Create LED Light

In about an hour, you can create easy do it yourself LED lighting with cr2032 batteries. These lights strands can be used on bicycles, walkways, on costumes or just as decorations. Because they are dirt and water resistant, they can be used indoors or out.

There are two methods for attaching the LED bulbs to the wire. One requires trimming the LED leads short and the other does not. Trimmed LEDs will be pushed into the speaker wire from one side without going through. They will then be glued in place. LEDs that have been left long will go all the way through and then the excess lead will be wrapped around the wire insulation. This can also be glued for extra stability and water protection. The wrapping just insures maximum contact between the leads and the speaker wire.

The first LED can be placed directly into the end of the wire

. Each LED should have a flat spot on the negative side. Speaker wire is usually two colors. Make sure that the negative side lead is always placed in the same color wire as all the other negative leads. So if you put the first LED's negative lead into the silver side, then all other negative leads should also go into silver.

After the LED on the end, the bulbs should be placed at even intervals along the wire. At the first interval, use the awl to poke holes into the insulation for the leads to go through. If you trim the lead ends into sharp angles, it will help with this process. Place the leads into the speaker wire as described above.

Once you have placed all the bulbs, strip about an inch of insulation from the end of the speaker wire. Take your batteries and stack them together. With a small piece of duct tape, secure the wire you used for negative to the negative side of the battery stack and the other wire to the positive side. Place the stack inside one of the bottle caps. Run a thin bead of glue around the rim of the cap and fit the other bottle cap over it to make a waterproof housing for the batteries.

When the power runs out, the glue can be removed fairly easily so that the batteries can be replaced. If it does not pull free, it can be cut with a sharp blade.

*One CR2032 battery has an approximate 200 mAh capacity. So the number of bulbs and the mA per bulb will tell you how many batteries you will need and about how long the power should last. More information about the program is available on the web site at soli-lite.