made my own lighting board from scratch

[JP12687]

So we were entered in a drama festival(the connecticut drama association festival) and they gave us VERY limited lighting so we asked, and got permission to use a lighting board backstage as long as we were able to set it all up in 5min..and not violate fire code.

So thursday we had our tech for a sat. show...and they tell us we cannot use a computer lighting board...or "computerized dimmers" ala DMX/AMX/MPX or any other kind of dimmers.

So the scramble was on, i made a late night trip to Home Depot bought wood, a little computer fan, alot of wires(Green, Black, and White spools) terminal stripcs, crimps, Dimmers(wall switch dimmers..like the sliding ones you find in houses) and edison connections.

So the next morning...545am call at school. We built a box to hold the "board" and the electrical components. We attachec the dimming switches and the edison plugs. We wire the switches to the plugs...then run the power to the relays.

We ran an edison plug in as power and connected it to the main relay...which also split to power the computer fan to keep it cool.

I'll try to get some pictures of it soon. It was the best 10 hours of my life...we had so much fun making it...

Its def. something i would recomend to any1 in the lighting/electrician end of theatre...its good to work on something like this.

[propmonkey]

ive been thinking of making one in my spare time as soon as i get some money to spend.

[moojoe]

there has to be something quite dangerous by running however many lights off of one edison outlet. how many lights did you have in it?

[rapscaLLion]

LOL, nice! I wanna see pics

Seriously though... WHY??? Why did you not have a lighting board, and why did they not allow computerized control?

Sounds like fun though!

[JP12687]

yea money...it cost about $475 for 8 channels, actually check that...$400 because we over bought stuff not knowing exacly what we would need since this was a heat of the moment thing

[JP12687]

i was running 3" frenels..inkies...not much juice at all...well under the 20amp the circuit was pulling...and under the gague wire we were using as our extension cord into the wall

[moojoe]

ah, ok, i thought you were using like...full size eplipsoidals and 6in fresnels or something

[DJErik07]

A few words of caution:
Residential dimmers are not equipted to handle the load of theater lights. If you feel the dimmer after a few minutes of operation you will find it very hot. If you are running multiple dimmers it still we be very hot even with the fan.

The cord you are feeding the "board" with should be the right gauge wire also. A large gauge wire, such as an extension cord will not work properly.

[SteveB]

Well.... (my comments that follow are in answer to your description of what you've fabricated).

You best hope they don't have a fire or building inspection, cause the cute little dimming system is most likely in violation of any number of electrical codes, among them, enclosure type (wood ?), numbers and sizes of wires in the enclosure, etc...

As much fun as you had making it work and to repeat others, it's most likely not a code compliant device and one that (as an instructer) I would not have allowed you to plug in and utilize.

Best to disassemble at this point, and posibly use the components elsewhere, maybe after reading a couple of good books on safe electrical practices and techniques.

SB

[len]

Originally Posted by rapscaLLion

LOL, nice! I wanna see pics

Seriously though... WHY??? Why did you not have a lighting board, and why did they not allow computerized control?

Sounds like fun though!

Ditto. I want to know why the ban.