LED Acrylic Luminous Panels

James_Evans · 13 September 2017 08:57

Hi everyone, for my PC I am m trying to replicate MurderMods Luminous panel

My plan is to use 50mm acrylic sheets, one white backed sheet with a transparent top and then a LED diffusing frosted acrylic piece on top, both scored using the laser cutter to generate a prismatic pattern to aid in light diffusion to generate a uniform glow. LED strips will be positioned at the edges of the sheet.

Do you think this is the best way of trying to replicate the effect? Any suggestions to improve the light dispersion? What settings on the laser would you say I should be using to create the scores in the acrylic? Thanks

peter_hellyer · 13 September 2017 09:23

Something like this might work well? http://elwirecraft.co.uk/el-products/el-panel-categories/white-el-panel-in-many-sizes-a6-a5-a4-a3-a2-and-a1/

tomnewsom · 13 September 2017 11:42

EL drivers emit a high-pitched whine which you may or may not be able to hear over the computer’s fans etc.

James_Evans · 13 September 2017 13:05

thats not so good… trying to make this a low noise build (600rpm on the fans) so that may be a pain, saying that i would probably need to try some out to get an idea of how loud it is.

I was looking at the prysmatic perspex people have made, what kind of depth should I be aiming to score/engrave the acrylic to?

Howard · 14 September 2017 05:16

Edge lit LED panel will be much brighter and much cheaper.
Ideally the spacing / depth of engraving would be based on inverse square law to get most even distribution.

James_Evans · 14 September 2017 08:30

yep, that’s what I was feeling. My plan was to make a structure similar to this:

What would be the best way of calculating the cuts for the light guide @Howard? just a bit unsure as the LED light is coming from the edge so the calculations would vary as we move across the panel edge to edge right?