Science Buddies: "Ask an Expert"

Hi, so I'm doing this Science fair project, Led Traffic Gloves, and well it says to solder but what I'm testing is changing the type of battery, like 2AA, 2C, and so on, can someone give me an idea for not soldering because 1 I can't really get a solder iron and 2 I need to keep changing the battery holder to the other types of batteries. I know I know it seems complicated, but I like challenge. Is there another way to tie the wires together without soldering them together?

Hi SnowFall201,

I’m assuming that you are working on the project described here:

https://www.sciencebuddies.org/science- ... p076.shtml

One suggestion is to twist together the stripped wire ends from the battery holder and from the LED circuit. If you can bend the wires around so that the wires from the positive and negative battery terminals don’t touch, this should work fine. Otherwise you could wrap the twisted wire ends with some vinyl tape.

The project procedure mentions using electrically conductive epoxy as an alternative to soldering the wires to the LED terminals. This may be a much better option for wiring the LED’s. You might find conductive epoxy at Radio Shack or a hardware store.

I hope this helps. Please post again if you have more questions.

A. Norman

Hi, thanks for the suggestion. I have another question that I won't someone to answer. I do not know how I will measure the Led brightness from the different types of batteries? Since, the batteries AA, AAA, C and D have the same voltage. My project is supposed to be measuring the brightness of the Led lights from the different types of batteries.

Hi SnowFall201,

This topic is well outside of my expertise. But I did find a project on this site that involves measuring LED brightness variation with current. The project procedure includes a technique for measuring LED light output. And there is a method for varying the current supplied to an LED. You may be able to adapt parts of this to your project:

https://www.sciencebuddies.org/science- ... ml#summary

Also, you might be able to use a smartphone app to measure LED light output. You may want to try one of the free apps to see if it will work in your experiment.

I hope this helps. Please post again if you have more questions.

A. Norman