IKEA Lamp With Neopixel Strip - Fire Effect

Hello Instructables and Makers.

Last time during IKEA shopping I bought paper lamp Holmo. And I thought that there is an opportuinity to improve its functionality with addressable LEDs and have some light effects.

So let's get to work!

You'll need this stuff to build this project:

• IKEA Lamp HOLMÖ (~ 7 euro)
• WS2812b addressable LED strip
• Arduino UNO
• Resistor 470 ohms
• 3 wire cable
• Bunch of protytyping wires
• USB charger (1A minimum)
• USB cable
• paper sheets A4 white
• zink wire or any other metal wire

Set up the lamp according to the attached instruction but don't put lampshade. We will do it later.

Now, measure the distance form top of the lamp to the lampshade lock which is installed at the bottom. In my case it was around 50 cm. Put this distance on your led strip. As a result I had 25 leds long strip. Cut the strip and prepare 3 wire cable. Solder wire ends to the led strip. Note, digital signal which controls LEDs goes in one direction so make sure you solder wires at the right strip end. Check the arrow marked on the strip (see photo above)

After soldering protect connection with insulation tape. Attach led stip to the lamp. I used insulation tape in case I want to use LED strip for other things in the future. It would be easier to deattach.

During the tests of the strip I wasn't satisfied with initial effect. Lampshade didn't diffuse light well, LEDs light dots where still visible. So I decided to install additional diffuser. It had to be cheap so I used regular A4 white sheet of paper and roll it. With 4 pieces of rolled sheet I built something like paper tube and put in on the lamp.

To not let paper tube go down to much I locked it with zink wire attached to lamp stem.

Connect arduino with usb cable to your computer and program it with fire effect. You'll find it on tweaking4all website. Here is a link

Tweaking4All fire effect

I used neopixel library to handle this effect. On the webpage you'll find more effects so you can experiment with a different ones.

Remember to change settings in program according to your Arduino - LED strip configuration. Make sure that number of LEDs and pin no are correct. More information about addressable LEDs you'll find on neopixel adafruit website.

Now it's time to connect LED strip to arduino and provide some power supply. I used usb charger with cable from my old smartphone. Cut the cable, find plus and minus wire, connect to prototype board. Make sure your charger has enough power. 1 LED is consuming max 60 mA, if you have 25 LEDs it gives 1,5 A of max current consumpiton. But fire effect is not going to use all LEDs at full power so I assumed that 1A charger will be enough. If

Connect LED strip 3 wire cable to prototype board according to attached picture. You have 2 power wires and 1 data wire (digital) which controlls the LED. Connect power wires to prototype board. Connect digital wire to arduino (I used pin 7), remeber to put 470 ohm resisor. it will protect you against unexpected voltage spikes.

Last step is to put lampshade. Make it gently, be careful, it's easy to damage the paper difuser. Lock lampshade on the bottom of the lamp according to IKEA instruction.

Now it's time to power on the lamp.

Hope you like final effect :)

This project was considered as one day, simple, low cost lamp upgrade. But there are many ways of further improvement. So what is planned here for the nearest future.

I will change arduino uno for arduino mini pro which is more compact and put it together with power supply inside bulb nest of lamp.

I want to add more effects and chage it with toggle button. I will use interupts in arduino to handle that.

So stay tuned for an update.

Hope you'll like this project!

Best regards

Maciej