Update! Heatsink/spacer from coins? How to make a spacer for s2+?(updated with pictures!)

I might make some new ones to get a better solder connection between the coins later or cut some 2mm plate and stack it bit for now I'll try it out! Each led won't get that much current anyway, so should be safe?

Are you running them in direct drive? Just think how hot a standard s2+ gets with 1 led at 3amps. It’s safe but I wouldn’t give it to just any one to use lol.
I wonder if you can forge the coins?

Forge? you mean in fire like a blacksmith? I used a small iroda butane torch heated up in vise and soldered on top and sandwich them together so excess tin came out! I use the blf a6 driver!

Oh I see! I basically did some forging today then haha, when I melted solder into the pill and smoothed it, you can actually forge some stuff with tin right?

I did it. Just for fun and without pretension to perfection - I did not even sand the surfaces of the coins.

The first pics in the thread. :)

I used 10 euro cent.

But it works very well - now in a S2+ Triple with Osram Oslon Square CQAR.CC 96 CRI (3500 K), Carclo 10509 and 1500 lumens. :)

After 30 sec. the temperature on the head is too high to touch it which means a efficient heat dissipation. This idea is not bad and an alternative if no lathe or spacer available.

sweet! looks similar to my spacer I'll put up some pics! However mine is not that even lol! I didn't even think about adding a smaller coin to fit into the pill, I just filled the recessed top part of the pill with solder and sanded it smooth!

10 cent euro coins: nordic gold mix, 89% copper, 5% alu, 5% zink, 1% tin

Soldered together with torch, cleaned with acetone first!

Drilled hole and sanded smooth

Drilling pills:

Filling top recessed part of pill with solder!

Sanded pill

Filled again!

Pill Sanded smooth!

Spacer sanded smooth!

Finished!

Stacking 3 coins and sanded to 5,5mm works best for me nice and tight lol!

Going to update with light finished soon!

This was very fun but time consuming lol! I might make some new spacers and sand in between them before soldering first!

Or I might cut out 20mm spacers from 2mm copper plate that I have with a hole saw and stack them together!

For now I'll try this! Stay tuned! Yeah yeah pics are late blah blah blah haha! Had some pc issues lol!

you beat me to it haha!

So the fact that I didn't sand between the coins is now bugging me should I redo them sanded between before soldering?

You can’t even buy that much copper for that price of the coin lol.
It looks fine to me.
Yea you where some what forging the coins you could probably melt them down and pour them into a mould that is already the right size. But that’s just overkill.

you guys rock, these are really nice spacers!
good craftsmanship

what do you think about the filled pill? Just an idea I had

thank you! koef3 did a better job than me, bit I'm happy with mine too, should be fine lol!

It is a good idea, but there are basically 3 approaches

  1. fill pill with solder and sand flat
  2. put smaller coin at the bottom (16mm) so spacer can sit inside pill
  3. sand down entire pill and make it flat (approx 20mm), no need to fill or use smaller coins at the bottom

Either of them should work.

I wonder, what is the reason using spacer with 1 led config?
Bottleneck of S2+ is brass pill. To see reasonable difference between copper and brass you should have some more conductive material under. For example, S3 with integrated shelf.

I built a mule and needed a very large spacer for that, hence the 1 LED setup.
You are right, the difference will be more obvious with more material and multi-emitter setups. I forgot to measure the triples I had, unfortunately.

I put your excellent copper spacer in a triple but I didn’t compare with a coin spacer. At some point I ran out of time building spacers and all my EUR coins are also used up :smiley:

Another advantage is that kirubas copper spacers can be polished easily, my coins always looked like a mess. Not as nice as what this thread has produced!

I wonder how my aluminum spacers will far heat wise.

Try brass plugs for PEX pipes as shown in this thread.Convenient budget spacer for Triple EDC found… @ Lowe’s!

They don’t cost too much more than stacks of coin, packs of 10 on Amazon US are $13.49, and is cheaper if you buy more at a time.
Amazon PEX Plug

Just make a new spacer for a 'special' project - of course with the proven euro coins.

62 grams of pure nordic gold 50 and 10 cent coins...

In daylight (MCPCB side shown) it looks even more beautiful, as decorated with 'gold and silver':

Very nice work! This is a slightly larger spacer, keen to see the special project soon!