CNCman's entry to the 8th annual BLF/O-L contest [ Handmade - FINISHED - ]

Hi everyone :slight_smile:
Welcome to the Old Lumens Flashlight Challenge 2020 here at BLF. :slight_smile:
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I will attempt to build a handmade flashlight, it will be called the “SKELETON”. :smiling_imp:
The intent is to make it transparent, hence the name.
The entire body will be made with clear plexiglass sheet with a little blue plexiglass mixed.
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Hopefully together we will be successful because this will be a challenge. :smiley:
Good Luck to all entries, it is a Honor to be here with you.
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It will be an Actively Cooled light using 2 x Efest 21700 3700mAh 30A Batteries, 1 x XHP70.2 led,
86.2mm(D) x 84.7mm(H) reflector, 20mm - FET Driver, 20mm Forward clicky switch with
Spring and PCB, Brushless DC Cooling Fan 40x40x20mm, Mini360 3A DC Voltage Step Down Buck drive,
Clear acrylic plexiglass Sheet 0.125” Thick, and possibly a specialty lens or AR coated glass lens
( it will depend if I can modify one of 3 lenses donated from a projection TV ).
( edited again 11/14/2020 )

:slight_smile: Good to see you participate.

Good to see you enter again CNCman. Looking forward to it :slight_smile:

Just getting started on this years competition. I decided to start with the battery tube and build aft to the tail cap.
This build will be done on the fly because of all the unknowns. So things will and already have been altered from the original design.
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So here are the original parts in line and it was necessary to down grade the batteries to 18650 from 21700 in fear the driver would not survive the amp load. Also a 32mm mpcb will be used to allow fitting the reflector better.
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Here was the first unknown problem, heating and rolling the battery tube. I used heat resistant barbecue gloves and aluminum tubing to heat and roll it into shape. It took several adjustments carefully heating rolling, bending and stress relieving it.

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Guessed at cutting the length and filed it square.

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Cutting a .060 slot the full length for a copper strip to set. This will provide the connection from the negative battery side fwd to the driver.

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Here is the semi-finished battery tube.

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I will start the tail cap next, it will be tricky building it. :beer:
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:+1: :slight_smile:

Nice start! :sunglasses: :+1:

Looking forward to see this build :wink:

I know what you’re up to here - I can see straight through it! lol

Nice start CNCman. I can clearly see what your doing.

Great to see you’ve started up, CNCman! Lookin’ good so far. That reflector looks huge.

Cool idea ! :+1:

Thanks guys :smiley:
It’s fun to be competing with you all. :beer:

This looks like a fun build in progress. i never knew it was possible to do all the things that you can do bending plastic—you’re like a sheet metal guy bending steel, except it’s sheet plastic. i’m going to school on this one :student:

Here is the electrical connection in the battery tube.
I had cut off a strip from a sheet of copper with snips and straightened it in a vice.
After filing one side square, I used calipers to layout a line to file the second side too. 1 hour filing this side.

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Rolling, bending, flattening in a vice, repeat several times and it is roughed in.

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Fitting it up, but not glued in place.

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Just doing one end for now until tail cap is roughed in.
Kinda strange not working to a drawing, just doing it as it needs it. Any suggestions are welcome :wink:

Very nicely done! Bravo!

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Trial and error mostly, learn as you go and scrap a few parts along the way. LOL
One thing to know is after heating it and you are molding it to something, the plastic will cool quickly, if you keep trying to bend it too much, it creates stress cracks or will crack after it cools. Also it has to be held in place at its plastic state ( Hot ) until it cools enough to keep the shape desired, good gloves are needed. The battery tube is one of the easier parts, the Head is where the fun begins, doing a cone. Also I learned on the battery tube, you loose .1 length per 1.0 length rolling. I calculated a .800 inside diameter X Pie 3.14 to get 2.5 inches length to cut for the roll. It finished .25 short. So I had to do it again with a 2.75 and it rolled good. I did not foresee that much shrinkage. :beer:

I, too, have never acrylic formed like that. Pretty cool! I can’t wait to see the end result.

Nice. :beer:

This looks so good! Why not run Aux LED’s through the “skeleton” too?

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I could not find any lighted switches in stock, but that is a good idea :+1: