“Goal
There are stairs up to where I live and during the winter and at night they can be treacherous. I wanted an easy method to illuminate the stairsimagine your hands are full of grocerieswhile also not having to go back and turn them off.
Overview
Basically I ran an LED strip down the railing of my stairs. At one end, you walk past an Obstacle Avoidance Sensor (you need to be within <5 inches) which an Arduino Nano listens for and triggers a Relay to turn on the LEDs for 30 seconds. All housed within a coffee container for “decent” weatherproofing. That’s it! More details below…”