Lighting Kit Help

Chances are that you're not getting power to the board.  Most battery boxes that I have seen recently have all been really poorly made, so sometimes they require a little work on getting proper contact between the batteries and the contact leaves and springs.  Aside from that, I know you probably already checked, but make sure all of your batteries are installed with the correct polarity.  I'm pretty sure that the board itself is fine.  Those tend to be pretty reliable.  It has always been the battery boxes of the power supplies that have been problematic.

Check the amperage output of the battery box as well. If the voltage is correct, but the amperage doesn't match, you"ll have problems getting the board running.

If memory serves, a lot of the Madman boards required either 9 or 12 volts at 2 amps. Madman boards were usually pretty simple affairs. 

Madman Lighting was sold off to Tena Controls a few years ago (2018) and I suspect that you may have a Tena designed board released under the Madman label because you're not required to solder resistors onto the board and you're using quick connect terminals instead of soldering the wires to the circuit outputs. Double check the amperage requirements carefully, because these boards (particularly those with special effects) tend to require a little more juice. These sorts of boards seem to favor a plug-in transformer to run most efficiently, but the idea is the same - you have to match both voltage and amperage to get things to work.

Edit - also check your connection instructions to see if a wire wrap tool is needed for installation. Some of the Madman stuff required it.

Thank you for these responses!

This is one that does require the wire wrap tool.  The board has 5 posts, one of which the instructions refer to as the power post.  That is connected to the micro-connector (male-female plug essentially), which in turn is connected to the power source.

The instructions leave something to be desired.  They are inconsistent, I suppose.  One on page, there is diagram showing the red wire to be attached to the "top" post (top side of the board), but every where else, it clearly says to attach the red wire to the "bottom" post, with the black wire on the "top".  I've tried both ways with no successful results.

you could always test with a 9V battery touched either to the wires to the board or the board directly.

Got everything connected today and checked that the battery pack was generating sufficient power with a volt meter.  Then put the volt meter on the power prongs of the circuit board and get sufficient power there.  But still, the on-board light on that board never lights up.

Thought that I would get power to a LED if I connected one, so I did that.  Nothing.

I'm bummed about this.  The lighting kit was not particularly cheap.  I can certainly ditch it and just connect a bunch of LEDs with appropriate resistors, do some soldering, all of that, but you know, I got the kit so I wouldn't have to bother with that stuff.  I've sent an e-mail to the Madman Lighting people, but honestly, I'm not sure that I really expect much in the way of a response.  Hopefully they will surprise me.

Feels like I'm at a stand-still on this build.  I'll likely go ahead and continue drilling all the holes while I wait for a response to my e-mail.  And maybe start working on whatever my next project will be.

Sorry to read that you weren't able to get it working.  You mentioned the instructions being inconsistent about how you connect the battery pack to the board, and that you tried both ways.  Do you remember how long you left the battery pack connected when you tried the different ways?  Its possible that reverse polarity for long enough may have killed the board.  Hopefully you'll get a helpful response from Madman Lighting.

Eaglecash867

Sorry to read that you weren't able to get it working.  You mentioned the instructions being inconsistent about how you connect the battery pack to the board, and that you tried both ways.  Do you remember how long you left the battery pack connected when you tried the different ways?  Its possible that reverse polarity for long enough may have killed the board.  Hopefully you'll get a helpful response from Madman Lighting.

 

Aggieman

I didn't time it or anything, but it was not for very long.  A few minutes.

Unfortunately, anything more than about a second can kill it if the polarity is reversed.  Those guys definitely need to get their instructions corrected.  I'm sure you're not the first one to have the issue.

Eaglecash867

 

 

Aggieman

I didn't time it or anything, but it was not for very long.  A few minutes.

 

 

Unfortunately, anything more than about a second can kill it if the polarity is reversed.  Those guys definitely need to get their instructions corrected.  I'm sure you're not the first one to have the issue.

 

I had reached out to them earlier for a clarification on what size of wire wrap tool to use for this project, and they never responded.  Honestly, I'm not expecting a response to this more critical issue either.  Seems like a good case study on how not to conduct customer relations, but I don't know, maybe my business school education was wrong?

Aggieman

Thanks for that information. I had reached out to them earlier for a clarification on what size of wire wrap tool to use for this project, and they never responded.  Honestly, I'm not expecting a response to this more critical issue either.  Seems like a good case study on how not to conduct customer relations, but I don't know, maybe my business school education was wrong?

A wire-wrap tool?  Yikes!  That definitely doesn't sound like a very user-friendly kit.  If you don't already know about them, have a look at Falcon 3D Parts some time.  Their lighting kits are kinda pricey, but they're plug and play.  I got their Millenium Falcon lighting kit last year when I came into a little extra dough and its pretty impressive.  The hardest part about it was downloading the phone app to control the lighting and sound through bluetooth.

Aggieman

maybe my business school education was wrong?

That will depend on whether you spent more time in Blocker than Dudley's

Just as a WAG, have you checked YouTube for this component?  There's tons of videos out there on near nigh everything.

My first instinct is that hte micro connector is bad--it only takes one pin bent to not align with its proper socket.

Poking about with a circuit tester is not an ideal way to learn how to test circuitry design.  Hopefully, that is not in your future.

Especially as it all sounds simple--you either connect all the anodes to a resistor; or you hook all the cathodes to the resistor, and everything else is just switching.  Sigh.

Aggieman, not sure if this is the kit you're talking about:

https://madmanlighting.com/products/big-imperial-cruiser-lighting-kit

If it is, I may have spotted your problem.  You had said that you were using 8 AA batteries to provide 12 volts.  According to the link above, the lighting kit needs an 18 volt power supply, capable of supplying 100mA of current.  12 AA batteries could definitely do that.  The only problem would be the physical size of the battery pack.  Have you looked into getting a 120VAC to 18VDC transformer that you can just plug in?  That might be the way to go for a more compact solution.

This one could handle the job easily.

Edit:  Oops, sorry.  Just noticed the power supply in the link I had posted was AC to AC.

Edit:  Here's one that could do the job, with about 650mA of headroom.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/381266032128?hash=item58c539f600:g:KyIAAOSwrklVW52R

Please excuse me saying this, but 89$ for a PCB and a few LEDs is an outrageous price IMO... And a design that needs 12V or even 18V battery power isn't very smart, neither. A white LED needs 4V, older digital chips need 5V and if you somehow need more voltage you could use a DC/DC converter - but you can also save money making your customer buy a whole family box of AA cells...

Now I'm sure I could make it work if I had it in my hands... Pity I don't... But maybe you could post a few photos, I would like to help you.

So you are sure the battery pack is giving you the right voltage... Are you sure about the polarity (+/-) now? If those two things are right and that little LED stil won't light up, it's probably time for some debugging on the board.

Any chance you could PM me the instructions?

Good luck with your starship and have a nice day

Paweł

Eaglecash867

Aggieman, not sure if this is the kit you're talking about:

https://madmanlighting.com/products/big-imperial-cruiser-lighting-kit

If it is, I may have spotted your problem.  You had said that you were using 8 AA batteries to provide 12 volts.  According to the link above, the lighting kit needs an 18 volt power supply, capable of supplying 100mA of current.  12 AA batteries could definitely do that.  The only problem would be the physical size of the battery pack.  Have you looked into getting a 120VAC to 18VDC transformer that you can just plug in?  That might be the way to go for a more compact solution.

This one could handle the job easily.

Edit:  Oops, sorry.  Just noticed the power supply in the link I had posted was AC to AC.

Edit:  Here's one that could do the job, with about 650mA of headroom.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/381266032128?hash=item58c539f600:g:KyIAAOSwrklVW52R

 

Pawel

Please excuse me saying this, but 89$ for a PCB and a few LEDs is an outrageous price IMO... And a design that needs 12V or even 18V battery power isn't very smart, neither. A white LED needs 4V, older digital chips need 5V and if you somehow need more voltage you could use a DC/DC converter - but you can also save money making your customer buy a whole family box of AA cells...

Now I'm sure I could make it work if I had it in my hands... Pity I don't... But maybe you could post a few photos, I would like to help you.

So you are sure the battery pack is giving you the right voltage... Are you sure about the polarity (+/-) now? If those two things are right and that little LED stil won't light up, it's probably time for some debugging on the board.

Any chance you could PM me the instructions?

Good luck with your starship and have a nice day

Paweł

 

Thank you for volunteering to diagnose the issue.

CapnMac82

 

 

Aggieman

maybe my business school education was wrong?

 

 

That will depend on whether you spent more time in Blocker than Dudley's

Just as a WAG, have you checked YouTube for this component?  There's tons of videos out there on near nigh everything.

My first instinct is that hte micro connector is bad--it only takes one pin bent to not align with its proper socket.

Poking about with a circuit tester is not an ideal way to learn how to test circuitry design.  Hopefully, that is not in your future.

Especially as it all sounds simple--you either connect all the anodes to a resistor; or you hook all the cathodes to the resistor, and everything else is just switching.  Sigh.

 

Ahh...got it.  You had said Star Destroyer in your first post.  

Photographs of the instruction booklet and how I have connected everything.

Instructions:

Battery Pack:

Male end of the Micro-Connector:

Volt Meter I am using:

Volt Meter connection to male micro-connector and result:

Circuit Board:

Circuit Board with female end of micro-connector connected to male end:

Volt Meter connection to power prongs on circuit board and result:

The unused prongs on the circuit board are intended connection points for the lights, but none show any power on the volt meter.  Now I fully admit to being a near-complete novice in this arena, so it is very possible that (a) I have connected something incorrectly and (b) I have no idea what I'm doing.  (I say near-complete novice as I did install LEDs into an Iron Man kit I did about a decade ago, but I didn't take any notes as to what I did then and I also was not using any pre-fab lighting kit).

Thanks to everyone who has responded to me on this issue!

Hello!

I've read the instructions and would like to suggest the following things:

1) to increase reliability connect the power like shown on page 3 of the instructions - wire the battery pack to the female connector and put the connector directly on the board pins. Saves you at least four potentially unreliable connections. That won't solve the problem, but will save you trouble in the future. Red wire (+) goes on the front (where the parts are) of the board in case of power and on the back for the LEDs

2) good news is there's a hefty diode on the board, so a reversed polarity shouldn't fry the board as long as the voltage isn't very high (and it isn't in case of the batteries you have)

3) in the photos where you do the measurement the instrument needle hits the right stop - please set it up so as to measure the actual voltage. Set on DC V 50. How many volts do you have? Might help with some troubleshooting.

4) let's test that diode (it's that black brick soldered right to the plus pin). Connect power and measure the voltage between the pad I indicated on the photo below and the bottom pin (-). How many volts do you have?

If you have some spare LED laying around you might check if you can make it light up when you set your meter on R x 1K and touch the long lead with the red probe and the short wire with the black probe. Then you might try checking the LED on the board but you have to be careful here - I would only attemp it if the spare LED you tested just barely lights up.

Let's see if that helps you. Good luck with your lighting and have a nice day

Paweł

Just to add a little bit to Pawel's note on #4, when you select the 50V range, you'll be reading middle arc of black numbers to get your voltage.

Also, many LEDs are polarity sensitive, so if you test one by applying voltage to it, make sure to put your positive lead on the longer of the two leads on the LED.  If you reverse it, it can pop like a firecracker.

Hope you can get it working...the solder joints they put on that board look terrible.  I say that because bad solder joints could also be the culprit, and can be fixed if you have good soldering skills.  Had exactly that issue on a lighting panel in a 1:1 aircraft a couple of weeks ago.  The entire thing would turn on and off on its own when subjected to vibration because the wire was actually floating in the middle of the glob of underheated solder and only making intermittent contact.  Its 100% reliable now after removing the solder joint for the aircraft power input, cleaning the solder pad, and then putting a new solder joint in there with proper heat transfer.

If it comes to reworking those solder joints and you don't want to attempt it, I can probably help you there.

Well, I routed the wires from the battery compartment directly to the power prongs and registered approximately 50 on the DC 50 setting.  But I noted that the wires got quite hot to the touch rather quickly, so I didn't get to testing the direct bulb connection.  I suspect I did something incorrectly in this test.

The female end of the connector did not seem to be functioning when I connected that directly to the power prongs.

Now when the wires start getting hot, that's not a very good sign...

That actually means you got a short circuit somewhere. If you're lucky, that short circuit is somewhere around the connector - check for wires touching one another, messy soldering shorting two pads or something like that.

If you're unlucky a part on the board got damaged and is causing the short from power supply (+) to the ground (-) - you can usually identify that part quickly because it smokes :-(

Please check the wires again, they have to stay room temperature.

Good luck with that board and have a nice day

Paweł

It might be the resolution of my cell phone causing me to see things that may not be there, but I have a few areas of concern. If you would, Aggieman, please double check the board around the quick connect pins. In your photos, it looks as if there is a yelllowish-green film over the solder joints  Again. It might be a problem on my end, but it looks as if you have dried flux pooled into the whole area.

Compare your photo to that which is shown in your instruction manual and you'll see that their image doesn't include this apparent stain. Each solder joint is free of discoloration and there are distinct clean spaces in between them. Your photo seems to show that discoloration both on and between the joins. The color makes me think of the residue certain flux pens seem to leave behind.

I only bring this up because some (not all, mind you) fluxes can be electrically conductive. If this is where the power initially enters the board, the pool of flux is also in contact with the outputs. It might not be the source of the shorting that Pawel has advised you on already, but it may be a contributing factor to the problems. 

If it is flux, a solid scrubbing with isopropyl alcohol will help to clean up the residue. 

Eaglecash also has a point on the quality of those solder joints. Double check them to see if there is any spiking going on. Sometimes with cold and/or contaminated solder joints, the operator will lift the iron away at an inopportune moment, letting the metal form a needle-like spike. If the joints around the power load are spiked, you may have the potential for shorts.

Can you also photograph the back side  of the board as well? With as rough as some of those solder joints look, I'd be curious to see if all of the components are properly mounted and the solder points sufficiently wetted. 

The wires getting hot can also be caused by the high resistance of bad solder joints.  I agree with KnightTemplar about the flux as well...there are some of them out there that are conductive.  When I clean flux from a solder joint, I have found that denatured alcohol works really well, along with an acid brush (don't worry, there isn't any acid involved, they're just called that).  The lead on that header all the way to the right in your pic really jumps out at me now.  It looks like its a cold solder joint where the header and the board aren't actually solidly connected electrically.  I can see the square header lead in the center of that globby, grey solder joint.  You shouldn't be able to see that.  That comes from insufficient, uneven heat transfer between the two components being soldered.  A high resistance connection like that can generate a lot of heat.  I've actually seen holes burned through aircraft skin that were caused by loose terminals on electrical buses...also have seen lots of melted static system tubing caused by the same thing.

Honestly, at this point, I hope that you paid for that through Paypal so you can file a dispute.  The amateur who made you pay $69.00 for that monstrosity shouldn't get to keep your money.

More testing just now.

I cleaned up the exposed wiring and reconnected, ensuring there was no contact between them.  No heat this time, so I am guessing that was the cause of the heat in my last test. I confirm power registering on the board's power prongs, but it still does not light an LED.

Latest photos:

I don't see any evidence of the greenish film but then I probably don't know what I'm really looking for.

I'm thinking I have a lemon here.  I've reached out twice to the manufacturer but still have heard nothing back from them, not even an acknowledgement of receipt of my communications.  They are about to receive a very unfriendly review.

Unless y'all see something else in these new photos, I'm likely to move on by rigging everything without the circuit board, running wires to LEDs and resistors, etc.

Yes, I did pay for this through PayPal.  I looked at the transaction and noticed a different e-mail address for TenaControls than what they list on the MadManLighting web site.  I just sent out another communication and gave them a deadline to respond; otherwise I will request a refund through PayPal and leave negative reviews of both the company and their products.

Yup...looks like you're definitely getting good voltage out of your battery box.  I see about 13.5 volts being indicated on your meter.  I think you're right about it being a lemon.  The flux that KnightTemplar mentioned is the kind of yellowy, shiny stuff on almost all of the solder joints on the board.  Its probably soft and a little tacky to the touch.  That stuff shouldn't be there.  Its a component in the solder (and it looks like they used really low-quality solder) that aids in heat transfer, and after the solder joint is made the flux is supposed to be cleaned away.  Its also a little strange that all of those surface mount components appear to have been soldered to the board using a regular soldering iron.  The problem with doing that is that only one solder joint at a time can be made on the component, and when one side is firmly attached with the first solder joint, the pressure applied for soldering the other contact often causes the component to crack internally and stop functioning.  A proper surface-mount soldering iron has a tip that spans across the top of the component so the solder joints on both sides are made at the same time...and its usually best done by a machine.  Its really difficult to do those by hand and not screw something up.

OK, the wiring looks a lot nicer now... Out of curiosity, could you check the voltage behind the big diode? That would mean repeating the measurement you show on the last picture, just move the red probe to the pad on the right side of that diode (like I shown you on the picture I posted previously). It might also be interesting to measure the voltage across the little LED (one probe on one side of the LED, and the other probe on the other side - maybe the LED is bad?).

As usual - good luck and have a nice day

Paweł

Pawel

OK, the wiring looks a lot nicer now... Out of curiosity, could you check the voltage behind the big diode? That would mean repeating the measurement you show on the last picture, just move the red probe to the pad on the right side of that diode (like I shown you on the picture I posted previously). It might also be interesting to measure the voltage across the little LED (one probe on one side of the LED, and the other probe on the other side - maybe the LED is bad?).

As usual - good luck and have a nice day

Paweł

 

Thanks everyone!