Bucket's 2nd Annual Scratch Made Flashlight Finished and Named!

After a little prodding, I've decided to enter the contest. I had a little trouble coming up with an idea, but have kinda sorta settled on one. I don't have much of anything hashed out yet, but I have the general idea.

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06/21/14 "Project Complete Summary"

This light was a lot of work. I made everything except the lens (UCLp from flashlightlens.com), switch (Tofty), driver (BLF17FET) and batteries (Kong).

-I started out by spinning the reflector from a flat piece of aluminum on a stainless steel mandrel that I also made. I spent countless hours wrestling with this until I got it.The rest of this light was built around the reflector which is 2 inches in diameter and 2-1/2 inches long.

-The head, bezel, body and tail cap were somewhat routine machining. But they were time consuming. The pill, being copper was the most time consuming and challenging. It's 3 inches long. Half an inch is threaded for the head. One inch is threaded for the body. The fins are on the exposed 1-1/2 inch portion. Cutting the fins is always stressful since regular copper machines poorly. When I run out of the copper that I have, I will be using Chromium copper from here on out. It machines better and oxidizes less.

-I am calling my DIY anodized finish a success. I was going for Olive Drab Green, but it took color so fast that it ended up black. It looks good. This light was the most that I have anodized all at once and I was nervous. But it turned out well and I am happy with the result.

-I even made my own o-rings this time. I bought 1/8" material from McMaster Carr and glued my own together. It is so easy I will never buy another pre-made o-ring again.

I apologize for the helter skelter way this post turned out. I did a poor job of planning it out and added things kind of willy-nilly. The videos and pictures are mostly in order though.

Also, a big THANK YOU to all that encourage me along. Feedback is important and I might have stalled out if I didn't have any.

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06/21/14 again.

Ledsmoke commented that it reminded him of stealth bombers. I liked the idea so "Bomber" it is.

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Editing as I go...

Reflector thread

I decided to clean this post up a bit and add video and pics of current state of the build.

Spinning my reflector.

A chunk of scrap to begin...

Bored and reflector pocket cut. OD turned for bezel threads.

Bezel threads cut.

Flipped around and angle cut on head. Pill thread pocket cut.

Pill threads cut and bezel installed...sorry no shots of bezel in progress.

Making the Head Part #1

Link for RBD

RBD Link

The pill :) 1.495 inches in diameter at the fins. 1.500 inches long exposed to the air. 3.000 inches of total length.

Pill

More machining on the pill.

Head and pill together

Ano is done. Not quite what I wanted, but not bad.

It's not exactly OD Green, but I'll take it.

Tail cap coming up next.

The host is (mostly) done. HD2010 with Bucket Pill for comparison.

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Edit 06/21/14

Finished!!!

The pill with MT-G2 installed. Total length is 3". The skinnier end is threaded to go inside the body and is 1" long to facilitate heat transfer to the body to help dissipate heat. Wires are 18ga.

You can see the threads a little better here.

Driver end: You can see the BLF17 FET driver there with an extra spring. I soldered most of it's length to the other spring. I just wanted more spring pressure on the batteries.

-Also notice the little copper tab coming out and being held by a screw. That is an actual chip from machining the grooves in the pill. It's soldered to the ground pad on the driver. This light should never have ground issues.

Wired up and running. Only 6 amps on turbo.

Everything laid out. Notice the O-rings. If you look closely enough, you may be able to see where I glued them together. I didn't take the head apart because I didn't want to handle the lens any more than I absolutely need to.

Just another perspective of the parts. I wish I had taken another picture of the inside of the tail cap. That's a Tofty switch in there. The ring holding it is made of copper.

All together and looking good.

From the tail end. Looks like I could have cleaned up better.

Tail Stand:)

Notice the green visible where I buffed through the ano a little too far on the front of the bezel. I actually thought about doing that to all of the raised edges to give it a two tone look, but I decided that I had worked on this thing enough.

Testing and Assembly

Results from Dale. My test equipment is seriously lacking.

Better Pics

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End Edit

I have always liked using these lights despite their dismal output. They are great work lights when putzing around under the hood of a car or any other machinery. I guess that I favor holding it vertically instead of horizontally. They are versatile when tail standing. I was looking for something unique and I think this fits the bill.

I am open to suggestions regarding most of the design. In fact, I welcome suggestions. Right now, I am debating on the size though I'm inclined to keep it the same general size as the original. The switch on these was pretty junky, so that will be something to work out. Batteries will probably be two 18650's in parallel. The million dollar questions are which LED(s) and driver. Finish will most likely be HAIII gray since I can't seem to make HAIII take color very well. If I do end up coloring it, I'll have to go with Type II ano instead of HAIII.

Fire away!

MTG-2 led driven at 3 amps with this reflector.

http://www.fasttech.com/products/0/10000503/1051800-sst-50-smooth-aluminum-reflector

I have two of them but cant tell you what the beam profile is like. Good luck.

Great!, just hold off the actual work in progress till after April 1st please. That is when the contest starts.

It would balance better with two heads, one throw, one mule. Dt slide switch.

Rule # 1 “Must be made from scratch. Cannot use a pre-existing light.”
So if you’re gonna make a light from scratch to look like that one, fantastic! Couple of toilet paper cardboard tubes with epoxy on em and we’re good to go! Uh, no pun intended…

That's a pretty shallow reflector. I imagine it would be pretty floody with an MT-G2. Not that that is a bad thing, but I need to decide what kind of beam that I want from this.

Darnit! I thought I could replace the bulb with an LED and be done!

Sorry, I did read your entire post but haven’t had enough coffee yet this morning to comprehend it. My bad.

I figured you were busting my stones.

You gonna make it swivel?

Yes! And put in a small motor and make it rotate like a firehouse

And blink in different colors.

I was just looking for cappuccino, they all want it complicated.

No, thought I thought about swivel...

Damnit I'm thinking about swivel again. I don't know. Maybe. It really complicates the light though.

Seriously Bucket, you should not be listening to a crazed mob of lunatics telling you what to do when all they are doing is making life difficult for you. Just do your own thing and be happy. Thats what it should be all about. Now, swivel head with hydraulic extension and spiral twist. this should be right up your alley. How about it?

He asked and me being of a kind and generous nature can hardly deny such a plea. Now should that spiral twist incorporate a zoomie?

This one will certainly be very, very interesting!!

I have decided to re-visit my DIY Reflector attempts. This may, by itself be the majority of the project for me. It also might just doom the project altogether, but I have searched without success for a good reflector for the MT-G2 and my search has been in vain.

I decided to attempt "spinning" a reflector out of sheet aluminum. I will document the abundant failures and any success that I might have below.

Can’t wait, dragging up a chair…need me to run the camera?

I have given this build some more though and have decided against the original right angle flashlight in favor of a traditional torch design. Dale convinced me to buy a reflector from Aliexpress which I will be using as a back up to my efforts in making my own. That way, I will at least have a light when this is over.

So far I have decided on the following:

  1. Led will be an MT-G2 on Noctigon
  2. The flashlight head and pill will be one piece which will be designed around whatever reflector I end up using.
    1. This will likely be anodized aluminum with copper pill press fit inside and machined to proper height.
    2. The copper may extend past the bottom of the head.
    3. It will be heavily finned.

Basically, I have not decided on much. I have to decide on:

  1. Battery size and configuration
  2. Driver
  3. Switch