I'm Trying to design some sort of circuit.. Not even if thats the propper term. I want to be able to flip a switch and have a group of LEDs go on along with a motor that spins something... I have a feeling this is probably quite simple for those in the know... But i'm a total idiot when it comes to this stuff... Any help would be great or a point in the right direction.. All i know is will need a transistors and capacitors. Thanks for the help.

 

You should give some more specifics. But if all you want is to spin a motor and light led's than you wont need either of those things. It depends on how you hook it up, but you'll need resistors for the LED's most likely, a motor, a battery and a switch and thats about it.

 

Thanks for the info.. Ok this is what I've go Various motors in differnt sizes I group of 10 LEDs, Resistors, capacitors, Switches, Transistors. I'm Trying to design a hand held little toy that when the switch is on the LEDs Light and the motor spins some sort of plastic thing that the LEDs Light up. Not sure what kind of board i need or even, lets say i have all the correct parts what order to set them up in.

 

Well you have to really pay attention when using LED's because 1) they are DIODES so they only allow current to flow in one direction (meaning you have to make sure you put the LED in the circuit with the correct direction) and 2) they have non-linear resistance. You may or may not know what this means, but basically, i'm just saying you have to be careful/pay attention if you want your circuit to work correctly.

How much background with electronics/circuits do you have? Are you more interested in just putting it together or in learning how to actually design it? There'll actually be a decent bit of calculations if you want to learn to actually design it...

 

Well.. I have a bachelors in economics and finance.. So as far as the background in electronics/circuits.. ZERO!! But i'm quite interested in making this work so i guess I would like to learn how to design it and just putting it together. So probably the way to put it together and the theroy behind why it works that way... I've got a million ideas on little projects like this and have never realy tried to do anything with them so i'm realy interested in learning while doing.... I really appreciate the help.

 

hey no prob. email me and i'll try to explain some of the background you'll need to use some of this stuff.

 

I sent you an email... again thanks for the help...

 

Guitarguy - posting your E-mail in forums generally isn't a good idea; spammers will inundate you. I suggest that you remove it.

 

Hey thanks. Ya, it is my junk mailbox anyways, but i will go ahead and delete it anyway. Thanks for the heads up.

 

ya know, if you want to actually know what you are doing, I would definitely suggest the ebook on allaboutcircuits.com (as in, not the forum) It will give you basic info on this. Also you are going to want to get tolerances on the LED, switch and motor. This includes namely, info on amps.

 

ok, you prob dont wanna know but..... the leds will have a roughly constant forward volt drop across them, say an led needs 10ma to light it up and the supply voltage is 10 volts. then say 1.5v is across the led, then that leaves 8.5 volts left,and 10 ma, so a resistor would be in series and have 10ma flowing through it 8.5 volt across it, so 8.5/10ma gives the value of resitor, this idea can be applied to many more resistors, in series or in parrelel.hope i have helped or given you a bit of info