One of the projects that delayed the start of my 7th annual contest entry

Other Types of Lights LED Lanterns
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This was to be a Christmas gift, however, it is now planned to be a late January birthday gift. Still not finished though. I am awaiting two small parts. hey are scheduled to be here in two days time.

It began as glued up alder

Once the wood was glued up I needed a large hole, drilled part ways through like a recess.

I ran into a glitch. The plan was to drill the 3-3/4” recess into the glued up end grain. I had an issue with the end grain not being sturdy enough the hold the drill point as I started to drill. The drill wandered a little and made a mess. After some thought I decided to laminate a 1/4” piece of stock onto the end grain.

I drilled the hole in the 1/4” stock before laminating and then used that to guide the bit as I completed the recess in the end garin of the alder.

I used scraps to make up a jig to hold the work and guide the router for the next step. I also hole-sawed a 2” diamter hole centered on the larger recess. The 2” hole goes completely through the wood block.

Here’s the top of the block showing the larger drilled recess and a slot I cut out with a handsaw and chisels.

This is the bottom end of a glass lamp shade. It is a spare to the hanging lamps that we installed in my son’s home a year or two back. This was a spare leftover part. I had to cut a section out to clear some of this lamps inner pieces. I used the Dremel tool with a diamond cutoff wheel. Water for a lubricant and cooling.

This is a 38 mm x 50 mm heat sink. It fits inside the bottom opening in the glass shade. The MCPCB will be mounted on the upper end. The driver will be mounted to the lower end. I made a mount. The 17 mm driver will be soldered to a 17-to-20mm brass ring, that is silver soldered to a copper washer, that has a 16 gauge piece of copper silver soldered to it, that will be screwed to the wood block. I hope that is clear.

There will be more pictures as I complete the light.

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:nerd_face: :nerd_face: :nerd_face: :+1:

Another great project. I love your build threads :star:

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Cool work. Interested to see how this turns out too. :+1:

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“The 17 mm driver will be soldered to a 17-to-20mm brass ring, that is silver soldered to a copper washer, that has a 16 gauge piece of copper silver soldered to it, that will be screwed to the wood block”

That lives in the house that Don built…

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This will have an onboard USB charger. A TP5000 2 amp board. It needs a heat sink. So I cut off a length from a longer stick and used arctic alumina thermal epoxy adhesive to mate the boad and the sink. That is a lot of wires, yes; 2 for power input, 2 to the cells (2 x 18650 in parallel) and three to extend to the red/green led indicator.

This morning I wired the mcpcb to the driver and installed the driver with a couple of leads left dangling. That is a Qlite 105C driver with only 4 of the 7135 regulators, for a max output of 1.5 amps.

Here’s the photon end of it. A triple mcpcb from kaidomain and three XP-G3, 2700K LEDs that I reflowed myself. I know many do not like the G3’s because of the greenness. However, I don’t see green at all when these 2700K LEDs are used in a light-diffusing mode as compared to a more or less focussed or concentrated beam. I used a triple set of led’s, not for maximum output, but for slightly greater efficiency as compared to a single led at the same current.

This lens/diffuser from Ledil will be cemented in place over the leds.

The charger with its heatsink fits into the slot and the heatsink with leds is centered in the well hole.

The view from the bottom. A 1/4” thick wood plate will cover the bottom and be secured to three threaded aluminum bosses that are pressed and glued in the block. There will be some grooves carved for the wiring.

There will be some short legs secured to the underside of the bottom plate. This will elevate the block and permit air flow. The theory is that when being charged, or when the light is on, convection air flow from the bottom and up through the central well with the heatsinks, will provide cooling.

A view from the top, looking down with the glass shade temporarily in place.

And another perspective.

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Jaggy wee diffuser :smiley: :+1:

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Really nice work MD. Love the grain shape on the end of the timber. :beer:

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A perfectly contest-worthy project that delays the contest project :party:

Nice progress sofar!

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Small progress.

Drilled holes to mount a clicky switch with a boot that will be glued in place.

Everything was just trial fitted and now placed back in the work-in-progress bin.

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I think I mentioned that this light will have some legs to elevate it for proper airflow through the “chimney”.

A tripod-like affair…

Mounted temporarily to the main block

It’ll look more or less like this when done…

The USB-C charge port (focus is a little off. Sorry but the phone camera seems to have a mind of its own)

I’m using a Dremel with a mini router bit for some of the wood removal.

And a chisel

It fits in the main block okay

A recess carved into the bottom plate

There will also be a voltage meter readout. A momentary contact switch will allow activation just long enough to check. The driver has LVP of around 2.9 volts.

I chopped the mount ears off as they are useless in this application

The meter fits in the side of the main block. At times an “oops” becomes a design feature. The Dremel bit caught the wood and slipped, making a chamfer on one side of the notch. It being easier to remove wood, rather than replace wood, I did the same on the other side.

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I dug through some switch adds ‘n’ ends the other day and found the momentary switch I’ll use to enable taking a voltvage reading. It’s 6 x 6 mm. I drilled a 1/4” flat bottom hole, then squared it with a chisel

I also did some carving for wire channels

I drew a rough plan for the wire runs. I hope have not forgotten anything.

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I more or less completed this project today.

Sorry, the focus is off and the lighting could be better. Soldering the twin color led to skinny wires was a PITA. No way around it as I needed more length than provided by the led leads.

The three leads were soldered and shrink wrap slid up to cover the joint. Then the leads were pressed into the speces between some fins. A test showed that this slight blockage of the fins has no effect at all on cooling the 2 amp charger. I could probably have done with a much smaller heat sink but this provides a nice spot for the led.

Just to be sure the led didn’t fall loose, I used some kaptan tape.

The charger board and heat sink assembly is cemented in place.

The USB port was cemented to the main block too. Here it is well hidden by the myriad rubber bands and a pencil used to hold it in place while the cement cured.

… sans rubber bands.

The main led heatsink mounted to determine needed wire lengths.

Cells loosely placed and some more wiring soldered up. The cells are NCR18659GA.

More wires, more soldering. Kaptan tape to hold wires in place while the work proceeds.

Wires done. Scraps of foam cut to hold cells in place when the bottom plate is fitted.

Here we have the Ledil diffuser cemented in place

The on-off-mode switch is fitted witha black silicone cap. That’s the right front coener.

The charge indicator led…

The voltmeter, set in the rear of the block. My thumb is on the momentary switch that activates the meter as wanted. The yellow stick thing is a pencil. Not important to the picture, it was just there.

I said more or less completed… the glass shade is not fixed in place. I have though of using 3M double sided tape to secure it. I am also going the look for a large o-ring at the hardware store tomorrow. There is a gap between the glass and the wood base. If I can find a suitable o-ring or cut an o-ring and simlpy stuff the material in the gap it will (a) look better than having the trench around the glass and (b) that may be sufficient to keep the glass in place in normal use. Normal use being the light sits there on a shelf.

Yes, the block is stained black. It is quite a departure from the light and dark woods that were used. My reason is quite simple. The home where this is being gifted to, has ebony stained woodwork; the door and window casings are ebony, as is the base trim, bookshelving, etc. There is some rust stained wood and this light will be placed on a rust colored entertainment center top.

The wood I used just happened to be small pieces from the odds ‘n’ ends shelves in the shop. I did kind of like the light / dark but, it’s not mine and I know our son prefers the ebony.

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Three illuminated shots

The first two on one of the low levels….I forget which :person_facepalming:

And the last shot is high level.

High is 1400 mAh split between the 3 parallel XP-G3’s (2700 K).

It won’t fit the orifice of my lumen-sphere.

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:face_with_monocle: :beer:

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Awesome work! :person_with_crown: :+1:

This could very well be an entry for the contest.

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Wow. Fantastic.
Things like this are why I enjoy this site so much. I wish I was 1/10 as creative.
Well done!

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Looks great, truly inventive and nicely executed.

In lieu of an o-ring, cut a black wire the proper length then push the covering back slightly at each end and solder the ends together… voila! A copper wire re-enforced silicone o- ring! If you need it to have more expansion/compression simply remove the wire. :wink:

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Good idea on the wire… we’ll see. Thanks.

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Orsm light MD. turned out really nice and practical to boot. :beer:

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This was awesome to see how you built it Don! :+1: your craftsmanship to details and building a very unique project is amazing. :smiley: