LED help

[dustdragon]

i have been watching alot of the eevblog videos on youtube and dicided this was the best place to ask

i am just starting out with electronics but i know some basics

i want to make something with a bunch of LED's like a display

but as i live in the uk i have to pay VAT on each LED i buy and i got alot from maplins for just over 1£ a LED

i don't have 50£ to spend on a bunch of LED's so was wundering if some one has an idear were i can find some cheap

[Stonent]

i have been watching alot of the eevblog videos on youtube and dicided this was the best place to ask

i am just starting out with electronics but i know some basics

i want to make something with a bunch of LED's like a display

but as i live in the uk i have to pay VAT on each LED i buy and i got alot from maplins for just over 1£ a LED

i don't have 50£ to spend on a bunch of LED's so was wundering if some one has an idear were i can find some cheap

I believe there's a term that people from the UK use called "shops"? 

In the US we have Radio Shack, called Tandy in other parts of the world. Maybe find a place that repairs TVs and ask the manager if there's a local place that sells small parts.

There's a place about 30 minutes drive from where I live in North Texas, that has fairly inexpensive parts. LEDs for a few cents each. Only 8.5% local tax, yay!

Mike from Mikeselectricstuff has all sorts of parts and cool gadgets related to lighting and displays that he uses in his business of building cool artistic light displays so I'm sure he figured out a way to not pay a pound per LED. Try Ebay as well, if you buy locally you can maybe avoid all those evil taxes.

Tayda Electronics is out of Thailand (I think)and they're fairly cheap and reputable. You could almost get a pound (weight) of LEDs for a pound (sterling)

[dustdragon]

Evil taxes is an under statement lol

i have looked around at local shops but seems more expensive if you get them in a shop or it may just be my local shops trying to make a huge profit 

the last time i got some from e-bay 70 LED for 25£ about half of them were dead  i have had really bad luck with stuff from ebay and would love to avoid it

[Jon86]

Bitsbox.co.uk 
Couple of quid for postage, and very reasonable prices. I really wish I lived somewhere with more shops, buying every little damn component online is a pain in the ass.

[Stonent]

Evil taxes is an under statement lol

i have looked around at local shops but seems more expensive if you get them in a shop or it may just be my local shops trying to make a huge profit 

the last time i got some from e-bay 70 LED for 25£ about half of them were dead  i have had really bad luck with stuff from ebay and would love to avoid it

Fortunately sales tax in the US is just state/county/city regulated. So if I live in Texas and ship parts from Oklahoma (nearest state to where I live) I don't pay tax to either place.

Some political folks have discussed the idea of eliminating the income tax and replacing it with a national sales tax. I haven't decided really what I think about that yet.

[notsob]

Here is an example of a hobby supplier, have a look at the 100 LED value pack. You will be responsible for  import duties in your country AND Futurlec are slow shippers, allow 8-10 weeks. I think they ship from Thailand or Malasia.

http://futurlec.com/Components.shtml

[grumpydoc]

but as i live in the uk i have to pay VAT on each LED i buy and i got alot from maplins for just over 1£ a LED

With only a few exceptions Maplin is not a great place to buy components. If you have a credit card then you can register for an account with Farnell - they do have a £20 minimum order value (exclusive of VAT so that's £24 inclusive but no postage on top) but that's not too bad if you batch things. Mouser have no minimum order but do have £12 postage on orders less than £55.

Farnell stock standard LEDS from a few pence each.

Also try http://www.surplectronics.com/, http://www.greenweld.co.uk/, http://www.rapidonline.com, http://www.bitsbox.co.uk/, http://www.esr.co.uk or probably any one of a dozen others you can find by Googling.

Also, in the UK, Radio Rallies are useful but you do tend to need transport to get to them.

[IanB]

I believe there's a term that people from the UK use called "shops"? 

In the US we have Radio Shack, called Tandy in other parts of the world. Maybe find a place that repairs TVs and ask the manager if there's a local place that sells small parts.

Maplin in the UK is very similar to Radio Shack in the US. Lots of fancy electronic consumer goods, a limited range of basic electronic components, and premium prices for parts that they do stock.

I think the best way to get lots of LEDs at a reasonable price is to find a "jumbo pack" from somewhere like an ebay seller.

[mariush]

Farnell has all kinds of leds, the more you buy, the cheaper they get. You may have to order a minimum amount (20 pounds or something like that) but they're cheap :

http://uk.farnell.com/leds-standard-under-75ma
http://uk.farnell.com/leds-standard-multicolor-under-75ma
http://uk.farnell.com/leds-standard-white-under-75ma

(and there's other categories of leds in the parent category (optoelectronics and displays)

There's also RS-Online which has leds : http://uk.rs-online.com/web/c/displays-optoelectronics/leds-led-accessories/visible-leds/

If you can wait a few weeks to get a package from China or thereabouts, there's plenty of eBay sellers that are willing to sell you bags of 100 / 250 / 500 leds for as low as a few dollars.  I bought 100 RGB leds for about 10-15$, I forget now exactly how much

For a hobby, to mess around, they're fine. They light up, fine but you don't have a guarantee that they all have the same brightness, same color hue (in a bag of red leds one may be more orange-ish, other may be more violet..)  leds sold as stores like Farnell are usually checked at factory and the ones not within some parameters are thrown away so these extra checks add to the cost.

[dennisyuki]

What about slavaging from LED Christmas lights.    Stores are already starting to put the lights out on the shelves for the CHristmas season in the US.

[G7PSK]

Try these people on E bay. I have had LED's from them in the past and not had any dud's. Under £4-00 a 100.

 http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/3mm-5mm-LED-LEDs-Red-Green-Blue-White-Yellow-Orange-Warm-White-RGB-Slow-Fast-UK-/200921123666?pt=UK_BOI_Electrical_Components_Supplies_ET&var=&hash=item2ec7d50b52

[nmmbeginer]

i get all my leds on ebay from china.

[Quick5pnt0]

Radio shack is great if you need something quick and don't mind paying out of your rear but ebay has the cheapest LEDs I've seen. The only problem is that it can take as long as a month for them to ship from China.

[Kryoclasm]

the last time i got some from e-bay 70 LED for 25£ about half of them were dead  i have had really bad luck with stuff from ebay and would love to avoid it

Not trying to be a jerk, but did you make sure they were connected in the right polarity?

That 50% number is the only reason I ask.

[staxquad]

Evil taxes is an under statement lol

i have looked around at local shops but seems more expensive if you get them in a shop or it may just be my local shops trying to make a huge profit 

the last time i got some from e-bay 70 LED for 25£ about half of them were dead  i have had really bad luck with stuff from ebay and would love to avoid it

Fortunately sales tax in the US is just state/county/city regulated. So if I live in Texas and ship parts from Oklahoma (nearest state to where I live) I don't pay tax to either place.

Some political folks have discussed the idea of eliminating the income tax and replacing it with a national sales tax. I haven't decided really what I think about that yet.

Great idea when your income is really high and your purchases are really low as a percentage of your income, so the difference, being  savings, deposited into banks and used as investments doesn't get taxed; if you're a billionaire, fantastic.    Poorer people would use up all their income that year to survive, save very little to nil, so all their income would effectively be taxed, compared to less and less the richer you are,  translating to a shifting of the tax burden onto the middle class/poor.  The filthy rich always have filthy devious ways to not pay their fair share. 

[xrunner]

Try these people on E bay. I have had LED's from them in the past and not had any dud's. Under £4-00 a 100.

Ya, I would say go to Ebay. I'm not even going to look and I bet you can get more LEDs than you can use in your life for super-cheap. Especially from China and Hong Kong. I order parts from Hong Kong and they are REALLY cheap. If you can wait 1 1/2 weeks or so order from China and save Big Bucks.

[zapta]

Great idea when your income is really high and your purchases are really low as a percentage of your income, so the difference, being  savings, deposited into banks and used as investments doesn't get taxed; if you're a billionaire, fantastic.    Poorer people would use up all their income that year to survive, save very little to nil, so all their income would effectively be taxed, compared to less and less the richer you are,  translating to a shifting of the tax burden onto the middle class/poor.  The filthy rich always have filthy devious ways to not pay their fair share.

If a billionaire consumes like a pauper, is he really a billionaire?  ;-)

OP, think also about the rest of your circuit. You may need other parts like resistors, transistors, etc.

[rolycat]

Another UK supplier worth considering is CPC. They are part of the Farnell group and often sell the same items at lower prices. Their big advantage for hobbyists is that there is no minimum order value and carriage is free. For example, you can buy 100 red LEDs for £3.60 with no extra costs:

http://cpc.farnell.com/jsp/search/productdetail.jsp?sku=SC09448

They stock a limited range compared with RS and Farnell but usually deliver within a day or two, so if you don't want to wait for Chinese eBay vendors and want some guarantee of quality they are a good option.

[grumpydoc]

Another UK supplier worth considering is CPC. They are part of the Farnell group and often sell the same items at lower prices. Their big advantage for hobbyists is that there is no minimum order value and carriage is free.

Yes, although watch out for the "handling charge" which they sometimes put on orders less than £45, although I note the T's&C's state "These Small Order Handling Charges won't apply to any Online Orders which are despatched to UK addresses and where delivery is to either (a) the main account holders registered address; or (b) the Customer's standard account delivery addresses. " which means they might have changed recently or else I need to complain about having been charged it on past orders.

Another thing to watch out for is that CPC have frequent special offers on thing which you won't get just by searching the online catalogue - once you've bought stuff you start to get catalogues through which have subtly different CPC part numbers which are cheaper.