Please stop guessing what the costs will be of particular components, you are probably wrong and it will influence the design process in a wrong way, namely not the best lantern is designed but a lantern that according to some BLF members’ wild guesses is cheap.
In the Q8 design process we tried to avoid thinking for the manufacturer as much as possible, and the end result had features that early in the process we thought we would never achieve, and we still got it for the original price goal.
As for using the Q8 board design, having a dedicated board designed for the lantern makes a lot of sense and will probably have no influence whatsoever on the costs, making DTP led boards costs very little money nowadays.
UPDATES Cross section of the BLF V2 lantern added. Further field testing going great! photos coming soon. also will have more detailed specifications for the lantern to provide to Barry & Thorfire soon. All we may need is to find someone to draft up a CAD of the lantern in the cross-section drawing below if Barry needs a more detailed version for Thorfire to work on.
What if the “shade” was a cylinder rather than a cup?
The top surface of the “aluminum threaded shelf/base” could be left un-anodized to help reflect light.
This would save a bit of polycarbonate and eliminate the paint, but I’m not sure how it would affect the lantern’s strength or otherwise change its construction. Just a thought.
I like the idea of amber switch LEDs rather than green ones like the Q8.
Looking forward to the new photos. Hope you had a great trip!
Nice to see some progress! But what happend with the tint ramping option we discussed earlier? As far as I understood it, we would need at least 6 LEDs (and a new LED board) to make that work.
Also I thought that our priority is to create the “ultimate Latern”, not the cheapest.
And please add me for a second one.
Is it intended that the lantern is water resistant? The schematic shows an o-ring at the base of the diffuser, but nothing at the top or around the center screw
The cup shape makes it much stronger than just a cylinder type shade. i did test that shint base reflector idea originally, and the flat-white surface increases light reflection and reduces the hard-light glare and bad light distribution flaws of most factory lanterns i tested & used. (shiny or chromed reflectors cause to much glare & artifacts.
The cross section can;t really show it, but the shade would definitely need either one or two index locking notches at the head area to lock it from turning. (Same goes for the base)