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Amp meter display light mod

A project log for Bench Power Supply Musings

A collection of ideas

stefan-lochbrunnerStefan Lochbrunner 03/02/2016 at 23:430 Comments

This is probably a really niche problem but I sometimes need an amp meter with an illuminated display when I need to characterize some LEDs from eBay that come without a datasheet, for example. In order to see when a LED starts to light up I need to turn down my lights which also prevents me from being able to read the analog amp meter seen in the project image. I could use my DMM, which has a display backlight, but using the 'built in' amp meter of this power supply is just more convenient.

From converting my broken desk lamp to LEDs I had some leftover pieces of LED strips that just seemed perfect for this purpose so I did a quick test and soldered up this prototype:

The two pins just plug into the 4-pin Berg connector from the PSU so the light is on whenever the PSU is on. But since the amp meter is only needed when the adjustable voltage part of the power supply is used I might add a switch or tie it some other way to the variable output.

This is really a very trivial mod so the main reason for this log is that I was just way too pleased with the result:

And this is how it looks with the lights turned off:

...

As I said, I was just too pleased with the look... contrary to the modified lamp which once done looked pretty much like before, where's the excitement in that?

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