A sign made of a vertical line of LEDs?

From: Eric Smith <eric_at_brouhaha.com>
Date: Fri Nov 13 14:10:43 1998

John Foust <jfoust_at_threedee.com> wrote:
> Anyone here know the name of this sort of device, so I can web-search
> for others who've made one? It wouldn't be hard to craft. To be
> obliquely on-topic, I've thought about making a simple circuit that
> would be driven by the parallel port of an old PC.

About 12 years ago Jim Philips and Richard Ottosen made signs with a column of
LEDs that was attached to a motor such that the path of the LEDs described a
cylinder. They called it a whirlygig.

A few years later, Rich Ottosen and I decided to try to build a name badge
that worked as you describe; a single column of LEDs that would show a
message as your eyes scanned past it.

We used a surface-mount PIC16C54 microcontroller and eight surface-mount
LEDs on a PC board about 1 inch square. A pair of lithium coin cells clips
to the back of the PCB.

By analogy to Jim's device, we called it a "whirlless gig".

Cheers,
Eric

Visualize Whirled Peas, or at least whirled LEDs.
Received on Fri Nov 13 1998 - 14:10:43 GMT