YuvalS's Hand Made Class, 7th Annual BLF/OL contest entry topic

Startin soldering, first I had to add 4 more AMCs to the 1.4A driver in order to allow maximum output of 1000 Lumens for each LED

Unfortunately it wasn't the tiniest thing I has to soldar, but first I cut the outer GND ring of the Nanjg 105C to allow easier and stronger soldering to the stars:


Finally I soldered 1806 resistor and LED to star3:


This is the first time I am soldering SMT parts by hand and it wasn't fun.
Next step is optics.....

Yessir. Those are difficult to work with. You have a certain amount of bravery to venture into that

Have to agree with Don here. Nice effort. :+1:

Busy weekend ahead, planing on finish the light
Just added the optics and soldered everything together

Glued the emitters (2*xm-l2 4200k on Copper MCPCB) to the heatsink with thermal paste:


Soldered all wires that cannot be reached after lenses are in place:



Carved the lenses (10 degrees tight Spot and 90 degrees Flood) holders, with a knife not to create dust inside the lenses:


Glued the lenses in place:


And FINALLY soldered everything together:

Sorry for posting a lot today but I had a lot of progress

I was working on the FW.
It is based on my original Caving light FW I already posted on this forum but I added some features and fix some minor bugs.
Main features are:

  1. Individual control over Spot and Flood LEDs
  2. Electronic lock off
  3. Step down timer to avoid overheating
  4. Low battery warning
  5. Battery check mode
  6. Very low emergency mode

The improved code can be found here

But before burning my FW to the light, I had to calibrate the voltage measurements, using my BattCheck FW, heavily based on ToyKeeper's Battcheck firmware (Thank you ToyKeeper)
You can download my FW here



Now I only have to mount it to the Helmet and test it in a cave

Love your work YuvalS. Good stuff. :beer:

Just did the final adjustments, some fixes and mount it to the helmet

First I had to sew the elastic band that hold the battery box to the back of the helmet (never thought that sewing can be part of building a light)


Then follow the advice of MtnDon, pinkpanda3310, DB Custom AND G0OSE, I used 3M double sided tape to glue the GoPro mount to the helmet


And now I can finally say that this build is completed (one week ahead of due date)!


I had this Idea of building a budget profesional caving lamp forever but always had something more urgent to do so this competition was exactly the encouragement I needed to complete this project.
I tried to document every step of the build as clear as I could and shared my FW in case other people are interested in building a similar lamp.
A rough estimation I did, shows that the parts cost me about 30 USD, not including aluminum pieces, Perspex, plastic, wires etc. which I disassembled from old stuff or had at home.

An equivalent commercial caving light costs more than 600 USD and the FW is less suitable to my needs so, in my opinion, it is really represents the BLF spirit.
If you have any comments or ideas please comment and don't hesitate to ask me any questions if you are interested in building a similar light.

I like the light. Great idea and work through.


THX MtnDon, couldn't do it without the support of guys from, BLF

A short video I made on my caving FW,
Sorry for my english , please note that the step-down timer is 36 seconds and not 36 minutes

Love it, well done you! :+1:
Oh, and how’d that 3m tape work out, is it still attached? i was thinking after it may be a bit heavy for that tape, and thought about using strong magnets………. or maybe a high quality mini cam mount with sucker/windscreen mount? (not an ebay $2 one)

Any cave shots with it? :slight_smile:

Well done :wink:

Thanks guys!


Not yet, tomorrow is planned a caving day, we are continue the world's longest salt cave survey



The tape is still holding but I didn't yet test it in a caving conditions, if it not hold i just replace it with screws as anybody else does.

Strong magnets are not an option because it will affect the compass for survey.
Also suction cups are not suitable since the helmet is not Smooth

Here are some beam shots, i drove to a remote location bus still some lights on the background and the moon:

Moon mode (3%):


Flood (90°) Low(6%):


Flood (90°) Medium(20%):


Flood (90°) High(40%):


Flood (90°) Highest(100%):


Spot (10°) Low(12%):


Spot (10°) High(100%):



That’s a cool looking headlamp YuvalS! I like that you can see all the wires and components. Kind of reminds me of The Terminator:

Orsm build YuvalS. I’ve enjoyed following you on your trip building this head torch. :beer:

Epic build!!!

Well done on completing your build :THUMBS-UP:

Great headlamp

Great headlamp