4th Annual BLF/OL Scratch Made Light Contest- Hand Made 10/31 finished

Sawing by hand is hard enough, I hate to think of doing it “wrong” handed. :frowning:

You have me pondering my scrap box of brass and copper again. :smiley:

Looking good
Your dog would be at home with my mob

I’m following real closely RBD. Amazing work. I understand whats going on as much as I understand LTP post were spell check has worked its charm. :+1:

Enjoying EVERY image! The hours are adding up Rufus!!! Tons of skill and patience! :beer: :beer: :beer:

Thanks for sharing. TL

I’ll agree about the hours adding up anyway.

Not much to show but did successfully tap the threads in the replacement tube. Also did some grinding on the brass collar. Since these pics I’ve done more filing and sanding on the tube and still need to do a lot more to the collar. The tube walls were originally 1 mm thick and now are .8 mm at the non threaded end tapering back to full thickness at the threaded end and I’ll remove a bit more yet, maybe to .6-.7mm to lighten it further.

Collar and tube

If you want to lighten it more without the effort couldn’t you just use a brighter light source? :person_facepalming:
Sorry. That is certainly thin walled. What is the brass collar being used for? something in the head I gather.

:person_facepalming: Exactly! :stuck_out_tongue: Aussies, Aussies Aussies. TL

That took a whopping tap didn’t it?? The Brass looks super clean! Can’t wait to see this beauty when it’s fully cooked!!

TL

I’m using a 20 x 1 mm tap. It’s too big for any tap wrench I have so I’m using a 10” crescent. I soldered the tube into a big ol’ brass nut so it could put it in the vise and used a combination of plastic tubes as a centering jig for the tap(the same ones used for the copper head core). Then desoldered it and started filing and sanding. I’m using the collar the same way you are Steve, to capture the wood at one end after I’ve brazed a stop collar to the tail end. I can’t braze one on the head end too or my nice wood will go up in smoke. There’s another short tube that fits into this one(at least it will when I’ve had my say) and that one has the 20 mm brass pill brazed to it that the collar threads onto. If you remember the first tube attempt had threads at both ends but that requiered reinforcement/thickening sleeves at both ends and I’d have to allow for the sleeves when reaming the wood tube. Since I need the short, inner tube to house the switch module anyway I decided to eliminate the internal threading and external collar. This will get rid of the void between the collars, allow me to pare down the tube, and subsequently reduce the overall thickness of the wood tube as well. If you follow all that I should fly you here so you can finish it for me.

One of my design guidelines is that whenever I use a manufactured part I don’t want it to look like what it was, especially if it shows like the bezel or this stop collar and had I left it six sided as it was it would have been both much heavier and too reminiscent of an L2.

The “big ol’ brass nut” is the other cap nut of the 3/4” compression fitting I’ve been using for some other parts, namely the bezel, bezel threads, and stop collar. Compared to their original forms and sizes witness protection should be so good. Most of the rest of the host is tube and sheet stock cut, rolled, thickened or thinned, and threaded, mostly by hand even though the drill press figures prominently. A good deal of time is spent staring at a pile of stuff trying to figure out how to put it together. The picture I drew early on is a guide to bounce ideas from and a visual aid but like Goose, it can’t talk to me. When I figure a section out I do as much with it as I can before I run out of gas or need to stop to allow some other section to catch up. Atm, the areas still a bit soft are the switch module and tail cap, I think most everything else is solid.

Rufus, When I get out your way, I want a lesson in HOW to keep a tap threading straight with a 10” crescent. :exclamation: If I tried that, there is no telling how the threads would come out but you can bet they wouldn’t look like yours!!

We have been adding some carbon fiber to a light or two here and I was glad to see how you & MRsDNF cover the ends on your wood pieces. That makes a nice look the way you did that.

Nice work… to say the very least. I sure have been enjoying these builds. :+1: THANK YOU!!! TL

What can I say? I cheat. :wink: It’s the guide tube surrounding both the brass and the tap that keeps it in line. .

Your Crescent. Is left or right handed ones better for alignment?

I use it both ways to counteract the pull of ineptitude.

:laughing:

Got some more done this evening. Here is the p60 pill fluxed and wired into a short section of tubing Then I spent some time. On the collar. I need to sand the O-ring side to 1.5mm from the O-ring seat. I used a washer as a guide. And ground it down close. And sanded it. The washer had tape on the other side as a shim. And I removed that and sanded it some more until I just began to sand the washer. After that I flipped it over, ground and sanded it down to even thickness at about 3.2 mm. Then I reamed the battery tube to fit the switch pill. It’s a snug press fit at this point. Here’s how it fits between the head and the tube. I also reamed the wood tube and sanded it some more. It’s ~26.2 mm now but with a wall thickness of 3 mm I think I can go down to 2.5 mm or less.
Cutting the tube

That is looking real sweet. I’ll swap you timber any day. :slight_smile:
Maybe you should think about having a name change to sandy? :stuck_out_tongue:

Haven’t had the time to go through any of the build threads for awhile. Wow, really shaping up to be a gorgeous light. Lots of creativity, problem solving, and fine machining going on here. Hope I can braze like you someday.

Looking very nice!