Electroluminescent Paint - proposed workshops

#21

Sounds great - have a few questions: What is the temperature range these can operate at? Also - what temp can they be safely heated/cooled to when not in use before permanent damage to the paint? Have several thoughts for mountaineering equipment but not sure if they’d be outside of the operating temps.

Also - what’s the power consumption like - I assume this is variable but what is max/min power requirements? Is the paint flexible? Is the paint stable under long term sunlight exposure, inc at high altitude? I saw an image of an airbus I think you did - but was not sure if this was just a mock up.

Also - after the workshop - will we be able to buy the paint from yourselves and apply it in our own time/choice of location? Do we need anything specialist for this - curing ovens/uv/anything weird?

Highly interested!

#22

Hi

For a small area like this, there’s an EL wire inverter we typically use as it’s cheap. I’m just inquiring at the moment about the cost from China to buy a bunch more of these. I will probably bring enough for everyone as well as 9V batteries, Y adapters so that 2 batteries can be put in series and some wall plugs for those who don’t want to use the batteries. These will be an additional cost, of probably under £5. If you do other projects, then you can swap between electronics or purchase new electronics from us or elsewhere (and we can tell you whether they’ll be suitable or not). The electronics are not included in the price to give people the option to buy elsewhere or not have to buy them every time if we do more workshops. £40+VAT really is very cheap for the amount of work and equipment that will be involved, but it will be worth it, it if people start doing awesome projects.

#23

Shall we start discussing dates, to see when we can get the right number of people together?
@saminvent - some questions…

  • can we run this workshop in the Makerspace, or do we need to come to your base?
  • roughly how long do you think we should plan for - 2hrs/4hrs/6hrs?
  • are there any days of the week that are typically good/bad for you? I’m assuming we’d want to try for a weekend…
  • you mentioned a 10 person minimum for a workshop - what would be a practical maximum?
#24

Hi Calum,

One project I was involved in was with Airbus, doing liveries (big fkoff 6m long stickers!) to go on the exterior of aircraft, where windspeeds are around 500mph, temperatures go down to as low as -57 degrees C and there’s lots of other hazards such as moisture, ozone and UV. For that, a layer of aviation-grade clearcloat was applied instead of automotive clearcoat. If you have ideas for very rugged projects, we have a number of solutions for giving much-enhanced impact protection. On the upper range, we expect the material could be used up to around 85C, but possibly it may be a bit higher. That Airbus plane was the first prototype and had EL liveries on both sides. Whilst I can’t say too much, expect to see more of them in the future. The paint is flexible, but shouldn’t be continuously flexed as the materials were not designed for this purpose. VynEL from Ellumiglow is a waterproof EL tape/panel product that can be sewn into clothing and even machine washed.

Power consumption, proportional to the area driven, is dependent on input voltage and frequency - which both affect the brightness. Running the speed shape I left at the space at a typical brightness could use between 1.5 to 3W of power, but those small inverters are only up to 50% efficient. We have a lot of data, so if you have a project in mind, we can spec up electronics including battery charging tech. for that purpose. One of my primary roles is in electroluminescent inverter design, so you’re in safe hands!

You will be able to buy the material from us, as much as you need and when you need it. We have spray painting facilities in Windsor you would be able to use, however, the intention is that if after these workshops multiple members wish to use LumiLor on a regular basis, we would set up permanent facilities to enable people to do LumiLor and other painting in the space. Any such setup is likely to be restricted to small objects as extraction is needed. Other than that, there should be no significant problems with people spraying LumiLor in the makerspace. The other benefit of buying the product from us will be that I hope to be able to host less formal workshops where people can receive as much help as they wish with their own projects, or I can simply arrange with anyone a time/day to help them out.

Finally (and I apologise it seems I can’t write a short answer in this place), we can have shot blasted and powdercoated any metal items prior to LumiLor as well as providing any other paints (primers, clearcoats, topcoats, basecoats) and other consumables needed at a low cost.

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#25

Hi Tom,

Yes we should (especially as Christmas is closing in fast - seriously where did 2017 go??)

The intention was absolutely for this to be run in the Makerspace. We have facilities but they are in Windsor, anyone can use them if they need to. As I mention in another comment, I hope there will be enough interest that a permanent LumiLor station can be set up in the Makerspace. I sometimes use our little spraystation - a 2ft wide extractor box, for doing EL paint projects, at a push.

Whilst I have commitments most days, I will run this workshop on whatever day the most members are free.

Ideally, we’d have a minimum of 10 people interested, but the workshops realistically can be about a maximum of 10 people - i.e. it would be fantastic if 15-20 people were interested in which case we can do the “101” workshop on two separate occasions with different groups of people. This also reduces the risk of people not being able to make the date.

It will most likely be 5h, so we could possibly do an afternoon start on a weekend, take our time and then go out for a beer afterwards. On the plus side, it’s fairly cheap entertainment! It would be a too tight to get everything done in less time than that, when people are doing this for the first time and my supervision is spread across 10 people.

Being completely honest, after lighting up 1 rectangle, under supervision, with the guns all set up, on a perfect test surface, you will not be an expert! It’s a balance really for me to try to put on a workshop which will get people interested, give people a good idea of how to do it and what can be done with it, as well as at the end people having something they can keep and say that they have made. I am very aware that people only want to spend money lighting up their projects, but I can’t expect people to want to do 5-10 samples first - hence the 101 training is really straightforward. We can do more workshops in the future where people work on their own projects, but have in advance, corresponded with me so that everything can be ready and we have what we need (including having metal objects powder coated and almost anything else primed with 2k primer first).

#26

I’m interested in this if I can fit it in. Sounds like fun.