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Your 24 pixel RGB LED light ring can be programmed to illuminate your plant on short/dark days and accelerate growth by providing evening light.
Start by soldering three wires to your ring. The wires don't have to go through the holes, you can solder them to the open pads on the bottom.
Solder one wire (generally red) to PWR +5v
Solder one wire (generally black) to GND
Solder one wire(any other color) to Data Input
2. You now need to solder a "featherwing protoboard." Here are the items you need.
3. Make sure you understand the top and bottom of the board. If you solder the board upsidedown, it will be garbage. The top has pin names and numbers on it as well as the words "feather wing" The bottom has no text
The TOP will have the short pins sticking UP for soldering. Here's what a finished soldered tripler looks like from the top
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Note! pins only belong where you see pin labels. Four holes on one side will not have pins.
4. Now solder the LED wires to the featherwing protoboard.
The wires must be in the hole directly next to the pin you want to connect to.
The ring GND wire must connect to the GND pin
The ring PWR 5v wire must connect to the USB pin
The ring data input wire must connect to the A2 pin (its the third hole below GND)
5. Making sure all the pins are lined up, plug the featherwing protoboard next to the controller.
You should be ready to start programming the light ring!
6. This code will light up your grow light for 10 seconds and then change the color for 10 seconds.
Note that you have four colors to work with Red, Green, Blue, and White.
You can set the colors and then infuse white or turn off the white and mix the colors as RGB.
Note that you can also change the overall brightness in this line. Choose a number between 0 and 1. Note that a high number may draw too much electrical current and tax your system.
Challenges:
Program your light to change through at least five different shades.
Can you use a "for loop" to fade your lights on when they first turn on?
The lines below show how to control an individual LED on the ring. Can you make a chaser sequence using a "for" loop?
The lines below show how to control an individual led on the ring. Can you make every other LED light up using a "for" loop?
Can you hook up your light intensity sensor and get the LED ring to only turn on when the light intensity is low?
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