h a l f b a k e r yThe leaning tower of Piezo
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It is often hard to find switches in the dark, especially in an unfamiliar building.
I'd like to be able to buy standard sized switch plates that include an electroluminescent bezel around each switch. This would be wired directly to the switch such that it was constantly powered (small EL panels
such as these consume very small amounts of power and so can be left on all the time). In the dark each switch would have an illuminated rectangle around it sufficient to allow one to see exactly where to find the switches.
I have found on the market single switch plates that are double-wide and include a large area of EL material to serve as a night light, but I would rather have one that indicates specifically the location of each switch.
The plastic encasing the EL panel could be impregnated with glow-in-the-dark powder to cause the switches to continue to glow when the power is out. This would provide a familiar beacon for navigation when the power goes out.
Glow-in-the-dark powder would not be sufficient for the basis of the device because even long-glow powders do not provide sufficient illumination after many hours of darkness (such as when finding switches in the morning, or for switches in constantly dark basements and stairwells).
1
http://www.liteaswitch.com/ [jhomrighaus, Apr 18 2007]
3
http://www.lkmfg.co...P/Hierarchy/01.html [jhomrighaus, Apr 18 2007]
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Google "illuminated light switches" for similar things. |
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I've run afoul of what's considered 'widely known' in the past, however this time, surely. |
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WIBNI no one had thought of this before. |
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My uncle had "illuminated light switch plates" only about 20 years ago. They were single size, and powered by the house, not photluminescent, so that part is well baked, and probably widely known to exist. |
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Admittedly, it was not the switch itself that glowed, nor was it an EL plate... |
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All the same, I think a change in idea title to qualify the type of illumination might be good. |
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