Ervin's try (2nd. Annual BLF Scratch Made Light Contest) update 6/23/2014 finally beam shots of my new thrower

And therein you have discovered the nature of the scratch built beast.

Last year I made a light from a .50 BMG live round. It was a big success and I could barely believe I did it!

This year I’m having to step up the game, and am not sure I’m up to it. :slight_smile:

Ervin, last year, I picked up some heavy copper washers from a friendly, local plumbing supply house for under a $1 ea. These were not the skinny crush-able type used for auto oil pans and the like. The washers were normal sized, like in your bolted assembly pic, and were meant for a Jacuzzi brand spa pump fitting. Just an idea that could help out?, or not.

This is going to be cool :slight_smile:

nickelflipper thanks

thank you i hope, for now its just a black hole for my free time :~
by the way nice work u are making too, will post later

firs post updated.

I hope you weren't in to much trouble and dinner was ready when you got home. Its good to see you get the soldering done and the light lit up. For some reason I only seem to make them smoke.

still alive :bigsmile:
its my living profession right now to solder, and IT, and this kind of stuff so its not just luck that i haven’t smoked something just jet. in other side of the coin I would love to have the ability you have(and I lack) to work and bring to live beautiful metallic stuff like you do …. :beer:

first post updated, driver homework, still some things to do and post and than will be complete for the driver section on my build.

Gob smacked. Lost for words.

Looks very cool, good work! :slight_smile:

thank you dave_

sort of BUMP :stuck_out_tongue:
first post updated driver finally is over, hope to not have bothered anyone, next step design, head construction, metal, metal, metal ………… :stuck_out_tongue:

Hey Ervin, I’m also in the contest and I haven’t started yet, but I figure why not help out the competition in the spirit of BLF karma?

When you’re soldering 7135 chips together, try taking a TINY bit of superglue and bonding the stack together ahead of time. Saves a ton of frustration. Also some good tweezers like you can get from mountainelectronics.com

One more thing, if you very carefully bend the three pins on the chip down ahead of time on all but the bottom chip in the stack it’s way easier to get the solder to jump from pin to pin.

Good luck!

This is a really interesting thread Ervin. Just two tips you may not have dug up from the volumes of DIY posting that goes on here. One member, I think maybe Djozz but can’t remember and couldn’t find the post if I did, suggested this method and I used it successfully on a recent mod. Epoxy the chips together with hi temp epoxy(JB weld works) and weave fine wire around/between the pins.

The second tip is to use the dip switches to control the gate pins only and use a second high power switch for main power. This idea for the amc 7135 has been around for awhile but if you are new to using them you may not have seen it.

Hey Ervin, if you want to bend metal look up annealing.

onetrickpony,Rufusbduck thank you both, super advices. I guess this are the type of benefits on an very friendly and with a lot of talented and experienced members around.
thanks to both of you it looks like driver going in a revision…

design in second post, started to update.

This is one seriously cool project black hole time sucking project(I like that) :slight_smile: I’m enjoying your imagination both on paper, in copper, and on the keyboard. Just don’t lose your job over it.

As RBD said. I'm glad the soldering worked out for you in the end.

I really like your concept drawings. The light is starting to take shape nicely!

…Poor desk…

Ervin Anastasi, I like your designs very much. Like Steampunk but more workable for everyday use. Literally brilliant.

Brilliant, though I have no idea really (out of my depth) I thoroughly enjoyed reading so far.

That’s Ervin! Always thinking outside of the box with another very original and neat idea. I look forward to seeing more.

thank you all for the support :slight_smile: , the work is going on, updates sec. post in design section:
cooper,cooper ……. …cooper …… :stuck_out_tongue: