Over the previous weeks the light tower team has been putting together designs for our persistence of vision design. This prototype design is rather simple, yet we hope to have a well done display by the end of this. Early in the design process the team was struggling to find components such as a motor, slip ring, and mounting set up for our purpose, however that has changed.

The team has been able to borrow from within the department, a easily programmable servo motor perfect for our application, that in early testing has proven as such. With a close deadline, we have resorted to using 3D printing to solve our mounting issues and for our spinning members. We chose to use high density LED light strips as opposed to soldering our own board of LEDs, and are close to having our code ready for a full assembly test.

In other news, our community partner, San Jose Light Tower Corporation, has recently received site approval from San Jose city council. Through a site survey conducted by an outside company, they determined that Arena Green next to the SAP Arena was an ideal location. Approval last week was two-fold, approving both Arena Green as the site for future development and that they may go forward with a world wide ideas competition. This competition will be the means to find a concept and design of the tower, this team will be submitting into the ideas competition once it is opened.