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looking for nice blue backlit pushbuttons

Went to dickies and jaycar but couldnt find anything I liked. I'll need about 100 to start with so they need to be at the right price. Backlight doesnt have to be blue but just something nice. Glass top would be excellent. A good tactile feel - with good positive click action. Sorry to be so picky but its for my future house as wall switches mounted on a blank plate connected to a low voltage controller which I am building. Just simple momentary action single pole. Any help appreciated in finding a quality supplier. The stuff at shops these days is so cheap.

I like the look of the round saturn switches that the Cbus2 home automation lighting system has but I dont want the associated circuitry. Just the buttons.

Reply to
Heywood Jablome
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Had a look here?

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Reply to
Caliban

blank

simple

automation

  1. Are you looking at 100 of these for just one house?
  2. How many switches per plate?
  3. Do you wish to use these for dimming or will your controller do that?

Cheers.

Reply to
Chris

On each plate I am thinking one button for on, one for off and 5 for presets. Thats 7 switches per plate.

The house will no doubt have 15 to 20 switch plates so ill need around 100 individual switches.

The controller will do that. The switches should all be single position momentary pushbutton with a backlight LED.

Reply to
Heywood Jablome

"Heywood Jablome" wrote in news:426376b5$0$29867$ snipped-for-privacy@news.optusnet.com.au:

Since you already have an MCU in the equation, sounds like an ideal application for a QPROX chip.

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They work great ! M

Reply to
Mike Diack

Short of taking a trip to Akihabara you are possibly best off contacting Clipsal and asking to see a rep in your area. See if you can purchase the Cbus plates/buttons without the circuitry. They are in my opinion the best looking switches available in the world. The other suggestion I was going to make was the Quantum proximity chips that Mike has already suggested with etched or coloured glass. Design a PCB to sit behind it with the QT chips and blue and orange leds for indicators - just like Clipsal's. However, with so many buttons to a single plate, you may be switching the wrong circuit. As well, I have found by experience that the more switches per plate the more confusion for users. Seriously consider labelling. What about a short touch for on and a longer touch for off - instead of 1 button for each.

I would be interested to see what you end up using and what type of controllers you are using. Other oz manufacturers are Dynalite (the best and most flexible system around), HPM (I think they are still into it) and there is a crowd in your home town (Melb?) that is into home automation with their own gear but I can't remember their name.

Cheers.

Reply to
Chris

Wow, I have seen them on mini Ipods but had not considered them for this application. This looks really really cool. Especially for this application. Have you used the development board? The linear one looks like just the ticket. Hoping its not too pricey.

Reply to
Heywood Jablome

"Heywood Jablome" wrote in news:4264f3ed$0$5178$ snipped-for-privacy@news.optusnet.com.au:

I didn't use the dev board, the app notes go into the layout issues very well so I made a board that fitted my application (in the back of a Clipsal/PDL flushplate) and it just went, no problems. Braemac sell them in user friendly MOQs (1 tube) and they aren't too pricey (IIRC around $5 for the single buttons and $10 for the 6 button chips). You gotta be a wee bit careful with backlight LED switching glitches otherwise you can get into a tail chasing scenario, but they go into that in the appnotes. I have a sneaky suspicion that they really are mask PICs. M

Reply to
Mike Diack

Those chips look cool. Farnell have got a range (QT-150 in SMD and PDIP for $8.27) in stock.

I think I'll have a play with some of them... 8-)

Reply to
dmm

dmm wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@4ax.com:

They have HUGE play potential ! My last app involved a giant blue rubber jellyfish that screamed "OUCH!!!" when the (museum) punters touched the tentacles. M

Reply to
Mike Diack

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