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LEDs for Beginners

by noahw on December 14, 2006 Table of Contents License: Attribution Non-commercial Share Alike (by-nc-sa) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Intro: LEDs for Beginners . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . step 1: Get some LEDs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . step 2: The LED . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . step 3: Power supply . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . step 4: Resistors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . step 5: One LED, no resistor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . step 6: One LED with a resistor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . step 7: Wiring up multiple LEDs in series . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . step 8: Wiring up multiple LEDs in parallel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . step 9: Extrapolation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Related Instructables . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 2 2 3 4 4 5 6 7 8 9 9

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http://www.instructables.com/id/LEDs-for-Beginners/

License: Attribution Non-commercial Share Alike (by-nc-sa) Intro: LEDs for Beginners
This instructable shows how to wire up one or more LEDs in a in a basic and clear way. Never done any work before with LEDs and don't know how to use them? Its ok, neither have I. ***If you have wired up LEDs before, this explanation might seem overly simplistic. Consider yourself warned.***

step 1: Get some LEDs

So I wasn't completely honest - I have used LEDs once or twice before for simple applications, but I never really knew what I was doing, and since so many projects on instructables use LEDs, I thought I might as well teach myself and post about it too. I know that there are many projects already posted that contain information about how to wire LEDs for simple projects - LED Throwies, LED Beginner Project: Part 2 and 9v LED flashlight - teh best evarrr!, but I think that there could still be some use for a detailed step by step explanation about the basics of LEDs for anyone who could use it. The first step was to buy some supplies and figure out what I would need to experiment with. For this project I ended up going to Radioshack because its close and a lot of people have access to it - but be warned their prices are really high for this kind of stuff and there are all kinds of low cost places to buy LEDs online. To light up an LED you need at the very minimum the LED itself and a power supply. From what I have read from other LED instructables wiring in a resistor is almost always a good idea. If you want to learn about what these materials are check out these wikipedia entries: LEDs Power supply Resistors Materials: LEDs - I basically just reached into the drawer at Radioshack and pulled out anything that wasn't more than $1 or $2 per LED. I got: 2760307 5mm Red LED 1.7 V 2760351 5MM Yellow LED 2.1 V 2760036 Flasher Red LED 5 V 2760041 2 Pack Red LED 2.6 V 2760086 Jumbo Red LED 2.4V Power Supply - I really didn't know what I would need to power them so I bought some 9V batteries and some 1.5V AA's. I figured that would allow me to mix and match and make enough different voltage combinations to make something light up - or at least burn those little suckers out in a puff of smelly plastic smoke. Resistors - Again, I wasn't too sure what I would need in terms of resistors here either. Since I got a whole bunch of different LEDs with various voltages I knew that I would need a couple different types of resistors, so I just bought a variety pack of 1/2 Watt Carbon Film Resistors (2710306). I gathered up a soldering gun, solder, needle nose pliers, electrical pliers, some primary wire and electrical tape too since I thought they might be useful.

http://www.instructables.com/id/LEDs-for-Beginners/

step 2: The LED

LEDs come in different sizes, brightnesses, voltages, colors and beam patterns, but the selection at Radioshack is pretty small and so I just picked up a couple different LEDs from what they had in a few different brightnesses and voltages. I kept close track of what LED was what voltage because I didn't want to accidentally send too much current through one of the low voltage LEDs. The first thing I did with the LEDs was figure out which wire (its called an electrode) was positive and which was negative. Generally speaking the longer wire is the positive electrode and the shorter wire is the negative electrode. You can also take a look inside the LED itself and see whats going on. The smaller of the metal pieces inside the LED connects to the positive electrode and the bigger one is the negative electrode (see picture below). But be warned - in the LEDs I picked up I didn't always find this to be true and some of the LEDs had the longer electrode on the negative when it should be on the positive. Go figure - its OK though, if it didn't light up I just flipped it around. Once I knew what was positive and what was negative I just had to remember what the voltage of each LED was. All my LEDs recommended 20mA of current. 20mA is standard for most LEDs.

Image Notes 1. The longer wire here turned out to be the positive electrode even though it connected to the bigger piece of metal in the LED itself. 2. The bigger piece inside means it should be the negative electrode, but it has the longer of the two leads coming off and in actuality turned out to be the positive electrode.

Image Notes 1. This is the annode or the positive ( ) electrode. 2. This is the cathode or the negative (-) electrode.

http://www.instructables.com/id/LEDs-for-Beginners/

step 3: Power supply

To make the power supplies I just soldered some wire onto the ends of the batteries I had bought so that I could easily attach the LEDs to them. The 9V battery served as my 9V power supply, one AA battery made a 1.5V power supply and three AA batteries bundled together made a 4.5V (1.5V + 1.5V + 1.5V = 4.5V) power supply. I didn't use alligator clips on the ends of the wire, but they would have been helpful here.

step 4: Resistors
I opened up the assortment pack to find that resistors aren't labeled with what value they are. The pack said it contained a whole bunch of different resistors from 100 ohms to 1 Meg ohm so I set out to see what was what. When I poked around online I found that all resistors have a coding system on them that tells you what value they are. Here are two pages which explain in depth about how to calculate resistor values. Do it yourself or Have it done for you I'll go through the examples of how I calculated the values myself in the next few steps when I start wiring up my LEDs. For the time being I just admired their little colored stripes and moved on to trying to get just one LED to light up.

http://www.instructables.com/id/LEDs-for-Beginners/

Image Notes 1. The color bands on the resistors indicate what value they are. Using the websites I linked to above, you can find whatever value resistor you need.

step 5: One LED, no resistor

I thought that I would start as simply as I possibly could - just one LED with no resistor. First I had to decide what power source to use and which LED to light up. This may seem obvious, but this was my first time through so I might as well be as clear as possible... LEDs require sufficient voltage to light them. Sometimes if you give them too little voltage they wont light at all, other times they will just shine dimly with low voltage. Too much voltage is bad and can burn out the LED instantaneously. So ideally you would like the voltage of the LED to match the voltage of your power supply, or even be slightly less. To do this you can do a couple of things: change your power supply voltage, change the LED your using, or you can use a resistor that allows you use a higher voltage power supply with a lower voltage LED. For now I just wanted to get one lit up so I chose my the power supply that had the lowest voltage - the single AA battery which outputs 1.5V. I chose to light the red 1.7V LED since the battery outputs 1.5V and I knew I wouldn't kill the LED with too much power. I wrapped my positive wire from the battery to the positive electrode of the LED and wrapped the negative wire from the battery to my negative electrode and presto - let there be LED light! This first experiment was pretty easy to do - just some wire twisting and enough knowledge to know that the 1.5V power supply would light the 1.7V LED without need a resistor.

http://www.instructables.com/id/LEDs-for-Beginners/

step 6: One LED with a resistor

It was just a coincidence that I bought an LED that was 1.7V and that it ended up working being able to be powered by my 1.5V power supply without the use of a resistor. For this second setup I decided to use the same LED, but up my power supply to the three AA batteries wired together which output 4.5V - enough power to burn out my 1.7V LED, so I would have to use a resistor. To figure out which resistor to use I used the formula: R = (V1 - V2) / I where: V1 = power supply voltage V2 = LED voltage I = LED current (usually 20mA which is .02A) Now there are lots of calculators online that will do this for you - and many other instructables reference this as a good one, however, the math really isn't too hard and so I wanted to go through the calculation myself and understand whats going on. Again, my LED is 1.7V, it takes 20mA (which is .02 A) of current and my supply is 4.5V. So the math is... R = (4.5V - 1.7V) / .02 A R = 140 ohms Once I knew that I needed a resistor of 140 ohms to get the correct amount of voltage to the LED I looked into my assortment package of resistors to see if I could find the right one. Knowing the value of a resistor requires reading the code from the color bands on the resistor itself. The package didn't come with a 140 ohm resistor but it did come with a 150 ohm one. Its always better to use the next closest value resistor greater than what you calculated. Using a lower value could burn out your LED. To figure out the color code you basically break down the first two digits of the resistor value, use the third digit to multiply the first two by and then assign the fourth digit as an indicator of tolerance. That sounds a lot more difficult than it really is. Using the color to number secret decoder website found here, a 150ohm resistor should have the following color code... Brown because the first digit in the value resistor I needed is 1 Green because the fifth digit is 5 Brown because in order to get to 150 you have to add one 0 to 15 to get to 150. Gold - the resistors I got all have 5% tolerance and 5% is represented by gold Check out the decoder page link above if this isn't making sense. I looked through all the resistors, found the one that was brown, green, brown, gold, and wired it in line on the positive electrode of the LED. (Whenever using a resistor on an LED it should get placed before the LED on the positive electrode). Low and behold, the LED lit up once again. The 150 ohm resistor stopped enough of the 4.5V power supply from reaching the 1.7V LED that it lit up safely and kept it from burning out. This is just the process that I went through to figure out what resistor to use with my particular LED with my particular power supply. You can easily use the formula above to figure out what value resistor to use with whatever LED and power source you happen to be using.

http://www.instructables.com/id/LEDs-for-Beginners/

step 7: Wiring up multiple LEDs in series

Now that I knew how to wire one LED with various combinations of LED voltages and power supplies, it was time to explore how to light up multiple LEDs. When it comes to wiring more than one LED to a power supply there are two options. The first option is to wire them in series and the second is to wire them in parallel. To see an in depth explanation about the difference between series and parallel check out this page. I'm going to cover wiring LEDs in series first. LEDs wired in series are connected end to end (the negative electrode of the first LED connects to the positive electrode of the second LED and the negative electrode of the second LED connects to the positive electrode of the third LED and so on and so on...). The main advantage of wiring things in series is that it distributes the total voltage of the power source between all of the LEDs. What that means is that if I had a 12V car battery, I could power 4, 3V LEDs (attaching a resistor to each of them). Hypothetically this could also work to power 12, 1V LEDs; 6, 2V LEDs; or even 1 12V LED if such a thing existed. Ok, let's try wiring 2, 2.6V LEDs in series to the 9V power supply and run through the math. R = (9V - 5.2V) / .02A R = 190 Ohms Next higher resistance value - 200 Ohms Now the variety package of resistors didn't come with a 190 or 200 Ohm resistor, but it did come with other resistors which I could use to make a 200 Ohm resistor. Just like LEDs, resistors can be wired together in either series or parallel (see next step for an explanation on wiring things together in parallel). When same value resistors are wired together in series you add their resistance. When same value resistors are wired together in parallel you divide the value of the resistor by the number of resistors wired together. So, in the most simplified sense, two 100 Ohm resistors wired together in series will equal 1 200 Ohm resistor (100 + 100 = 200). Two 100 Ohm resistors wired together in parallel will equal one 50 Ohm resistor (100 / 2 = 50). Unfortunately, I learned this key point after I wired my resistors together for the experiment. I had originally wanted to wire two 100 Ohm resistors together to equal the 200 Ohms of resistance I needed to protect my LEDs. Instead of wiring them in series, as it should have been, I wired my resistors in parallel (did I mention I am beginner with resistors?) So my resistors were only providing 50 Ohms of resistance - which apparently worked out OK on my LEDs in the short duration of the experiment. Having too much power getting to the LEDs would probably burn them out in the long term. (Thanks beanwaur and shark500 for pointing this out.) I took my resistors and placed them in front of the positive lead of the first LED that was wired in series and hooked them up to the battery and once again, there was LED light! With three different combinations of LEDs and battery power supplies and no puffs of plastic smoke yet things were looking good - aside from my little confusion between wiring resistors in series and in parallel.

http://www.instructables.com/id/LEDs-for-Beginners/

Image Notes 1. Two 100ohm resistors were wired together in parallel to provide 50 Ohms of resistance. I had meant to wire them together in series to provide the 200ohms of resistance that the LED's needed. These LED's were forgiving. 2. LED's wired in series

step 8: Wiring up multiple LEDs in parallel

Unlike LEDs that are wired in series, LEDs wired in parallel use one wire to connect all the positive electrodes of the LEDs your using to the positive wire of the power supply and use another wire to connect all the negative electrodes of the LEDs your using to the negative wire of the power supply. Wiring things in parallel has some distinct advantages over wiring things in series. If you wire a whole bunch of LEDs in parallel rather than dividing the power supplied to them between them, they all share it. So, a 12V battery wired to four 3V LEDs in series would distribute 3V to each of the LEDs. But that same 12V battery wired to four 3V LEDs in parallel would deliver the full 12V to each LED - enough to burn out the LEDs for sure! Wiring LEDs in parallel allows many LEDs to share just one low voltage power supply. We could take those same four 3V LEDs and wire them in parallel to a smaller power supply, say two AA batteries putting out a total of 3V and each of the LEDs would get the 3V they need. In short, wiring in series divides the total power supply between the LEDs. Wiring them in parallel means that each LED will receive the total voltage that the power supply is outputting. And finally, just some warnings...wiring in parallel drains your power supply faster than wiring things in series because they end up drawing more current from the power supply. It also only works if all the LEDs you are using have exactly the same power specifications. Do NOT mix and match different types/colors of LEDs when wiring in parallel. OK, now onto to actually doing the thing. I decided to do two different parallel setups. The first one I tried was as simple as it could be - just two 1.7V LEDs wired in parallel to a single 1.5V AA battery. I connected the two positive electrodes on the LEDs to the positive wire coming from the battery and connected the two negative electrodes on the LEDs to the negative wire coming from the battery. The 1.7V LEDs didn't require a resistor because the 1.5V coming from the battery was enough to light the LED, but not more than the LEDs voltage - so there was no risk of burning it out. (This set up is not pictured) Both of the 1.7V LEDs were lit by the 1.5V power supply, but remember, the were drawing more current from the battery and would thus make the battery drain faster. If there were more LEDs connected to the battery, they would draw even more current from the battery and drain it even faster. For the second setup, I decided to put everything I had learned together and wire the two LEDs in parallel to my 9V power supply - certainly too much juice for the LEDs alone so I would have to use a resistor for sure. To figure out what value I should use I went back to the trusty formula - but since they were wired in parallel there is a slight change to the formula when it comes to the current - I. R = (V1 - V2) / I where: V1 = supply voltage V2 = LED voltage I = LED current (we had been using 20 mA in our other calculations but since wiring LEDs in parallel draws more current I had to multiply the current that one LED draws by the total number of LEDs I was using. 20 mA x 2 = 40 mA, or .04A. And my values for the formula this time were: R = (9V - 1.7V) / .04A R = 182.5 Ohms Again, since the variety pack didn't come with that exact value resistor I attempted to use the two 100 Ohm resistors bundled together in series to make 200 Ohms of resistance. I ended up just repeating the mistake that I made in the last step again though, and wired them together in parallel by mistake and so the two 100 Ohm resistors only ended up providing 50 Ohms of resistance. Again, these LEDs were particularly forgiving of my mistake - and now I have learned a valuable lesson about wiring resistors in series and in parallel.

http://www.instructables.com/id/LEDs-for-Beginners/

One last note about wiring LEDs in parallel - while I put my resistor in front of both LEDs it is recommended that you put a resistor in front of each LED. This is the safer better way to wire LEDs in parallel with resistors - and also ensures that you don't make the mistake that I did accidentally. The 1.7V LEDs connected to the 9V battery lit up - and my small adventure into LED land was completed.

Image Notes 1. This is where I made a mistake - these two resistors were wired together in parallel when they should have been wired together in series and placed before the positive electrode of each of the LED's. I ended up providing only 50 Ohms of resistance for the LED's when I had wanted to give them 200 Ohms.

step 9: Extrapolation
While I didn't actually end up making anything besides a couple of lit LEDs, this information can be used to make all kinds of cool things! The take away concepts hopefully were: - Power a whole bunch of different value LEDs using the same basic principals. - Figure out what is the positive electrode and what is the negative electrode of an LED by looking at it and testing it. - Use resistors, or combinations of resistors wired together in series or in parallel to supply the correct amount of power to the LED. - Make calculations to determine what resistor is needed using the formula, or using web sites that do it for you. - Wire LEDs in series or in parallel depending on the application. - Make LEDs light up! This was the most basic kind of walk through for LEDs possible - and I learned a whole lot along the way. LED arrays and wiring schemes can get significantly more complicated - but for the most part, LEDs are pretty simple to work with, and with relatively little knowledge I was able to light them up - all be it if I sent a little too much juice through them towards the end of the experiment. I don't fear the LED now. They are my friends.

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http://www.instructables.com/id/LEDs-for-Beginners/

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Comments
50 comments Add Comment view all 444 comments

sko56 says:

Jul 14, 2010. 9:12 PM REPLY The only reason the LED doesn't Fry from adding 1.5V is because the Alkaline Battery has an internal resistance. Ohms Law Holds true I (current) = V(volts)/R(resistance in ) . If there was no resistance the current would be near Infinity causing the Wattage to go through the roof as well (W=I^2*R). same reason a "throwie" works without a resistor. Apr 3, 2010. 1:26 AM REPLY One thing that most of these LED tutorials neglect to mention is the WATTAGE of the resistor, which can not be discerned from the color bars, at least not as far as what I can tell... Let me give an example: I am building an 8 led strip, parallel connected with a 9 volt power supply. My reasoning for Parallel connection is that I want to deliver the same power to every LED and avoid a lot of complicated mathematics and resistors everywhere, as well as the benefit of not having one blown LED cripple the entire string. I am using 8 5mm Ultrawhite LED 30mA 3.5 Volt A quick trip to this page: metku.net/index.html Scrolling down to the LED's in Parallel calculator, I enter my numbers: 9v power supply 3.5 volt drop across the LEDs Desired LED current 30mA 8 LEDs connected Gives me a result of: 1) Calculated Limiting Resistor 22.92 OHMS 2) Nearest higher rated 10% resistor 27 Ohm which is a Red/Purple/Black/Gold (10% tolerance) banded resistor 3) Calculated Resistor Wattage 1.32 WATTS 4) Safe pick is a resistor with power rating of 2.2 WATTS The important information is the 2nd and 4th whereas the 1st is an EXACT value which leades to the 2nd which is the NEAREST manufactured resistor capable of handling my demands. The 3rd vale again is the EXACT value in my circuit, and the 4th is the SAFEST higher valued resistor that I can buy that will not lead to heat problems or heavily loaded resistor. (Hope that is not confusing) In front of me on my desk is a strip of resistors. Indeed there is a 27 Ohm resistor in that pack, Red/Purple/Black/Gold SO am I good to go? NO. Closer examination of the package the resistors came in show me that they are 0.25 Watt 10% Tolerance. My calculation above shows clearly that I need 2.2 WATTS for my "safest pick" Which means I need to go back to the store and buy the proper resistor, OR I will need 9 of the ones I have which is doable, but not ideal. The next question that I see a lot but not many are answering, is "Do I need a resistor on every leg. The answer to that is no, a single resistor of the proper value on the + side before the led chain will ensure that the power to all legs of the chain is already resisted and the same for every LED in the chain. I am also a noob to this type of thing, but had this spelled out for me very clearly by a dear friend, and have passed the information on to you exactly as I have recieved it in the hopes it will help someone else. Enjoy and Good Luck! ///MindsEye

MindsEye69 says:

burwuro says:
Thankyou very much! you have no idea how much that helped a newbie like me!

Jul 14, 2010. 6:22 PM REPLY

legless says:

Jun 2, 2010. 6:21 AM REPLY The reason you need a resistor with a higher power rating is that in your example you are using only one resistor. It must be able to dissipate the full power in your circuit. Your calculations show that a 1W resistor won't be enough but you'd probably get by with a 2W one. If you put a resistor on each LED you will be able to use your much smaller 1/4W resistors and some cases 1/8W resistors. Physical size might be an issue - the bigger the power rating the bigger the resistor. Some larger resistors can give off quite a lot of heat and may even need to be fitted with a heat sink to help keep it cool. Unlikely in most electronic circuits though. Also note that the power rating of a resistor is usually quoted at 25C so higher operating temperatures will lower this rating.

http://www.instructables.com/id/LEDs-for-Beginners/

Entropy512 says:

Jul 14, 2010. 12:41 PM REPLY Also, for various reasons covered above, multiple parallel LEDs off of a single resistor is not a good idea. "as well as the benefit of not having one blown LED cripple the entire string." - If you run multiple parallel LEDs off of a single resistor, this is what will happen. In fact, unlike the series arrangement where the blown LED will cause the other LEDs to go out (but not get damaged), a blown LED will cause the other LEDs to get driven harder. They'll get brighter, but unless you rectify the situation soon, this will cause another LED to burn out. You wind up with a cascading failure where all LEDs become permanently damaged. The chances of an LED blowing when driven properly are quite slim. (However, depending on the environment you use them in, the leads might corrode. This is a problem with the cheaper Christmas light strings for example.)

jrgcool35 says:

Mar 16, 2007. 9:06 PM REPLY -.- you must not know much about LEDs. Let me tell you rules number 1. 1. NEVER EVER hook a LED up to a battery without a resitor becasue it can/will explode in your face possibly sending the plastic shards ino your eyes... Next time either 1 hook a resistor up and/or wear safety gogles.

killrsheep says:

Mar 21, 2007. 5:48 PM REPLY Umm Yes and NO... NEVER EVER hook a led without a resistor... but it wont explode, (i havent tried on voltages over 9V) it will only burn up and produce a very dimm light: why you say?... " my led did not die out with a 1.5V battery"... because, Batteries have an internal resistance value, (its a very small one ands its just because perfect batteries dont exist, in a perfect battery, current would rise to infinity in this setup) wich means that the only thing limititng the current on that led is the battery, trust me its not nice, ... "Power" or Voltage doesnt kill leds (unless you hook them up the way you did) its actually current that burns them up, LEDS are fun: its basic electronics only calculus you will ever need to do is subtraction and ohms law

jrgcool35 says:

Mar 21, 2007. 10:04 PM REPLY Oh i didn't notice that he was using almost identical voltages then its ok but to be safe only put it on with a resistor and dont hook up a 9v battery to a 1.7v LED or then i WILL explode (personal experiences)

jrgcool35 says:
it* I wont explode lol

Mar 21, 2007. 10:05 PM REPLY

steelersfan32 says:
Well in some extreme case you could too!

Jul 14, 2010. 6:17 PM REPLY

pennsteve says:

Dec 24, 2009. 11:18 PM REPLY If I have a 1.5 Volt LED at 20mA using a 1.5 Volt Battery, why would I need a resistor? According to the calculations 1.5 - 1.5 =0 / .20=0 ohms. Right or wrong? Thanks ;)

Entropy512 says:

Jul 14, 2010. 12:37 PM REPLY Problem is that an LEDs Vf can vary a bit from unit to unit. A 0.1 volt difference can make a huge difference in current if no resistor is involved. The reason you can run LEDs off of coin cells safely (such as LED Throwies) is because small batteries have high internal resistance. i.e. the resistor is effectively built into the battery. I would never try to run an LED off of any combination of AA cells without a resistor - AAs have too low internal resistance to do this consistently without frying some LEDs. Jun 2, 2010. 7:20 AM REPLY It isn't an ideal situation to run a 1.5V LED off a 1.5V battery for one reason. CURRENT. Even a typical AA battery might be rated at 2000mAh which means it could deliver 2A of current for an hour (in a theoretical perfect circuit of 1 ohm). Common red LEDs have an internal resistance of about 22 ohms though we can't really say they have a resistance as far as a circuit is concerned. You can't work out the current flowing through an LED just because you know its operating voltage. A 1.5V LED might fail on a 1.5V battery due to heat. However having said that, small button cell batteries can have quite high internal resistances and may run an LED for a while without damage before they are exhausted.

legless says:

nanosec12 says:
You don't need a resistor if your supply voltage is equal to, or less than, the LED forward bias voltage. In the case you mention, with a 1.5v LED and a 1.5v battery you are good to go without any resistors.

Jan 6, 2010. 5:24 PM REPLY

babylonfive says:

Apr 9, 2009. 11:34 AM REPLY One extra correction I just noticed in my original answer: If two LEDs are wired in parallel and use a single resistor, that CAN work if the resistor is sized for the combined LEDs desired current, and if the voltage drop is very close to each other (i.e. they come from the same lot of material)... this is not a horrible thing to do, and could work... it just usually doesn't work terribly well, because LEDs can easily have different drops and the orginal comment still holds... I just realized I sounded like "it won't work"... and really... it will work for a while.

Entropy512 says:

Jul 14, 2010. 12:29 PM REPLY However, strongly not recommended, since, as stated above, if one LED fails the others will be overdriven, so multiple parallel strands without per-strand overcurrent protection will result in a cascading failure.

http://www.instructables.com/id/LEDs-for-Beginners/

MindsEye69 says:
Ok I have the following setup: (see attatched image) I have 9 Large Ultrawhite LED's with a resistor on each + leg. The power supply is an AC adaptor Type 930 In: 230v ~ 50hz 6.6VA Out: 9V (Solid line with 3 --- under it) 300mA I tested it with my Multimeter and it outputs 9v DC so I assumed it was ok. I plugged it in and the power supply got REAL hot.

Jun 11, 2010. 2:27 PM REPLY

Now knowing as little as I do, I thought that instead of using Orange Orange Brown Gold which would be 330 ohm I used the ones I had which were Orange White Brown Gold 390 ohm resistors. I figured more resistance would just make the diodes dimmer a bit but would still work. 9 V Power supply 3.2 Diode Forward Voltage 20 mA forward current 9 LEDs Entered the above specs into a LED calculator: The wizard says: In solution 1: * each 330 ohm resistor dissipates 132 mW * the wizard says the color code for 330 is orange orange brown * the wizard thinks 1/4W resistors are fine for your application Help * together, all resistors dissipate 1188 mW * together, the diodes dissipate 576 mW * total power dissipated by the array is 1764 mW * the array draws current of 180 mA from the source. The other issue was that I had one diode backwards. I am going to resolder that one. Is it the wrong resistors or the backwards LED that caused the overheat? I am worried about it catching fire or something evil like that... the power supply was hot enough to burn yourself on. Thanks for any help!/ //MindsEye69

verence says:
Maybe a little bit late... > I have 9 Large Ultrawhite LED's with a resistor on each + leg. Standard design, should work. >The power supply is an AC adaptor Type 930 > In: 230v ~ 50hz 6.6VA > Out: 9V (Solid line with 3 --- under it) 300mA The "solid line with the 3 ---" means, it is rectified (i.e. DC) but not stabilized, but you should be fine.

Jul 14, 2010. 12:19 PM REPLY

> I tested it with my Multimeter and it outputs 9v DC so I assumed it was ok. If you tested it without load, that is not a good sign! Yep, NOT! As the supply is not stabilized, the unloaded voltage should be somewhat higher than the nominal voltage. > I plugged it in and the power supply got REAL hot. That is definitely _not_ good. > Now knowing as little as I do, I thought that instead of using Orange Orange Brown Gold which would be 330 ohm I used the ones I had which were Orange White Brown Gold 390 ohm resistors. I figured more resistance would just make the diodes dimmer a bit but would still work. Absolutely correct. You might not even be able to notice the difference. > 9 V Power supply > 3.2 Diode Forward Voltage

http://www.instructables.com/id/LEDs-for-Beginners/

> 20 mA forward current > 9 LEDs As the forward voltage is depending on the current (i.e. the higher the current, the higher the voltage, until it breaks down), I assume it is Vf @ If=20mA. OK, let's do the math. Voltage to be 'wasted' at the resistor: U[r]=U[supply]-U[LEDforward] : 9V-3.2V = 5.8V Value of the resistor: R=U/I : 5.8V / 20mA = 290 Ohm So your 330/390 Ohm should be fine. Check the power that the resistor has to handle: P=U*I : 5.8V * 20mA = 0.116W So, a 125mW Resistor will get hot, but work. Check the totally used current - easy: P[total]= 9 * 20mA = 180mA Very well inside your 300mA power supply budget. Well, as far as I can see, you did all your math right, and your wall wart _should_ not get hot. Maybe the power supply is damaged, or the guys who labelled it were a little bit too enthusiastic. Anyway, there is one thing you could try: Don't expose any LED to the full 9V and 'waste' the surplus voltage (5.8V of 9V) in a resistor, but combine the LED serially into groups of two or even three. (Of course, you will only get 4 [8LEDs] or 3 strands in parallel) To do this, make strands like: +9V--[+LED-]--[+LED-]--[resistor]--GND or even: +9V--[+LED-]--[+LED-]--[+LED-]--GND instead of +9V--[+LED-]--GND.. Yes, that is NO resistor for the 3xLED variant as 3*Uf=3*3.2V>9V (They might be a little bit dimmer than expected, though). For the 2 LED variant, the resistor should be around (9V-2*3.2V)/20mA=130Ohm. That way, the power supply has only to deliver 3*20mA or 4*20mA instead of 9*20mA. > The other issue was that I had one diode backwards. I am going to resolder that one. Is it the wrong resistors or the backwards LED that caused the overheat? Nope, no chance. The backward diode would not have drawn any current (at least not for this setup). > I am worried about it catching fire or something evil like that... the power supply was hot enough to burn yourself on. Still, that doesn't sound good. If the supply still gets hot, try another one, it might be broken or just wrongly labeled.

Coolboyme says:
please tell me if led's fuse like other bulbs i have this doubt as LED"s dont have filaments

Sep 5, 2009. 12:52 AM REPLY

daspoint says:

Oct 2, 2009. 8:57 AM REPLY You are correct - they do not have a filament. They have a "Junction". This is what makes them less prone to damage do to dropping and other abuse.... that's not to say they can not -not- be damaged in this manner-- they can . If an LED is fed to high a voltage a couple of things happen almost immediately before failure. First- They get hot ! They can get hot enough to melt the lens - Be careful !!! Second - they change colour (red turns to an orange, green turns almost yellow ) then the junction fails. Sometimes it is permanent - sometimes the damage is temporary. Hope this helps.

demonshreder says:

Jun 18, 2010. 10:36 AM REPLY My first ever LED was a 3v Bright light model of blue colour for a night lamp. I just plugged it into the 9v Cell and poof.....there you go........instead of a bright blue light i got a reddish one in the "filament" thing and a good fresh smell of plastic.....thx to this guide now I know how to use LEDs without ****ing them up......

Minifig666 says:
They can sometimes explode too!

Dec 2, 2009. 10:36 AM REPLY

s3ctorsev3n says:

Dec 8, 2009. 10:56 PM REPLY I had an electronics class in middle school. The first thing one kid did the day we started working with LED's was run over to the wall and jam the two electrodes into a wall socket. The resulting explosion was quite spectacular, if somewhat short lived. Needless to say, we immediately skipped to the lecture on the importance of resistors.

bcraun says:
cool.

Jan 16, 2010. 7:18 AM REPLY

Coolboyme says:
Thank you very much daspoint. Your post was very Helpful.

Oct 4, 2009. 3:58 AM REPLY

AmandaGbur says:
Very nice instructable! Helped me learn A LOT. One question though, where can i buy red/black wire?

Jun 3, 2010. 7:18 PM REPLY

http://www.instructables.com/id/LEDs-for-Beginners/

demonshreder says:

Jun 18, 2010. 10:34 AM REPLY Dude, just go to your nearest hardware or electrical shop and ask them for electrical wire of lets say, 1 meter. Then as the shopkeepers are enlightened fellows they will give you the proper wire needed for your usage just tell them why you want the wires for if you dont know the exact technical specs.... Jul 23, 2009. 7:51 PM REPLY

tvilot says:
"or even 1 12V LED if such a thing existed." Actually ... such a thing now does exist!!! http://led.linear1.org/12vdc-leds-from-best-hong-kong/ Insane!!!

karossii says:
Those aren't 12v LEDs, they are LEDs with resistors pre-wired to accept 12v safely. HUGE difference!

Dec 7, 2009. 3:38 AM REPLY

tvilot says:

Dec 7, 2009. 8:24 AM REPLY I don't follow. If the resistors are allowing the LED to run 12V "safely," how is that different from what I already do with LEDs at lower voltages? I always have a current limiting resistor when wiring up an LED. Thanks.

karossii says:

Dec 7, 2009. 3:51 PM REPLY If you follow your link and read the article, they mention that "The proper current-limiting resistor is already installed. " That is no different at all from you buying a regular LED that runs at 1v to 3.5v and adding resistors to allow them to run off of a 12v power source. A 12v LED would not need any resistor to run directly off of a 12v power source (but what color it would be, I have no idea, as the voltage of the LED is tied in directly to the LED color...)

legless says:

Jun 2, 2010. 7:40 AM REPLY Exactly. If one uses LEDs a lot in 12V applications, buying them made up can save a lot of time and it's often very economical in quantity. There are also some LEDs that have internal resistors built in. They save space on a circuit board but their brightness is then sort of "preprogrammed". Also because the brightness of an LED can be influenced by even a small change in supply voltage (11.5V instead of 12V), one might not get the desired brightness with prewired LEDs. Jun 2, 2010. 7:29 AM REPLY

legless says:
" the voltage of the LED is tied in directly to the LED color"

While that is not strictly true, as the emitted colour is dependant on the particular semiconductor material used, one finds in practice that various colours of LEDs have different forward voltages.

tvilot says:
I'm still not following you. Just because it has a current limiting resistor doesn't mean it runs at 1.5V. OK, how about these: www.elexp.com/opt_3330.htm

Dec 7, 2009. 4:16 PM REPLY

Entropy512 says:

Jul 14, 2010. 12:35 PM REPLY See legless's other post - "There are also some LEDs that have internal resistors built in. " - You just found some. Also, you sometimes will find high-power LEDs that consist of multiple chips in series on a single package. Such LEDs will have Vf values 2-3 times what you would normally expect for an LED of that color. (For example, Luxeon V emitters had a Vf of around 7v, since they had four chips in a 2S2P configuration.)

thecodfather14 says:

Jan 27, 2010. 2:31 PM REPLY do u need a resitor if u are just using one LED and also what is the wire u are using called please reply quick i need this for a scince project thank u urgent !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! please help

legless says:

Jun 2, 2010. 6:50 AM REPLY Basically yes you should use a resistor. In practice you might get a 1.7V LED to light from a 1.5V battery. In this case the resistor would add enough of a voltage drop that the LED would no longer light. In most cases an LED or series of LEDs is being powered by a voltage source often much higher than the rated forward voltage of the LED. An LED is a current controlled device unlike a normal lightbulb where the brightness is governed by voltage. LEDs have a nominal current rating. If this is exceeded the internal temperature of the LED wiil rise causing its P-N junction to fail and burn out. The simplest way to prevent this and set the brightness is the current limiting resistor. This series resistor has an associated voltage drop across it thereby delivering the correct voltage to the LED and limiting its current. Ohm's Law and Kirchoff's Voltage Law (2nd law) can be used to calculate resistor values. There are plenty of LED resistor calculators online if you're unsure. Any fine hookup wire will work.

http://www.instructables.com/id/LEDs-for-Beginners/

kcls says:
I may be wrong, but im pretty sure you dont need a resistor, but it makes the led last longer.

Feb 11, 2010. 10:24 AM REPLY

mikeybee says:

Dec 29, 2006. 8:14 PM REPLY Here's another, pretty sure fire way to tell which side is (+) or (-): Most LEDs come with a very small raised ridge at the base of the 'bulb'. If you look closely at that ridge, it's not a complete circle -- there will be a small notche-off portion. This notch-off, from what I've found so far, is always lined up with the (-) side of the LED.

blainewood says:
This is by far the best way to distinguish which lead is an anode and which is a cathode.

May 21, 2010. 1:10 PM REPLY

RelientOwl says:
And for those who don't know what it means Light Emmiting Diode

May 18, 2010. 1:05 PM REPLY

stagebuilder says:

May 22, 2009. 9:49 PM REPLY I have a question related to this article. I have a 20 LED string of battery powered Xmas type lites, running off of a 3xAA battery pack. Within the battery pack is a single resistor, which appears to be 5.1 ohms (green/brown/gold/gold). I want to splice another length of 20 LEDs onto the exiting set but run all 40 off of the same 3xAA configuration. Do I just divide the resistor value in half since I doubled the load (work being done) ?

doughnutty says:
I am looking for this answer also.

Mar 28, 2010. 11:21 PM REPLY

legomitch02 says:

May 10, 2010. 12:59 PM REPLY i think you would need the same resistor because they both have 4.5v going to them and they both need a smaller voltage so you would have to lower the voltage of both using the resistor WARNING: this may be worrng wait until someone else confirms this ty ^^

legomitch02 says:

May 4, 2010. 6:19 PM REPLY Im following the Music LED Light Box instructable and im using a 12v power supply with it. Is it possible for me to have a connection made from the power supply to an ipod speaker that runs on 3.6v using resistors? Apr 15, 2010. 4:42 PM REPLY You can buy LEDs online very cheaply but many times you will have to either wait a month as it ships from China or buy an insane amount to get a good deal. I've found a decent deal on amazon. 25 for $7.49 with free super saver shipping if anyone needs some for a project or something. That's about $.30 a piece. Whatever you do just don't buy them at radio shack or "ripoff shack" as I affectionately call them. www.amazon.com/gp/product/B003GDT2DE/sr=89/qid=1271373497/ref=olp_product_details Apr 4, 2010. 5:39 PM REPLY I am wiring six 2.1V led's with 25mA each in parallel to a 11.5V power source. I am going to put a resistor on the positive leg of each individual led. What formula should I use to determine how many Ohms of resistance I need to put on each resistor of each led in this situation? Should I use (11.5-2.1) * .150=62.66 Ohms or should I find out how much resistance one 2.1V led with 25mA would use with a 11.5V power source? Ex. (11.5-2.1) * 25 ? I really don't know which formula to use, please someone help me find the answer to this question. I'm only 16 years old and I'm new to this kind of electronic stuff.

jbeineke says:

bananashake says:

krisavi says:
Hey, it should be the right formula tho you may want to recheck at ledcalc.com/ under parallel connection part...

Apr 11, 2010. 6:33 AM REPLY

zombiefire says:
mine are the same size HELP!!!!!!!

Apr 1, 2010. 3:53 AM REPLY

ydeardorff says:
no it does not matter which side the resistor is on. only the polarity of the LED.

Mar 29, 2010. 4:28 PM REPLY

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http://www.instructables.com/id/LEDs-for-Beginners/