The trits are 6mm x 1.5mm and I only have 2mm or 0.9mm drill bits, (the thought only just occurred to me) so I used the .9mm bits to drill a series of vertical holes in wobbly lines , then kinda drilled in from the sides of the holes at an angle moving the drill bits around to break the holes into one another then a diamond cone shaped dremmel bit to enlarge the slots so I could get the small rectangle diamond file in there, still needs tidied up & nothing is fixed in place.
Very excited though, first light I’ve made with titanium
With all the awesome things you’ve made over the years I’m surprised you haven’t played with titanium yet. This first dabble with it is looking very nice already.
Yeah, especially when the chuck is too big to even hold the bits...
So a little tip for this is I cut three pieces of 2.5mm copper wire and use them to brace the 0.9mm bit centre in the drill chuck.
Can be a bit fidgety to get them in place but it works ;)
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Some more work on the casings today.
Cut, shaped & slotted a 3.5mm machine screw to make a grub screw for fixing the copper pill in place.
Drilled & tapped a 3.5mm hole through the inner cores into to the copper pill, installed grub screw and levelled off.
Drilled & filed another tritium slot into the front section titanium casing.
Marked final positions of the various contact points on the outside of the copper core in red & blue ink.
The thick red line on the very end rotating switch piece shows where the internal sprung brass contact lines up.
The thick blue line on the body shows where the flashlight will be in the off position.
The thick red line on the main body shows where the direct drive/ charging mode connection is.
The way these indicators will work is, when the two green tritium vials are lined up on the titanium outer shell, the light is in the off position. When the green indicator on the rotary tail section is turned to line up with the red indicator in the body section , the light is in direct drive mode, or in charging mode if the head section is then disconnected and the charger port is exposed.
Other than that the tritium indicators let me know where the switch is positioned.
Nothing is fixed in place yet, still got some tidying up to do and fit LED & reflector.
Tritium vials installed in outer casing with UV setting glue & copper bezels in place.
I wont be making a set or another one of these I don’t think, though the thought did cross mind mind
This light has turned out to be way more intensive and time consuming to build than I initially thought it would but I have enjoyed making it
And it does already have a similar companion
That is a fantastic result!
It is hard to believe that that supernice flashlight in the gif above is completely built with hand tools! Only when you see the complete build thread you realise that.