Mounting a light (zebralight) to locline

[adrianmariano]

I want to mount a zebralight to the end of a length of loc line. Loc line is a flexible pipe material made of little segments that snap together. Here's a picture:

I can mount the light at either end. This section of loc line has a pipe fitting attached. The reason is that the one idea I have so far is to glue a magnet or piece of steel to the bottom of the zebra light and stick it by magnet to the pipe fitting. I'm not sure if this is secure enough. The locline is fairly stiff, so if you grab the light to reposition it I don't want the light to come off.

So I'm curious if anybody has any other ideas about how to mount a flashlight. I looked around and found tons of gun mounts, but I'm not sure if they could be made to work for this.

There is a locline segment that is flat with a hole for a bolt, so I could bolt something on if I found something suitable. The zebralight fits inside that fatter end of the locline segments but not the shorter end. I could conceivably glue it in somehow, though this seems a bit risky. (I'd like to retain the ability to change the battery.)

Here are some more pics of the locline parts with the zebralight.

 

[Mr_Light]

If you are looking for a temporary mount you could drill a hole in one of the segments and use a small screw and nut with a couple of washers to attach a piece of velcro. I have also just drilled a hole through one of the regular segments and used a nylon tie wrap. This isn't very elegant but it is very secure.

 

[adrianmariano]

I am looking for a somewhat permanent solution, and something without sharp pointy parts that could cause injury. I had thought about just trying to secure it with ties to the loc line, but drilling a hole would make it more secure. Ideally I'd like it to be reversible so that we could remove the light if desired, perhaps install a newer, better light in a couple years...who knows

 

[Toaster]

You could go to a hardware or auto parts store and pick up a 3/4" rubber lined hose clamp and just bolt it to one of the locline pieces.

 

[McGizmo]

The pipe hanger suggest would certainly work. You can also get nylon versions that would be plenty strong enough and not as "sharp" as the metal hangers. You can also probably find some form of utility clip or hanger that the light can snap into and the clip can be mounted to a Loc-Line segment. There are some TwoFish rubber clamps that might be viable as well. First decide if it makes a difference if the light body is in line or perpendicular to your Loc-Line stalk. There are Loc-Line "T"'s as well as 90 degree elbows.

I just grabbed my zebra light and used its head band rubber harness efectively, IMHO, on a stalk of Loc-Line:

I don't know what your application is or whether vibration and rigidity will be an issue. For a static location, the example above seems to be quite adequate and yet secure. You can twist the light around for orientation but it will not slip in the harness nor will the harness come off the Loc-Line without some concentrated effort.

EDIT: looking at your light and Loc-Line segments, it seems that if you have access to a lathe, you could modify the bore in the female end of a segment and install an O-ring inside it that would snap over the tail of your light and hold it nicely. For that matter, a machined piece of delrin could be made to host your light as well as attach to the Loc-Line.

Frankly, I think there are an infinite number of pretty straight forward solutions available to you and it boils down to what you have on hand or easily accessible as well as perhaps more details in what your requirements might be. :shrug:

 

[Illum]

why not epoxy magnets to both the locline and the base if your zebralite?

 

[adrianmariano]

You could go to a hardware or auto parts store and pick up a 3/4" rubber lined hose clamp and just bolt it to one of the locline pieces.

I agree that there are lots of possible solutions to the mounting problem. I couldn't think of very many, which is why I made this post.

After some experimentation and discussion with the user of the light (my 7 year old) it appears that mounting the light perpendicular to the loc-line is the preferred option (kind of a surprise to me). So far this is the only option for perpendicular mounting that has been suggested.

(Well, someone suggested using a magnet to clip onto the zebralight's metal clip, but that's not very secure.)

I'm curious if anybody has any other ideas for a perpendicular mounting method.

One possible downside of this type of mounting bracket is that it will be essentially impossible to temporarily remove the light and then remount it. (That's because tightening the bolt through the loc line seems to be pretty tricky.)

 

[adrianmariano]

In case anyone is wondering what I did, here are some pictures. The 3/4" clamp is too big for the Zebralight. The 5/8" is a bit tight, so I put an extra nut in as a spacer and bolted it down to the loc line. Seems to be working ok. One observation, though, is that the loc line makes a lot of noise (squeeks) when it is repositioned.

This picture shows the light in use taken with the flash:

And here we have a picture without the flash:

Apparently this is the medium setting. Low is reportedly too dim.

 

[Toaster]

I was wondering how it all turned out. Nice pics :thumbsup: What's the verdict from your son on the whole setup?

 

[adrianmariano]

Daughter, actually. She appears to be pleased with the setup. It's definitely working better than the old light (a fluorescent booklight) which she would put in her lap aimed at the book. (That light also suffers from a strange problem. It seems that as the batteries grow weaker the light still delivers the same output, but it takes longer to start. It can get to where it takes 30 seconds or longer to start. All in all it works better if you can plug it in...)

I was going to mount the locline on the wall but she said to put it on the ceiling instead. The Zebralight switch is easy to use, which is good. A cheap DX light I got her has a pretty stiff switch and her 7 year old hands find it a struggle to turn on. However, she seemed to have some trouble understanding the interface of the Zebralight and how to get the desired brightness. (I didn't tell her about the strobe mode.)

 

[Toaster]

Glad she's enjoying it. In a way I'm kinda jealous. She'll probably get to use that Zebralight more than just about anyone else hanging out here