Need some electronics advise

Hi

Im toying with different ideas for ironman lights (chest and hands) and as wiring up individual leds and resistors is a bit of a pain in the butt, i have bought a 12v flexible led strip. Thing is its sealed and its not intended to be cut to various lengths, but thats what i intend to do (obviously i would have to solder wires to it)

Now from looking at it I can tell you it has 48 leds, and what appear to be 16 resistors. The copper strip its all attached to is divided by black lines. Im assuming that as an led is about 3-4v that it is set up in 16 lots of 3 leds and a resistor, so if i were to cut it it would have to be in groups like that.

I ahve included a pic and have outlined the wires at the start of the strip, the resistors wch have "181" on them and in green ive draen on the lines.



The main thing that is confusing me (maybe coz my electronics knowledge is limited...) is if the strip goes RESISTOR-LED-LED-LED etc etc Then why are the wires not attached at the very beginnng? and why is the very beginning not a resistor? you can see from the pic it starts LED-LED-RESISTOR-LED-POS WIRE-NEG WIRE-LED-LED-RESISTOR-LED-LED-LED-RESISTOR etc etc

so hopefully some electrnics whizz can shed some light on this for me

anyone...

Hi,

12 volts, 48 LEDs, 16 resistors. To be honest, I have not see those strips of this variation before but let me share with you my theory:

1. Each White LED is about 3.2 to 3.6 volts and so, each LED 'segment' comprises of three LEDs and a current limiting resistor. The resistor could be 68 to 120 Ohms.

2. The current limiting resistor can be placed before or after the three LEDs. But whatever you do, this would need 12 volts.

And so, that's it. If you can zoom the copper tracks, it would help too.

But for the Iron Man project where you need:

1. 2x LEDs for the eyes
2. 1x LED for the Arc Reactor
3. 2x LEDs for each hand repulsors
4. 2x LEDs for each boot jet

So, IMHO, you would need to anestize your butt and solder resistors to individual LEDs . (I prefer this way when it comes to Iron Man and this uses less battery power.)

But since I do not have an Iron Man model kit, it would be nice if you could take some progress pictures so everyone can explore the wiring.

hello, could you perhaps upload/ point out where the resistors are located?

I would probably suggest when you cut the strip to remove the resistors and add individual ones to each LED to change the voltage needed if that makes any sense.