MakerBot Modifications - Lights

Lights!

Lit-Up MakerBot

The construction of the TOM makes it pretty hard to get a good view as to what's going on while it's
building.  You've probably noticed how hard it is to see if you're getting a decent print, or just some more modern art to add to your plastic graveyard.
I remedied this by adding two LED strip lights and an LED spot light.
In this picture, there are two Ikea Dioder strip lights mounted in the left and right front corners.  There's also a small led spot light mounted under the Z stage.  I used a Clas Ohlson light.
Between the two, you can see that the lighting situation is better than average.
The Idea Dioder set comes as a set of four strip lights, an AC-12V DC wall-wart and a small square connector.  Each strip light draws around 2 watts and the spot light draws just under that.  This is super convenient as the PSU in the base of the TOM natively has a 12V rail and an additional 6 watt load shouldn't hurt anything.
Here's how to make your own awesome lights:
Materials:

• 4x 45 degree mounts: 15721
• Solder
• Female -> 2 Male Molex 8981 HDD connector
• Heat shrink tube and insulation tape
• Double stick tape
• Hot glue
• Dioder LED Strip Light kit
• 1x LED Spot Light

1. Print a set of 45 degree mounts
2. Mount each light using two of the mounts on the left and right side.  Mount the lights so the power connector is at the bottom and can be fed down through the acrylic base. 
3. Crack open the DC end of the Dioder power supply and check the polarity of the wires.  The circuit board should be labeled.  Double check the polarity using a multimeter.
4. Snip off the Dioder DC end leaving about 30 cm of cord still attached.
5. Snip off one of the male HDD connectors.
6. Solder the positive Dioder wire to the 12V+ wire (yellow), Solder the negative to the ground wire (black) using heat shrink tube and insulation tape to secure the connection
7. Insulate and tape off the remaining 5V+ (red) and ground (black) wires.
8. Use double stick tape to secure the Dioder power connector to the bottom of the acrylic base in a convenient place.
9. Attach the lights to the inside left and right corners using double hot glue.  Route the wires through the openings in the base.  
10. Attach the spotlight to the bottom of the Z stage.  Route the wires to follow the extruder cut-off wire.
11. Optional - cut down the Dioder hookup wires to limit the amount of stuff you need to jam back into the base.
12. Hook up the lights to the Dioder connector.  Unplug everything else from the PSU (to protect your controllers) and turn on the PSU.  If the lights don't immediately turn on, unplug everything and double check for shorts and bad connections.

Replacement Dioder end

After I was done, I had a perfectly good 12V wall-wart and two remaining strip lights with no home.  To make the whole thing a little more useful, I printed out a box to replace the Dioder end now living in the MakerBot.  Using a little proto-board you can make your own replacement.  

Check this thing for a replacement end: 15721.  Use the schematic for making the proto-board.

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