a mirrored (chromed?) back so you get the full effect. My only question is did the IR searchlight cast a white beam?

I dunno how well it would work, but to get a nice glow whatever your using, I would do the entirety of the light with the most lustrious chrome or silver you can get, then hit a clear coat of whatever color you want the inside, lets say black for example, you'd have the black tint, but it would still be nice and reflective.  But I havent tried it yet, my only attempt at lighting failed (think the bulb with the kit was bad)

Hello!

The IR light sholdn't give a lot of visible light or it would present an excellent target at nighttime. That's why it probably didn't give any visible light. But for looking cool I'd say use a red LED for lighting. Here's a way to calculate the parameters: Say you want to use 9Volts battery and one red LED which needs a voltage under 2Volts. That means 7Volts to "lose". You do that connecting a resistor between the battery and the LED. Let's say we want the LED to shine medium-bright and the current would then be 10 miliamps (more for brighter, less for dimmer). Then the resistor should be close to 7volts/0.01 amps = 700 ohm. Practically you'd use 820 ohm or 1kiloohm resistor, voila. A bit more complicated than a light bulb, but then no heat and lasts almost forever.

You could try reflecting the light off the mirror, as in some real spotlights, or injecting the light from the side in the light's lens (like the way it's done in car radios to backlight the dials).

Hope I didn't write you more than you wanted to know, happy modelling and have a nice day

Pawel

Pawel is right on. (btw ...awwww, thanks camo! Never knew you had feeling like that for me!)

The only thing that I would ad to this would be that imitating an IR light is a little difficult as it's supposed to be IR, but here's two things .... 1) I don't know if I would go with a red LED as the IR light itself, if you look right at one, is a little more purple. There's a trick to painting a LED with clear orange paint to make it look more like an incadecent light .... however, I'm not sure that the same can be done for IR light.

2) The more resistors you add to an LED the dimmer it will become. My overall thought on this would be to paint the LED bulb and or the lense that you're using with a clear purple/ red (if you can find this color/ type of paint .... never seen clear purple). Then wire everything up the way its supposed to be in the dio. Then start adding/ testing with increasly more resistors until you get the color/ brightness that you're looking for.

Lighting models is a big pain IMO, however the end result if done right is great ... if not, you might be stuck the a model that's been hacked up for nothin!

Let us know how it goes!

modelbuilder wrote:

I am building a SdKfz 251/20 UHU German halftrack and I have been mulling over the idea of wiring it with a bulb to get the IR light to actually project light. I was thinking of using a grain of wheat bulb but am afraid it will just show up as a pinpoint behind the lense. do you guys have any ideas for me?

One: IR doesn't give off visible light.. You have to be wearing NVGs or looking through a FLIR to see it...

Two: If you want to use the Notek light, it does little more than project a small "pool" of white light on the ground immediately in front of the vehicle... You'd be better off using the service drive with the B/O markers (cat's eyes) lit.  Even then, there will be very little light cast, since that's their function.. To be seen by others, rather than see where you're going... About the only thing they illuminate is themselves... Even in 1/1 scale, the light given off by B/O drive is practically nil, so in 1/35th, this'd be a useless endeavor for scale effect... It'd just be too dim..

Three: Go LED rather than GoW or GoR bulbs.. The bulbs WILL burn out at and at the worst possible time...

 

 

Hans von Hammer wrote:

modelbuilder wrote: I am building a SdKfz 251/20 UHU German halftrack and I have been mulling over the idea of wiring it with a bulb to get the IR light to actually project light. I was thinking of using a grain of wheat bulb but am afraid it will just show up as a pinpoint behind the lense. do you guys have any ideas for me? One: IR doesn't give off visible light.. You have to be wearing NVGs or looking through a FLIR to see it... Two: If you want to use the Notek light, it does little more than project a small "pool" of white light on the ground immediately in front of the vehicle... You'd be better off using the service drive with the B/O markers (cat's eyes) lit.  Even then, there will be very little light cast, since that's their function.. To be seen by others, rather than see where you're going... About the only thing they illuminate is themselves... Even in 1/1 scale, the light given off by B/O drive is practically nil, so in 1/35th, this'd be a useless endeavor for scale effect... It'd just be too dim.. Three: Go LED rather than GoW or GoR bulbs.. The bulbs WILL burn out at and at the worst possible time...

 

Hans

So I would be correct in assuming that even if one were standing right next to the IR light when it was switched on that it would not be visible at all. Not even a faint glow from the light?

The only time that I ever saw the visible light from an IR (w/o NVGs, etc) were the battery powered IR chemlights. You could hold one in a closed fist and look into it. Only hen could you see a little bit of the purplish light.

You'd be better off just building up your model and telling people there's an IR light in there .... and YES its really lit!

Hans So I would be correct in assuming that even if one were standing right next to the IR light when it was switched on that it would not be visible at all. Not even a faint glow from the light?

You'd feel heat from it if you touched it, and that's it.. You have to be wearing NVGs or using NODs to see them and what they're illuminating...  

MC's right about the chemlights too...