What is it?

A 16-segment RGB LED display using 20 WS2812b LEDs per digit.

Each digit measures around 100mm x 130mm (4" x 5").

The digits are chainable, much like a strip made of WS2812bs, with each digit having it's own power and signal broken out for ease of power distribution. External power is required (5V) and the LEDs themselves need to be driven (from an Arduino, say).

Why did you make it?

There was no cheap, large-ish RGB 16 segment display available. There are options for cheap single color 8 segment display (and perhaps RGB) and options for cheap small 8-16 segment displays, but none that I could find that met the size and cost I was looking for.

The digits themselves were for an art project I was considering doing which fell through and now I have some spare boards from the research and development phase of the project.

What makes it special?

To my knowledge, there is no other board that offers the combination of color, cost, size and addressability.

The board itself is very rudimentary as it's mostly a glorified WS2812b strip in a particular pattern. With the pattern, the effect is quite nice and with the cost going down on PCB fabrication, the underlying electronics and board assembly, these types of "artisinal" circuits are becoming more accessible.

Additional information

This is a very simple board with 20 WS2812b LEDs on them that can mounted as a sixteen segment display.

The LEDs will need to be driven externally (from an Arduino, say) and powered from a 5V power supply that can handle the current draw. The current draw can be substantial, especially if the digits are chained, with the immediate effect being the color will degrade the further down the digit line you go if power isn't replenished.

Power and signal headers are broken out on the board to provide ease of power, etc.

This project is open source hardware, so please feel free to extend, improve or just create yourself. The batch I'm selling here is from an order done through JLCPCB and all files, including the Gerbers, the BOM and the CPL files, are available for people who want to have their own board fabricated (see the documentation for more info).

Not being sold are the spacers, separators or the diffusors shown in the preview. If you would like these, please contact me to discuss further.