Introduction: Controling EL Wire With Arduino

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How to hack an EL wire inverter to be controled with an Arduino.

Power sourced by arduino 3.3voltage (no batteries)

No relay required (relay have limited cycles)

This hack avoid inverter self blinking

- Materials:

NPN transistor = 123AP

Diode = 1N4003 or any general purpose

10kΩ resistor

wires

Thermal shrink

- Tools:

Soldering Iron

Side cutters

Screw Driver

Step 1: Open EL Wire Inverter

just one screw to open

Step 2: Remove Power Supply Wires

not completely necessary but only one power supply is a nice to have.

if so, just remember to connect inverter negative pad to arduino, both boards need to have same voltage reference

Step 3: Diagram of the Hacking Circuit

diode is for arduino pin protection

resistor lowers the current in the base of the transistor

when high signal is provided in the base, collector shorts to ground

means transistor is inverting signal

when High signal provided EL Wire Is Active.

Step 4: Opening Connection

remove all soldering material in the second pin of the IC, make sure connection is open

Step 5: Connect Components

attach components to the EL wire inverter board as the picture reference.

make sure diode cathode (white line) is pointing to the inverter board

transistor is

Step 6: Thermal Shirnk Instalation

Step 7: Pin Connections

Make sure to connect red wire to 3.3 volts pin in Arduino and black wire to ground, signal wire (orange) to pin 13 of arduino board.

download blink example sketch to test & enjoy making your own variations

Remember, the new Arduino 101 based on INTEL Curie includes accelerometer and gyroscope that can be programed to make EL Wire to glow base on movement, I'll include sketches my when I have them ready.