Circuitry!!

The most challenging part of this project was designing and assembling the circuitry for the LED. I wanted the LED to illuminate the stone from behind, and leave little if any of the wiring to be visible. Initially, I thought to thread the wire through tubing and locate the battery pack behind the wearers neck on the chain.  Most fortunately however, Erica from class found some very tiny LED pins with a small battery pack holding two watch batteries that were capable of lighting the LED I was using.  This gave me the option to mount the battery pack behind the piece, removing the need to route wiring and locate a battery pack elsewhere.

I wanted the LED to be mounted solidly as electrical solder connections are inherently weak and any motion at the connections would ultimately cause the joint to fail.  I decided to mount the LED on a small disc of plastic and perforate the plastic to hold a small brass wire soldered to the  negative contact on the LED.  The LED was epoxied to the disc and formed a solid base for the negative contact protruding down through the disc.


 

 

The battery case had a threaded top with a holder for the original LED pin.  I cut the holder off the top with a jewelers saw, leaving me with a threaded ring which I epoxied to the underside of the plastic disc, so that the negative contact would protrude down below the ring. By screwing the battery case onto the threaded ring, the negative contact of the LED  was now touching the negative terminal of the battery in the case.  The circuit was completed by the contact between the outside of the battery case and the strut of the basket, allowing the LED to light when the case was screwed down completely on to the ring.

 

This lighting mechanism went through uncounted revisions before this design.  I wanted the mechanism to be durable and allow for battery replacement as well as have the ability to control an on/off switch.