no, this isn’t my comp entry as I have to pull my finger out and get started on that. However, this will help, hopefully 
my workshop/ garage is poorly lit with the sole lighting above the work area, which means that I’m often working in my own shadow. So, for some supplemental lighting, I figured I’d convert a flexible neck desk lamp with some bits’n’pieces I had laying around. Namely:
a desk lamp I bought from someone at work for $5
an old old 5V 700mA cell phone charger
an orphaned WW XR-E of unknown bin
some AMC7135 350mA chips
a lump of aluminium
a decent selection of largely inappropriate tools
Largely inspired by Rufusbduck (and all the people that said direct driving LEDs with 5V powersupplies was bad news), I made a test circuit with 1 AMC7135 chip, a switch, a spare LED and the wall wart I’ll be using
amazingly, it worked!
next was the heatsink, some mysteriously machined and drilled 1x2in (ish) bar that I’d fished out of the machine shop’s recycling bin
lots of gurning and WD40 later, I had
and some drilling, tapping, filing and polishing later
completely and total overkill for a 2W LED, but hey ho, in for a penny in for a pound
test layout with the LED and optic (holder needed trimming to fit over the screws)
wired up with 2 7135 chips stacked on top of each other
here’s the recipient
now with bulb holder removed
and the head wired up
the base was a bit more of a PITA as I didn’t realise that the weight in the base was a plastic sack filled with concrete, so sawing/ cutting a space for the powersupply wasn’t going to work. So instead I used a pry bar and a dead blow mallet to cut a quarter out. The guts of the wall wart were then wired so that half the input was wired through the switch (i.e. the ps would be off with the light off) and the output was wired so that the colours matched Liberal (oh, sorry, bad word in the US) amounts of electrician’s tape was used to make sure there wouldn’t be any accidental shorts (picture is pre-finished tape coat).
original base was stuck back on, followed by the alu cover of an old macbook pro battery, largely just because I could
amazingly, it works! It’s not super bright, which is just how I want it (although it is a little yellower than I’d prefer) as I don’t want to be dazzled by it. Spread is good and it even provides decent lighting on its own.
now onto my headlamp project!
